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Students Hack School-Issued iPads Within One Week

Posted by samzenpus on from the extra-credit-hacking dept.

Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Los Angeles Unified School District started issuing iPads to its students this school year, as part of a $30 million deal with Apple. Now Sam Sanders reports at NPR that less than a week after getting their iPads, high school students have found a way to bypass software blocks on the devices that limit what websites the students can use. The students are getting around software that lets school district officials know where the iPads are, what the students are doing with them at all times and lets the district block certain sites, such as social media favorites like Facebook. 'They were bound to fail,' says Renee Hobbs, who's been a skeptic of the iPad program from the start. 'There is a huge history in American education of being attracted to the new, shiny, hugely promising bauble and then watching the idea fizzle because teachers weren't properly trained to use it and it just ended up in the closet.' The rollout of the iPads might have to be delayed as officials reassess access policies. Right now, the program is still in Phase 1, with fewer than 15,000 iPads distributed. 'I'm guessing this is just a sample of what will likely occur on other campuses once this hits Twitter, YouTube or other social media sites explaining to our students how to breach or compromise the security of these devices,' says Steven Zipperman. 'I want to prevent a "runaway train" scenario when we may have the ability to put a hold on the roll-out.' The incident has prompted questions about overall preparations for the $1-billion tablet initiative."

5 of 375 comments (clear)

  1. well by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Good thing they didn't waste $1 billion on teachers or books.

    1. Re:well by TWiTfan · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Well, at least the kids are learning something from their iPads, though it's not the lessons the schools intended.

      --
      The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
    2. Re:well by interkin3tic · · Score: 5, Insightful
      One lesson everyone can take away from this is that trying to lock down devices for patronizing reasons is foolish. Surprisingly, it appears the schools are at least sort of getting that message:

      "So we talked to students, and we asked them, 'Why did you do this?' And in many cases, they said, 'You guys are just locking us out of too much stuff.' " He says, after talking with students, that the Los Angeles Unified School District's iPad policy probably should be changed, allowing for some social media and music streaming sites.

      The memo from a sublinked article suggests that concerns for safety were the reasons the devices were supposed to be locked down. Can't have kids getting on facebook: they might meet up with child molesters and get raped and killed!

      I suspect their concern for avoiding that scenario was mainly "... and then WE'D BE SUED!!!" So perhaps they should have gone the permission slip route and only given out ipads to kids whose parents agreed that the parents are the parents and if anything bad happens to the children in connection with the ipads, or if they caught their kids looking at nudity (and subsequently were utterly scarred for life), that was on the parents and not something they could sue over. This however is not a lesson that school districts ever seem to learn.

  2. I heard from a teacher in NC by sandytaru · · Score: 5, Insightful

    - whose school district had gotten all the kids iPads. She was complaining that the new toys, in conjunction with all the stupid assessments she had to do, had put her weeks behind the curriculum because she had to spend all her time helping her third graders learn to use the tablets. So I'm sure the teachers in CA who got stuck with this are frustrated about this and probably the ones who are now on delay are greatly relieved.

    Personally, I think that money could better be spent on good old fashioned computer labs. A good student PC is a heck of a lot cheaper, and these kids need to learn to type on a real keyboard or else they're going to be at a huge disadvantage compared to their peers who do.

    --
    Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
  3. ^This by globaljustin · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Technology in the classroom...all of it...it's just **tools to teach**

    Anyone who things technology can reduce staff budget or allow larger class sizes is smoking crack.

    A professionally trained, well-paid *human* teacher is absolutely the only thing that educates a child.

    Everything else is just a tool.

    --
    Thank you Dave Raggett