I’m an avid MacBook user.
Every morning, I unzip my backpack and slide out my MacBook. The aluminum hits my desk with a soft, confident thud. Like a fencer drawing his sword, I tap the computer awake with a flourish, watching as the keyboard backlight glows and the Apple logo greets me as if I’m an old friend. Within seconds, I’m logged in through Touch ID.
During the day, my MacBook and I accomplish a lot. I toggle between Safari and Google Chrome like a digital diplomat. I check my iMessages despite, as usual, receiving zero notifications. I scroll through my photos app, notes app, calendar app and podcasts app. I sneak over to YouTube during AP Environmental Science — sorry, Mrs. Oh — and watch Heimler’s History to study for my history tests instead. And I can do all of this because of my beautiful, beloved, brilliant best friend: my MacBook.
Meanwhile, for another student, a school-issued Chromebook wheezes to life. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve voluntarily touched a school Chromebook during my time at Cherry Hill High School East. It’s not personal, but once you’re used to a 14-inch Liquid Retina display, returning to district-issued plastic feels like downgrading from first class to economy.
That said, my beloved MacBook is precisely the problem.
This year, the district implemented Lightspeed Systems, a monitoring extension that allows teachers to view, lock and record students’ web activity in real time. Teachers can see every open tab on Google Chrome, close distracting sites and even restrict WiFi access — all in an effort to minimize off-task behavior and limit opportunities for cheating.
However, Lightspeed only monitors activity within Google Chrome, meaning that any student using a different browser, such as Safari or Firefox, is effectively invisible to the Lightspeed system. While Chromebooks restrict students to Google Chrome and prevent access to other browsers — including Safari, the built-in app on MacBooks — personal laptops remain free to roam the internet unchecked. Using alternative browsers on personal computers, students can open blocked sites and consult outside resources without any oversight, completely undermining the intended purpose of Lightspeed. If I’m browsing on Safari with my MacBook, the Lightspeed system may as well be staring at a blank wall.
Beyond the everyday loopholes and distractions, the Chromebook chaos reaches its peak absurdity during state testing. Without fail, I watch half of the student body take their annual pilgrimage into the hallways before testing begins, rummaging through Chromebook carts like it’s Black Friday. I am among them. Despite carrying a perfectly functional MacBook, I must abandon it and retrieve a district-issued Chromebook required for state testing. If Chromebooks are mandatory for testing, they shouldn’t be optional for the other 170 days of the year. East shouldn’t normalize inconsistent computer platform usage and then scramble for uniformity when it suddenly matters.
All of this points to one simple truth: inconsistency is creating an unnecessary and unfair headache. If every student were required to use a school-issued Chromebook every day, the Lightspeed loopholes would vanish, and the annual scramble for Chromebooks during standardized testing would become less widespread. Thus, school-issued Chromebooks should be mandatory for all Cherry Hill Public School students, with all personal computers being prohibited.
Yes, it would mean trading my beautiful, beloved, brilliant MacBook for a chunk of plastic during the school day. It would mean I’d no longer be able to toggle between Safari and Chrome at will or text with friends during classes. Above all, it would mean saying a temporary goodbye to my best friend. But it would also mean East can adopt a fairer, more consistent system for everyone.
Still, nothing will diminish my profound appreciation for the satisfying clicks on my MacBook keyboard and the seamless sync of my Apple ecosystem. I will continue to use it — enthusiastically — the moment I walk through my front door.
But from 7:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., I can survive with a Chromebook. We all can.
