Phi Beta Cons writes about a Harvard professor who wants to empower impoverished NYC junior high and high school students by giving them the one thing we all know they need: cellphones.

The cellphones are intended to serve as educational devices with access to Internet programs; links between students, teachers, parents, and mentors; granters of such dubious rewards for high achievers as ring tones from Jay-Z or song downloads from Beyoncé; and receptors for motivational messages from an advertising campaign.

Impoverished children need help.  No doubt about that.  “But in the end, behavior modification via cellphone – not to mention the commercial promotion of pop culture – will hardly substitute for the hard-wiring of students in homes and classrooms with the virtues necessary for achievement.”