Education Commissioner Susan Gendron is making promises to school districts we hope she can keep.

In a letter sent last week to superintendents, Gendron revealed her plans to extend the state’s innovative middle-school laptop program beyond its initial four-year run. She’s included $10 million in her budget request to replace all the computers in the program and to continue it for at least another year. She also told school districts that they could expect to be able to buy the old laptops, some of which have been used for five years, for $48 each.

It’s good news. The laptop program should be extended beyond its initial contract, which expires in 2006.

The problem is that the program needs approval from the Legislature, which has balked in the past at extending it beyond middle school and faces a tight balance sheet.

By announcing her intentions before the Legislature returns to Augusta, it’s possible Gendron is attempting a bit of public diplomacy. Laptops might not have earned the unanimous support of lawmakers, but parents, educators – including many who were initially skeptical – and researchers have been enthusiastic about them.

Here’s how the George Lucas Education Foundation described the laptop program in a 2003 study: “What visitors see is a new kind of learning, in which students are given the authority to seek out information from a wealth of resources and translate that information into forms far beyond term papers or worksheets.”

Another study, identified by GLEF, found that teachers are able to use more up-to-date resources and information, and students have the tools to pursue organize, analyze and present information.

The big knock against the laptops is that standardized test scores have not improved. It’s tough to quantify the positive effects the laptops have.

A 2004 study from the University of Southern Maine’s Center for Education Policy, Applied Research and Evaluation identified the difficulty of measuring the program’s success: “There is substantial self-reported evidence that student learning has increased and improved. In the coming years, this perceived impact on student learning needs additional attention and study. This sustained and systematic analysis will require new types of assessments, along with traditional ones, to capture the potentially new and more varied ways of learning that are occurring through the implementation of Maine’s innovative one-to-one laptop technology program.”

The researchers, nonetheless, conclude that the program has been successful, helping schools to integrate technology into the classroom and the learning process.

Gendron’s laptop promise depends on the Legislature. Lawmakers shouldn’t make a liar out of her.