Caroline Man, a sixth-form student at the South Island School, is becoming familiar with computers as early as possible. Not only does she have a personal computer at home, but her school has intr9duced the use of computers for several subjects. With about 100 PCs altogether, and nearly half available to students, South Island School is among the leaders in bringing computers into Hong Kong classrooms. But it is by no means the norm. Only 24 percent of secondary schools had more than 40 PCs, according to a recent survey of 10,000 teachers and students at 28 schools, commissioned by the Hong Kong Development and Strategic Research Center (HKDSRC), a non-profit public policy group. Most of those were older models. Only 42.8 percent of respondents said they used Pentium-based PCs and 22.4 percent still used PCs with 386 processors. The local government has pledged to spend $2.5 billion to integrate computers into the school curriculum. The money needed to be spent wisely rather than be squandered on buying computers, leading educators said. They pointed out that acquiring hardware was only the first step. Leo Yam, director of the Educational Technology and Development Center at Lingnan College, said what he called “soft technology” needed to be put in place first. Soft technology includes software, but also extends to training teachers and redesigning the curriculum to integrate computers. Mr. Yam said teachers had to learn not only how to operate computers, but also how PCs could help them teach. Teachers’ attitudes also needed to be changed. Mr. Yam said teachers did not actually fear they would be replaced by a computer, but worried that if they did not adopt new technology, they would seem outdated to superiors and parents. Many teachers did not even use overhead projectors, in classes, Mr. Yam said. So even before worrying about the introduction of new technology, teachers have to ask if they have used the low-tech effectively first. Perhaps the most important channel for introduction of computers to the classroom is through curriculum design, by structuring courses to make the best use of computers. At South Island School, computers are used in “design ease with computers” courses and there are several available for students to use at any time to type course work. South Island School also allows students to access the Internet on two PCs in the school library.