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Comment by CallingIit | Hacker News Reader

Calling it. They went store to store buying Macbooks. Multiple sets of laptops just for a social experiement? What kind of IT department would allow the KIDS to get the computers they need. And with no bulk discount, what school would allow that? This happened in his dreams.

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> What kind of IT department would allow the KIDS to get the computers they need.

I would guess that this is something more like a 20-kid Montessori school, than a regular big-building public institution. The kind where there's one teacher (who does things like run field trips as sociological object lessons), and no IT staff to speak of, but which has a big budget nevertheless due to the high tuition cost of private education paid by the (rich) parents.

I don't quite remember which product had just released that morning, but it was the kind of thing that had attracted a long line of campers outside the entrance the night before

Seriously? You work at an apple store, it was supposedly your most memorable experience, and you don't remember what product was being released? It's not like they have hundreds of products. Sounds fishy.

I bet he could look it up pretty easily by trying to date the experience but it's not important to the story. When Apple names every iteration the same flippin name it would get blurry in my head as well. iPad, iPad 2, New iPad, iPad 4?? I don't even think I got the names correct myself now from memory.

I'm also skeptical that among 15 teenagers, including a "rowdy troublemaker", not one would be chatting or giggling during this "experiment"?

I don't care if it's slightly embellished or even pure fiction, it could have happened. It highlights the discrimination faced by many groups of people, and encourages readers to act excellently with all types of people. I like the article for that reason alone. The class outing was also a cool idea, it would be fun to try a cheaper variant.

Fictional discrimination. In reality the other mall employees could have been decent human beings instead of douchebags.

They were given gift cards and their teacher was supervising them. It's not like they were given a thousand dollars each and sent on a shopping spree.I know schools that give laptops to students - and this one was allowing them to buy them, possibly to teach them something, give them that experience. If it was a small, privately paid school,then I don't see what this would not be true.

They weren't asking for MacBooks at every store, that would be silly.

What were they trying to buy at every other store? The school just let the kids go on a shopping spree at the mall?

Still, KIDS were given thousands of dollars to buy stuff tech for their school. This happens no where. Now if he said it was a coffee shop or such, sure.

I purchased a couple switches and a new server for my high school when I was a junior. I also was allowed to buy on the school's line of credit at a local hardware store for things I needed for the stage.

I went to a private catholic high school in a small city. The administration trusted the students. They also didn't have IT staff, so geek speaking technobabble sounds better than paying actual staff. Walked out of high school with independent study classes, real experience in IT and building control systems, and without my parents paying expensive tuition.

You can learn from both fact and fiction.

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