Nine local high schools will get laptop computers this fall in a deal brokered between the state and Apple Computer late last week.

The computer giant agreed to lease laptops to Maine high schools for $300 per machine. That price covers the lease, repairs, teacher training and the installation of a wireless network in each high school.

Twenty-nine public high schools have signed up for the deal, including eight from western Maine. Another five, including Mt. Abram High School in Salem, have said they’ll pursue similar Apple lease agreements on their own.

In SAD 43, which serves Byron, Mexico, Rumford and Roxbury, Superintendent James Hodgkins signed up for 350 machines under the state plan. That’s enough for every freshman, sophomore and teacher in Mountain Valley High School.

Hodgkins was not a proponent of the laptop initiative when it began in Maine middle schools two years ago. He questioned whether the massive program could be sustained in the long term.

He still has questions. But after watching the program grow in the middle school, Hodgkins believes laptops are vital to education.

“My job is to provide the best education I can here at MSAD 43,” he said. “We need to do it. We need to make it happen.”

In Union 44, which serves Sabattus, Litchfield and Wales, Superintendent Paul Malinski made sure his school joined the initiative. Oak Hill High School school will get about 150 laptops.

What hooked him was the price.

Without the lease agreement, Union 44 would have spent thousands of dollars to buy 25 to 30 desktop computers this fall, Malinski said.

Now, his school will be able to lease 150 brand-new Apple iBooks, with training and wiring, for $300 each.

“If you went to Staples to buy a Palm Pilot it would probably cost you almost that much,” he said.

Like many school systems, Union 44 will pay for the leased machines with a mix of state grants, federal grants and its technology budget.

Although more than 30 high schools plan to lease laptops this year, each school will distribute the machines differently. Some will give one computer to every ninth-grader. Others, such as Auburn and SAD 9 in Farmington, will make the computers available to students in all grades.

“That way, they will be used to their maximum potential,” said Susan Pratt, assistant superintendent in SAD 9, which will lease 305 machines for Mt. Blue High School.

Wireless networks must now be installed in each high school. Laptops could be delivered some time this fall.

The state’s first-in-the-nation program has provided laptops to more than 34,000 middle school students and teachers. Officials had hoped to expand it into high schools, but the Legislature failed to set aside money for the expansion. Many school systems, including Lewiston’s, said they could not afford to lease the computers without full funding from the state.

Officials say they hope the state will fund the program next year so more high schools will join in 2005.