Empire High School issued iBooks - laptop computers by Apple Computer Inc. - to each of its 340 students, becoming one of the first U.S. public schools to shun printed textbooks.

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

Two years ago, about 600 school districts nationwide had pilot projects to provide laptops for each student, a figure that has likely doubled since then, said Mark Schneiderman, director of federal education policy for the Software and Information Industry Association in Washington. But most still issue textbooks, for now.

Many publishers of traditional textbooks are offering digital formats to address the growing use of computers, and that provided some of the material for Empire High's curriculum. Teachers also used subscription services and free Web resources.

Students get the materials over the school's wireless Internet network. The school has a central filtering system that limits what can be downloaded on campus. The system also controls chat room visits and instant messaging that might otherwise distract wired students.

Students can turn in homework online. A Web program checks against Internet sources for plagiarized material and against the work of other students.

Before Empire High opened, officials looked at the use of laptops in other schools and decided that high school students were more engaged when using computers. Unlike many adults, teens weaned on digital material seem to have little difficulty adapting to reading primarily on computer screens, Baker said.

But educators also decided they could do more with the technology.

All of Empire's students knew about the laptop-only setup when they enrolled, and students who were uncomfortable with it were allowed to enroll in the district's other, more traditional schools. But Empire has a waiting list.

The school is not entirely paperless, however. It has a library, and students are often assigned outside reading.

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