I've brought my kindle to even the most strict of technology-banned lectures (with punishments like dropping a letter grade after one violation, and failing you after two), and never have they given me a problem when asked. They realize the issue isn't the silicon or lithium, it's the distractions it enables. I'm sure I could connect to some LLM on it, it's just that no one ever will.

I’ve tried many e-readers since early Kindle but I keep coming back to two fundamental problems with e-ink, both relevant to education.

First, extremely cumbersome and error-prone to type compared to swipe-typing on a soft keyboard. Even highlighting a few sentences can be problematic when spanning across a page boundary.

Second, navigation is also painful compared to a physical book. When reading non-fiction, it’s vital to be able to jump around quickly, backtrack, and cross-reference material. Amazon has done some good work on the UX for this, but nothing is as simple as flipping through a physical book.

Android e-readers are better insofar as open to third-party software, but still have the same hardware shortcomings.

My compromise has been to settle on medium-sized (~Kindle or iPad Mini size) tablets and treat them just as an e-reader. (Similar to the “kale phone” concept ie minimal software installed on it … no distractions.) They are much more responsive, hence fairly easy to navigate and type on.

Its obvious they don't care.

That said, I always thought exams should be the moment of truth.

I had teachers that spoke broken english, but I'd do the homework and read the textbook in class. I learned many topics without the use of a teacher.