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More on the iPads for Laurel Hill

April 13th, 2012, 9:44 am · Post a Comment · posted by

Got a call from Eric Mitchell, the Okaloosa School District technology specialist, who answered some of the questions I raised about the district’s purchase of iPads for Laurel Hill School.

The cost, about $140,000 for 150 iPads, includes training for teachers (some of whom may not be familiar with the Apple iPhone/iPad OS), the purchase of books and apps, and a supply of backup iPads for those that fail or are broken. The insurance, about $50 per year, would be paid by parents.

State law requires school districts to spend about half their textbook money on digital books by 2014, so the district is using this pilot program to determine the feasibility of using iPads in the rest of their schools.

The book costs would be a lot less than print, almost a tenth.

The district is also evaluating other digital e-readers, like Kindles and Nooks. Mitchell said the failure rate of Kindles was a lot higher, sometimes as high as 20 percent.

Another huge obstacle is the interface between the district’s book purchasing and the providers “store.” Apple makes it easy for school districts to purchase school books, but Amazon at present requires transactions to go through its main sales conduit, which features some questionable content, like books with adult themes. Mitchell says Barnes & Noble is a tad better but they haven’t yet evaluated the process.

Also, the Apple app experience is a lot cleaner than its Android counterpart.

I’ll be curious to see how the district fares with Nooks. Meanwhile, with a state law breathing down their neck, my feeling is the school district is probably smart to evaluate the iPad now rather than later.

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