America's 'FutureReady' Education Visionaries Announced; Dell, Microsoft and Intel Honor FutureReady Winners With $750,000 in Technology and Services for Their Schools

These visionaries, whose innovative essays merited the award of acustom technology solution from the companies, are:

-- Small school winner Hall Fletcher Elementary School (Asheville, N.C.) -- Rocko Smucker, technology chair and first grade teacher at his school, has established a three-year technology plan to prepare students to be "producers, creators and entrepreneurs." Using interactive whiteboards and wireless Dell notebooks, Smucker aims to have students' develop 21st century skills by eventually producing 90 percent of their assignments digitally.

-- Medium school winner Union Pines High School (Cameron, N.C.) -- Robin Calcutt, a teacher at Union Pines, plans to aid teachers in integrating technology into the curriculum; equip a Ninth Grade Academy with handheld computers and other devices to help reduce drop-out rates; and help seniors create e-portfolios of their course work that can be shared with scholarship committees, universities and future employers.

-- Large school winner Abington Senior High School (Abington, Penn.) -- Laurence Goldberg, director of technology at Abington, envisions students using MP3 devices to create digital portfolios; Dell Intelligent Classroom(TM) technology for collaboration and project-based learning; a state-of-the-art mobile video production lab to produce multimedia reports; and advanced software to create their own multi-user virtual environments. He also plans to implement a platform that enables teachers to manage lessons and assessments on the Web, providing students with anytime, anywhere access to educational content that can be customized to their learning styles, abilities and schedules.

"Visionaries have the unique ability to dream of what's possibleand then make it a reality," said Michael Dell, Dell's chairman, whoteamed with Microsoft's Bill Gates to determine the winners. "We areexcited to watch these visionaries use technology to help studentsdevelop skills in collaboration, critical thinking and teamwork thatthey'll need to compete in the global economy."

In a video presentation, Gates said of the visionaries that "Theirimportant work is helping to improve instruction and helping tochallenge young people to perform at higher and higher levels. All ofthem showed a great deal of effort and creativity and I look forwardto hearing about their progress in using technology to enhancelearning."

FutureReady is a collaboration between Dell, Microsoft and Inteldesigned to help students reach their full potential throughinnovative use of technology in the classroom. Companies includingCrossTec Corp., maker of NetOp School software, and Datamation alsocontributed products to the prize packages.

FutureReady also offered two other ways for K-12 schools to wintechnology for their classrooms. Earlier this month, five schools wereannounced as winners of the FutureReady Mobile Lab Contest, in whichschools rallied their communities to log votes on www.futureready.orgfor a chance to win a mobile computer lab with approximate retailvalue of $10,000.

Additionally, the following schools, selected by random drawing,have won FutureReady's Dell Intelligent Classroom(TM) Sweepstakes.Each will receive classroom technology with an approximate retailvalue of $75,000:

-- Large school winner Tulare Western High School in Tulare, Calif.

-- Medium school winner Antietam Middle Senior High School in Reading, Penn.

-- Small school winner North Shelby School District in Shelbyville, Mo.

For more information about the FutureReady program, visitwww.futureready.org.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq:MSFT) is the worldwide leaderin software, services and solutions that help people and businessesrealize their full potential.

About Intel

Intel, the world leader in silicon innovation, developstechnologies, products and initiatives to continually advance howpeople work and live. Additional information about Intel is availableat www.intel.com/pressroom.

About Dell

Dell Inc. (NASDAQ:DELL) listens to customers and deliversinnovative technology and services they trust and value. Uniquelyenabled by its direct business model, Dell sells more systems globallythan any computer company, placing it No. 28 on the Fortune 500.Company revenue for the last four quarters was $56 billion. For moreinformation, visit www.dell.com. To get Dell news direct, visitwww.dell.com/RSS.

Dell is a trademark of Dell Inc.

Dell disclaims any proprietary interest in the marks and names ofothers.