from the FUSD Archives Oct 1971:
Data Processing Center’s Important Classroom Role
Original 1971 article from the Fremont Register. Did you notice?
- Maloney school’s namesake mentioned in article.
- Systems were called “computor” not computer.
- $78,249 in 1971 is worth $625,945 today.
- You can probably spot a IBM 1401 at Computer History Museum.
FREMONT — “Fremont’s Data Processing Center is interested in playing a more important role in classroom instruction,” stated Charles Beazley, director of the FUSD Data Processing Center.
The goal of the center is to eventually have a system whereby the high school and grade school teachers will be able to spend more time with the student on a personal level, according to Beazley.
Located at the old Irvington Elementary Grammar School, the center is now holding classes for all the high schools. Introduction classes in data processing are being offered at the schools: As the classes advance the students take one class a week at the center.
Presently, the center is operating with equipment known as the 1401 Computor System. In February (1972) the system will be replaced with the 360-25 series which will enable the center to expand, according to Tom Maloney, associate superintendent of the school district.
A proposal recently made by Ohlone College will help finance the equipment. The new computor system. The new computer system would enable the college to use the center more extensively than at the present. Registration, scheduling and grade reports are a few of the applications used by the college now.
The 360-25 Computor System will cost $78,249 of witch Ohlone would finance $30,274. This will lower the rental costs of the district funding to $47,974.
The Data Processing Center is used by and for the Fremont Unified School DIsitrict, with programming done for the Pleasanton-Amador Valley Joint School District and the Newark Unified School District.
Applications used for the school district are payroll,and personnel, accounts payable and warehouse orders, purchase orders, budget reporting, school scheduling, grade reporting, attendance reporting, drivers education data bank, testing applications and school reports. The center is required by the state to send in health and student reports.
Currently the center is conducting a survey of other districts with data processing centers in order to expand our “program.” said Maloney.
The performance difference between the IBM 1401 and a modern cellphone is hard to grasp.
- IBM 1401 used vacuum tubes and early transistors, had limited memory (typically around 16 kilobytes), and its processing speed was measured in milliseconds per instruction.
- Cellphones have gigabytes of memory, and processing speeds in billions of cycles per second.
- Cellphones fit in your pocket (not the refrigerator size of the IBM 1401) and are millions of times faster.
