When I was in 10th grade Oxford University had a computer.... They were the only one's that could afford one.

Olivetti were making a computer with no volatile storage and the only output device was via a built in printer. You had to type your program in _every_ time you turned on the computer and the output was purely print. Oxford University owned it too but they were kind enough to lend it to us for a couple of weeks.... It was a "portable".... The size of a small suitcase and three times as heavy... <LOL>

Spell checkers didn't exist when I was in school... We had to learn or we failed

When I was doing my flying training we had 10 minutes _every_ morning to work our way through 100 calculations as accurately as we could. It didn't matter if you finished - the accuracy was the key. One of my colleagues "complained", the conversation went like this:-

Student: Why can't we use a calculator for this crap?
Instructor: Because one day, when you need it most, the batteries will be flat.
Student: Sir, it's a solar powered calculator....
Instructor: It'll be ****ing night time son, get on with the test!!!!!

He proved the point of a proper education IMO.....