This seems like a really narrow perspective on kids' use of computers in schools, but even if that's the case, it seems to me the solution might be to... teach

This seems like a really narrow perspective on kids' use of computers in schools, but even if that's the case, it seems to me the solution might be to... teach them computing, not take it away. Or, we might recognize that there's lots of technology we don't learn the ins-and-outs of and yet that are fundamental to our lives, even if we could technically get by without it Anyway, I would think that having a simple, locked-down OS at school is preferable than having a laptop on which they can do whatever they want, at least to the issue of being distracted in class. Also, a related comment points out that not all is doom-and-gloom - surprisingly, schools can actually implement sane usage restrictions for laptops in class.