Nearly a month into a revolutionary experiment in 21st-century education, students and teachers at Arizona's Empire High School say they don't seem to miss toting textbooks around.

When the school issued iBooks--laptop computers from Apple Computer Inc.--to each of its 340 students at the start of classes July 22, it became one of the first public bricks-and-mortar schools in the United States to shun printed textbooks.

School officials believe the electronic materials will get students more engaged in learning. Empire High, which opened its doors to students for the first time last month, was designed specifically to have a textbook-free environment.

"We've always been pretty aggressive in our use of technology, and we have a history of taking risks," said Calvin Baker, superintendent of the Vail Unified School District, which has 7,000 students outside of Tucson.

Schools typically overlay computers onto their instruction "like frosting on the cake," Baker said. "We decided that the real opportunity was to make the laptops the key ingredient of the cake ... to truly change the way that schools operated."

So far, the risk appears to be paying off. "In terms of the technology actually working, things have gone better than expected," Baker said. "Anytime you do something brand-new, there are going to be issues that come up ... but, by and large, getting it off the ground went really well."

Two years ago, about 600 school districts nationwide had pilot projects to provide laptops for each student--a figure that's likely doubled since then, said Mark Schneiderman, director of federal education policy for the Software and Information Industry Association in Washington, D.C.

But most still issue textbooks--for now.

Teacher Becky Ogle holds her iBook as she explains how to use an Excel spreadsheet to a freshman class at Empire High School in Vail, Ariz., on Aug. 16. (Associated Press photo)

For example, in the Henrico County school system near Richmond, Va., students in 23 middle and high schools will be using laptops for the fifth straight year, though teachers still use textbooks, said spokesman Mychael Dickerson.

Many publishers of traditional textbooks are offering digital formats to address the growing use of computers, and that has provided some of the material for Empire High's curriculum. Teachers also use subscription services and free web resources. For example, in social studies courses, students use a database from educational publisher ABC-CLIO to study American history and other related topics, Baker said. Students and teachers also have access to netTrekker, a student-centric online search engine designed to produce reliable, educator-approved search results for in-school research projects and other lessons that incorporate use of the web.