My school classroom back in the 1970s and 80s was much the same as it had been for my parents just after the Second World War. It consisted of desks in rows, blackboards and blotted exercise books with board dusters often used as weapons by teachers to catch out unruly pupils. The biggest technological advance was the language lab, where we listened to distant-sounding French people on reel-to-reel recordings.

Now youngsters use computers, the Internet brings their subjects to life and technology has been embraced as an essential part of the learning experience.

One of the main instigators of this revolution has been RM Education, which is at the forefront of the digital revolution in the classroom. But is this world of children doing homework on their laptops a better one?

RM Education chief executive Terry Sweeney said: “There was a suspicion of technology at first, but ask any teacher now and they would not want us to take it away from them.”

Mr Sweeney, 43, became chief executive in June 2008, and describes the interim period as “the most challenginging time to lead a company in a generation.”

His predecessor, Tim Pearson, had set up a strategy of diversification to take the company beyond the schools market and into education generally, as there was a danger of it having all its eggs in one basket.

Expanding into other areas, such as assessment and exam marking, proved to be a wise move, although it has not been without pain as the impact of the scrapping of the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) initiative has hit the company.

The expansion is also international. For example, the company has been in Australia for ten years and the United States for more than five.

The name of the business has changed, too. Originally Research Machines, it became RM and last year RM Education.

It now employs more than 2,800 people worldwide, 1,200 of them at Milton Park, making it one of the county’s largest private sector employers.

Mr Sweeney said: “We are about the business of education. The fact that we help teachers to teach and learners to learn energises our firm.”

RM Education’s strong culture applies to staff as well. Mr Sweeney is keen to ensure his employees treat the company as “more than just a job” and surveys suggest 80 per cent of staff feel “proud” to work there.

He refers to it as a “meritocracy” with people having power because of their abilities, and says many staff have been with the company for more than 20 years.

That said, there have been redundancies “in the low dozens” (Mr Sweeney won’t say exactly how many) at RM Education, mainly caused by the scrapping of the BSF programme, where it was contracted to supply new information technology equipment to schools and colleges across the UK.

Mr Sweeney said: “We had a pipeline of activity and that stopped on July 5 last year.

“We had up to 60 people who suddenly had nothing to do, and we did try to find roles for them across the business. With the job cuts, I didn’t take those decisions lightly, and most people understand that.”

Mr Sweeney is keen to point out that the company has signed up a considerable number of long-term contracts over the last six months, despite it being the “toughest period in my dozen years here.”

He points to a ten-year information communication technology (ICT) agreement with Dudley schools, and a six-year deal with Cambridge Assessment for a marking service as examples.

“Public sector education fared better than most other areas. Funding is protected and then there is the Government’s Academies Programme to consider.”

Mr Sweeney emphasises that RM Education knows its market so well and also refers to the “entrepreneurial spirit” within the company.

An example of this is office workers Sarah Green and Judith Coles who won the firm’s Entrepreneur of the Year competition, and now stand to win up to £1m in royalties from their product, SimplyWorks, which allows up to ten pupils to access a program simultaneously, rather than having it loaded individually on to their computers.

Mr Sweeney says that such innovation combined with entrepreneurial hard work pays dividends, not just for the individuals concerned, but the company as a whole.

And he is aware of the responsibility that RM Education has to its customers and, ultimately, to the next generation entering the world of work.

He said: “As soon as kids get out into the workplace, they are confronted by technology.

“The question is are we doing enough to equip them for that?”

And Mr Sweeney can see how education is changing directly through the eyes of his own children, Catriona, 15, Cameron, 11, and five-year-old Freya.

In the next ten years Mr Sweeney believes schools will increasingly make use of universal applications online in “the cloud” which will allow parents to become even more involved in their child’s educational progress.

“We will know how kids are doing and be able to engage with the teacher all the time,” he said.

But what of youngsters falling victim to the “digital divide” with some unable to afford to keep up with technological advances?

Mr Sweeney said: “The gap is not as big as it was ten years ago and, if you consider virtually 100 per cent of kids have a mobile telephone, then the majority of applications will be accessible.”