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Fig. 3. One possible implementation of a School System
3.4 Building the Recommended Educational Computer
There were two principal reasons for wanting to develop an Australian Educational
Computer: so that Australian school children would have access to well designed
equipment and to provide a development and manufacturing opportunity for Austra-
lian industry. It was generally supposed that an Australian company such as Mi-
crobee, which produced a CP/M computer used in many Australian schools, would be
a likely manufacturer. The next step in the process should have been the setting up of
a System Concept Study to be followed by a Development Proposal, but at this stage
the project ran out of steam, as the 3 year Government funding for the program was at
an end and further funds were not made available. The System Concept Study and
Development Proposal were thus not taken any further [8].
4 Reflections on a School Computer That Was Never Built
One of the strengths in the work undertaken to design Australian School Computer
Systems was that the work of the Technical Requirement Working Party lay within a
program that intended to be far-reaching. The News Release by the Minister for Edu-
cation and Youth Affairs, announcing the $18.7 million Computer Education Program
on 19 th February 1984, stated:
“We are going to approach computer education in terms of a broad
educational program, rather than simply as an exercise in hardware
provision. The central themes here are building a capacity to generate
Australian content with sound educational values across a broad range
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