How One School District Handled Rolling Out 20,000 iPads

First time accepted submitter Gamoid writes This past school year, the Coachella Valley Unified School District gave out iPads to every single student. The good news is that kids love them, and only 6 of them got stolen or went missing. The bad news is, these iPads are sucking so much bandwidth that it's keeping neighboring school districts from getting online. Here's why the CVUSD is considering becoming its own ISP.

Comments

Yeah, students will use bandwidth

[NotDrWho]

You would have gotten the same results giving them each their own smartphone or computer.

Re:Yeah, students will use bandwidth

[Anonymous Coward]

Would have provided more benefit to provide them textbooks not influenced from Texas educational cult and a updated computer lab. I love technology but this is a complete waste of money. How about we raise teacher wages and bring in some that actually give a crap? How about we spend this money on educational campaigns so that parents make education a priority in their homes?

Giving kids something to play Angry Birds / crappy facebook games isn't going to improve grades.

Re:Yeah, students will use bandwidth

[UnknownSoldier]

> "According to the Sacramento Bee, the average teacher salary in 2011 was $67,871.

How the hell is that "enough" when CEO & entertainers -- the most useless people in society -- make millions, yet the most important people in society -- teachers barely make a decent salary??

Re:Yeah, students will use bandwidth

[schnell]

yet the most important people in society -- teachers barely make a decent salary??

I went to public school and had some great teachers who were worth their weight in gold. I also had other teachers who weren't worth a nickel and did a great amount of harm to their students.

If teachers' unions ever agree to let teachers be paid based on how good they are - rather than just by seniority - you might actually see more attractive salaries for good teachers. You might also see more bright people interested in taking up the profession if they knew they could make a better living doing so.

With that being said, my only experience in this is with US public schools and their teachers' unions. I'm curious if anyone else knows of examples where teachers are paid purely on merit and the effect (or lack thereof) it has had on educational outcomes.

Re:Yeah, students will use bandwidth

[Anonymous Coward]

A book is a 'consumption device' too - much more so than an i pad. But no-one would argue that they shouldn't be in schools - although arguments like this have been made in the past. And anyway, why wouldn't we teach people how to use these devices?

Mission creep.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, the kids love them and yes, they probably do have educational value... but look at the mission creep. The district becoming its own ISP next? Can of worms.

Public funding for education going into internet bandwidth for widgets... well, it takes a bridging argument to say that's a good thing.

Re:Mission creep.

[nine-times]

but look at the mission creep. The district becoming its own ISP next? Can of worms.

On the other hand, it's a can of worms that probably wouldn't have needed to be opened if we had some kind of a plan to develop public internet infrastructure that was free/cheap for people without a lot of money.

I only bring this up because I would imagine some people looking at this and saying, "A public school system should not be intruding into the area of being an ISP, which has traditionally been an area for private business." I would respond by pointing out that the Internet really should be considered public telecommunications infrastructure.

Re:Mission creep.

[pr0fessor]

When I was in school I was always excited to go to my science class because we did experiments.... unfortunately my kids never got to experience that due to, possible danger, funding, and insurance considerations all they did was read about it. {but they still have football}

I would rather they bring back science to science classes...

Expensive?

[Anonymous Coward]

iPads may seem expensive to some people but when you consider the price of traditional books, an iPad could be a bargain. When I was in school some twenty years ago, textbooks were $50-100+ a piece. They would get replaced every 2-3 years. A iPad plus some sort of open courseware could be a cheaper solution and it would be easier on the backs of the students.

All this being said, the public school I went to would replace books every couple of years. I actually spend my first six years in private school and they would keep their books for much longer. I remember one book that was around 12 years old with most being 5-6 years old.

Re:Expensive?

[TechyImmigrant]

>textbooks were $50-100+ a piece

They cost that because the publishers are in a nice corruption loop with the school boards.

The school boards bless particular books from particular publishers and the publishers update the books each year so they have to be re-purchased. Unknown benefits flow from the publishers to the school board members.

Obviously it would be cheaper for education districts to band together and commission their own textbooks that cost $0 to distribute once written. But the school boards are strangely disinterested in this option.

Re:Did anything improve?

[AK Marc]

How was your childhood where at age 5 your idea of nirvana was hookers and coke?

Most children are naturally curious. Feed that curiosity in a fun way gets much better results than desks, "teaching" (that's really lecturing) and worksheets. Even if the rote memorization and stiffling environment will raise performance the next quarter. When the schools follow the corporate model of "next quarter" results, then the schools will fail. 6th grade is for making the best 25 year old possible, not the best 7th grader possible.

Re:We shall see.

[BoberFett]

You don't actually think digital text books are free, do you?

Re:I still can't for the life of me

[Belial6]

Yep, the iPad is the educational systems version of the military's $500 toilet seat.

Re:Apple has platform for content development

[dk20]

Didn't apple just recently agree to pay like $400 million as a settlement for price fixing ebook prices?
So on top of the price of the device, there is also the artificial ebook prices?

Care to cite some examples of people actually creating content on the iPad in the real world? Most of the people i see with them are playing games or watching video's (consumption).

Re:meh.

[brantondaveperson]

Not an argument pro or anti Apple per se, but standardising on a device means less time spent working out how to set up each device and worrying about app compatibility, and more time spent actually teaching. And a 'good' Android device that's robust enough to handle kids pugging in the USB charger (for instance...) isn't all that much cheaper than an iPad. In actual fact, I don't even know of one that's as solid as the iPad is.

Now, the role of eduction is the debate that's worth having here - Apple v.s Google is a distraction - is having these types of devices in schools a good thing? And if it is, exactly how ought it to be used? Hard questions - and ones that we're only now starting to look at. Ubiquitous tablet computing is very new - but it's not going away and we do need to teach our children how to use it well.