LOS ALTOS, Calif. — The chief technology officer of eBay sends his children to a nine-classroom school here. So do employees of Silicon Valley giants like Google, Apple, Yahoo and Hewlett-Packard.

Grading the Digital School

Blackboards, Not Laptops

Articles in this series are looking at the intersection of education, technology and business as schools embrace digital learning.

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Cathy Waheed helps Shira Zeev, a fifth grader. Waldorf parents are happy to delay their children's engagement with technology. More Photos »

But the school’s chief teaching tools are anything but high-tech: pens and paper, knitting needles and, occasionally, mud. Not a computer to be found. No screens at all. They are not allowed in the classroom, and the school even frowns on their use at home.

Schools nationwide have rushed to supply their classrooms with computers, and many policy makers say it is foolish to do otherwise. But the contrarian point of view can be found at the epicenter of the tech economy, where some parents and educators have a message: computers and schools don’t mix.

This is the Waldorf School of the Peninsula, one of around 160 Waldorf schools in the country that subscribe to a teaching philosophy focused on physical activity and learning through creative, hands-on tasks. Those who endorse this approach say computers inhibit creative thinking, movement, human interaction and attention spans.

The Waldorf method is nearly a century old, but its foothold here among the digerati puts into sharp relief an intensifying debate about the role of computers in education.

“I fundamentally reject the notion you need technology aids in grammar school,” said Alan Eagle, 50, whose daughter, Andie, is one of the 196 children at the Waldorf elementary school; his son William, 13, is at the nearby middle school. “The idea that an app on an iPad can better teach my kids to read or do arithmetic, that’s ridiculous.”

Mr. Eagle knows a bit about technology. He holds a computer science degree from Dartmouth and works in executive communications at Google, where he has written speeches for the chairman, Eric E. Schmidt. He uses an iPad and a smartphone. But he says his daughter, a fifth grader, “doesn’t know how to use Google,” and his son is just learning. (Starting in eighth grade, the school endorses the limited use of gadgets.)

Three-quarters of the students here have parents with a strong high-tech connection. Mr. Eagle, like other parents, sees no contradiction. Technology, he says, has its time and place: “If I worked at Miramax and made good, artsy, rated R movies, I wouldn’t want my kids to see them until they were 17.”

While other schools in the region brag about their wired classrooms, the Waldorf school embraces a simple, retro look — blackboards with colorful chalk, bookshelves with encyclopedias, wooden desks filled with workbooks and No. 2 pencils.

On a recent Tuesday, Andie Eagle and her fifth-grade classmates refreshed their knitting skills, crisscrossing wooden needles around balls of yarn, making fabric swatches. It’s an activity the school says helps develop problem-solving, patterning, math skills and coordination. The long-term goal: make socks.

Down the hall, a teacher drilled third-graders on multiplication by asking them to pretend to turn their bodies into lightning bolts. She asked them a math problem — four times five — and, in unison, they shouted “20” and zapped their fingers at the number on the blackboard. A roomful of human calculators.

In second grade, students standing in a circle learned language skills by repeating verses after the teacher, while simultaneously playing catch with bean bags. It’s an exercise aimed at synchronizing body and brain. Here, as in other classes, the day can start with a recitation or verse about God that reflects a nondenominational emphasis on the divine.

Andie’s teacher, Cathy Waheed, who is a former computer engineer, tries to make learning both irresistible and highly tactile. Last year she taught fractions by having the children cut up food — apples, quesadillas, cake — into quarters, halves and sixteenths.

“For three weeks, we ate our way through fractions,” she said. “When I made enough fractional pieces of cake to feed everyone, do you think I had their attention?”

Some education experts say that the push to equip classrooms with computers is unwarranted because studies do not clearly show that this leads to better test scores or other measurable gains.

A change to the morning school start time is under consideration at Gunn High School, but an official stressed that no decision has been made.

School department heads will discuss the possibility of different start times, among other agenda items, when they gather for their regular bi-weekly meeting Wednesday.

Gunn students currently begin their day at 7:55 a.m., but some parents, students and teen sleep advocates have pushed for a later start time.

Palo Alto High School moved its start time from 7:50 a.m. to 8:15 a.m. last fall and simultaneously adopted major changes to the school schedule -- moving from a traditional seven-periods-a-day schedule to a "block schedule," in which classes meet every other day but for twice as long.

The Paly change -- which some in the Gunn community have urged that Gunn emulate -- came after lengthy study by a "bell schedule task force" convened by former Principal Jacquie McEvoy.

Gunn operates on what it calls a "modified" block schedule, adopted more than a decade ago, in which students have six classes Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and five classes Tuesdays and Thursdays. Classes meet for longer than the traditional 50 minutes.

Assistant Principal Tom Jacoubowsky said Gunn has been "very happy" with the "modified" schedule and is not considering adopting the Paly block schedule.

But he said Gunn is "kicking around ideas" about changes to the morning start time.

"It's something we're exploring," he said.

"We have to take a bunch of factors into account -- including traffic on Arastradero Road.

Stanford University today sent e-mails to 1,673 high school students from "around the world," inviting them to join the undergraduate Class of 2015, the university announced.

Those students -– plus the 754 admitted last December under Stanford's non-binding "early action" program -- represent just 7 percent of the 34,348 who applied for a spot in this fall's freshman class.

Admitted students have until May 1 to accept or take a pass on Stanford's offer.

Of students admitted to Stanford, about 70 percent in recent years have decided to attend.

The university announced a 72 percent "yield rate" for the Class of 2014 and a 70 percent yield for the class of 2013, the Stanford Daily reported, adding that Stanford's rate in recent years is second only to that of Harvard University.

"Stanford has been exceedingly fortunate to attract a simply amazing group of applicants from all over the world," Dean of Admission and Financial Aid Richard Shaw said in a prepared statement.

"In our review, we were humbled by the exceptional accomplishments of those candidates who have been admitted, as well as the competitive strength of all of the applicants."

Last year, Stanford offered freshman admission to 2,300 -– or 7.2 percent -– of the 32,022 who applied.

If negotiations with the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) go well, Caltrain might get an infusion of $4.9 million over two years to prop up its operating budget.

Right now, the public-transit program faces a projected $30 million shortfall in its operating budget, and could run out of cash by 2015, according to the agency.

If it doesn't find a solution, Caltrain may cut the number of weekly trains from 86 to 48, eliminate weekend trains and close up to seven stations.

But the VTA funds could ease the severity of those cuts.

"There will have to be some service reductions," San Mateo County Transit District CEO Mike Scanlon told the board of directors on March 24, as quoted in an agency press release. "I'm cautiously optimistic that we can put together the puzzle and while there will be some sacrifices and some cuts, it won't be nearly as severe as we had originally planned."

The money would come as repayment of funds extended to VTA by SamTrans in 1991 to buy right-of-way for Caltrain.

"We agreed they wouldn't be obligated to pay it back, but would make their best effort to do so," explained Mark Simon, SamTrans executive officer for public affairs. The agency anticipated repayment in 2007, after voters passed a proposition allowing gas taxes to be allocated to transit.

"That was the first time around of $4 gas, so that fund got very large," he said. "But instead of allocating the funds to transit, the state took them. So we never quite got the money."

While the repayment could help Caltrain, it doesn't do much for its parent agency, which appears to be prioritizing buses over trains. "Saying 'you can have the money, but have to use it for Caltrain, doesn't help SamTrans," Simon said. "It all affects how much service we can provide. Either we find another source of money, or the cuts get worse."

According to the board, the funding would provide only two years' of relief, leaving the directors searching for ways to propose a permanent funding source to voters for approval in 2012. Currently Caltrain receives most of its money through contributions from San Francisco, the Santa Clara VTA and SamTrans.