Having fresh, healthy food prepared properly will go a long way toward making it palatable. Trust me, my wife is a vegan chef ;-)
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L.A. School District Officially Ends $1.3 Billion iPad Initiative in the Midst of an FBI Investigation
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Having fresh, healthy food prepared properly will go a long way toward making it palatable. Trust me, my wife is a vegan chef ;-)
People here seem to only care about where something is made and cost.
No discussion at all about what is best for students.
I could save a ton of paper and offer the students a lot more and better materials if they all had an electronic screen. Just getting a word processor and content creation into every student's hands is work it.
No kidding it is expensive. Cold cost $1K per kid. Multiply by a few hundred thousand kids and it is serious money.
But let's turn the discussion around and talk about what works best for students. Remember the average student in THIS school I'm at in LA lives in a family that makes about $14K to 24K per year. Maybe two families in one apartment and the mom works two jobs. These are tomorrow's leaders and employees.
No discussion at all about what is best for students.
I could save a ton of paper and offer the students a lot more and better materials if they all had an electronic screen. Just getting a word processor and content creation into every student's hands is work it.
No kidding it is expensive. Cold cost $1K per kid. Multiply by a few hundred thousand kids and it is serious money.
But let's turn the discussion around and talk about what works best for students. Remember the average student in THIS school I'm at in LA lives in a family that makes about $14K to 24K per year. Maybe two families in one apartment and the mom works two jobs. These are tomorrow's leaders and employees.
Did I say there is no need for laptop or computers at all. No just that MOST people don't need them most of the time anymore.
I use Pages daily on an iPad, and Numbers and if I have to under sufferance, Office. With a BT Keyboard... That does have copy and past capability... and Arrow keys to move around and that works perfectly. Using a mouse in a text app slows you down quite a bit, but again power users would find that hard I am sure.
I agree productivity is much higher with a keyboard, not a mouse. But I use a pen - even on the iPad for drawing work.
Sure you as a programmer need a traditional desktop / laptop computer. You can't compile on a chromebook or an Android device either.
Everything you have said is about creating content. This is not what this is about. It's about consuming content and reading.
The truth of the matter is someone should come up with a good cheap Linux convertible Laptop.
Wouldn't the cost per kid be less, because the tablets would be used for a few years, right? So, if they last 3 years, the cost per kid is around $330? Probably over-simplistic math, but just making a point that the cost of the tablets should be spread over a few years.
Since you are from there, were the funds from a school bond that was voted on or did the district come up with the money elsewhere?
LOL, in case of Apple they are spent on Chinese products
Made with parts from the Korean company
This iPad program is exactly what happens when you put luddites in charge of "innovation". Like school wifi networks with ridiculous gateway pages on them and school PCs running Vista...
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Being from the L.A. area myself, I know high school students whose schools (non-LAUSD) tried to bring in iPads. The schools tried to get the teachers to use the iPads in new ways, but of course new ≠ better, and they turned out to be useless. Big deal, you can write on digital notes instead of paper. Cheap laptops and some instruction on how to use MS Word and Excel would be a lot more useful. When the kids get to college, they'll only ever use computers in class for taking lecture notes, not messing around with special tablet technology.
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YES, exactly. And the lack of buttons. My Samsung TV takes longer to turn on than a new MacBook Air or Pro, and its GUI lags when I just want to change the input.
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Being from the L.A. area myself, I know high school students whose schools (non-LAUSD) tried to bring in iPads. The schools tried to get the teachers to use the iPads in new ways, but of course new ≠ better, and they turned out to be useless. Big deal, you can write on digital notes instead of paper. Cheap laptops and some instruction on how to use MS Word and Excel would be a lot more useful. When the kids get to college, they'll only ever use computers in class for taking lecture notes, not messing around with special tablet technology.
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YES, exactly. And the lack of buttons. My Samsung TV takes longer to turn on than a new MacBook Air or Pro, and its GUI lags when I just want to change the input.
Anecdotal success story regarding this program...
It will be sad to see this end.
It was a great idea, poorly implemented.
Maybe next time, this could be done right with iPads, with correct oversight and I.T. infrastructure, and not just pork barrel contract awards.
That said, when I took dear Mom-in-law to an iPad class, there was a mother and her little boy, with an iPad from this L.A. school district program. The mother explained that she herself could not afford one, but since her boy had one, they were going to learn how to use it. The little boy (about 8) was precocious, but attentive. He was surrounded by adults, and paid attention at the apple store class. This was my only direct observation of this program.
A caring parent plus a leg up with access to this technology seemed like an immediate win-win to me. I'm sure this is an isolated case, but I cannot tally the positive impact this program had on this young boy and his mother.
I would be all for a continuation of this program, with better oversight and implementation.
It will be sad to see this end.
It was a great idea, poorly implemented.
Maybe next time, this could be done right with iPads, with correct oversight and I.T. infrastructure, and not just pork barrel contract awards.
That said, when I took dear Mom-in-law to an iPad class, there was a mother and her little boy, with an iPad from this L.A. school district program. The mother explained that she herself could not afford one, but since her boy had one, they were going to learn how to use it. The little boy (about 8) was precocious, but attentive. He was surrounded by adults, and paid attention at the apple store class. This was my only direct observation of this program.
A caring parent plus a leg up with access to this technology seemed like an immediate win-win to me. I'm sure this is an isolated case, but I cannot tally the positive impact this program had on this young boy and his mother.
I would be all for a continuation of this program, with better oversight and implementation.
Had they pressed ahead with the Ipads, then basically the money would have been spent largely on korean products
No matter how you present education and how techy or fancy you get, The only thing that matters is the teaching! That requires a teacher in s classroom only. iPads, chrome books etc are all a distraction from real teaching. Spend money on better teachers and you'll be rewarded, this is just an awful way to spend. I love iOS devices but it's a waste.
They shouldn't be spending on other peoples kids either.
Give it back to the tax payer if we have so much to waste.
Give it back to the tax payer if we have so much to waste.
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Probably because it involves potential government corruption that the LAUSD had an opportunity and duty to investigate itself, but chose not to.
Here are some of the potential reasons that it could be a massive $1.3 billion fraudulent use of public funds:
- the funds were authorized by a school construction bond measure (borrowed / debt), that was passed by public vote in order to build and repair schools, not purchase computers or tablets. The money was diverted by the LAUSD to purposes other than what had been authorized by the law.
- requirements for the computers / tablets were specifically limited so that Pearson could be the only possible winner of the contract and so that iPads were the only devices that could meet these narrowly defined specs.
- negotiations and dealings were allegedly not done in a transparent and proper manner, perhaps secretly planning and deciding how they could avoid a proper bidding process and review. Prices for iPads and software were also inflated and significant discounts could have probably obtained elsewhere, but again, competition was probably purposely eliminated.
Or better yet bring your own food or send your kids with food. Why should the TAX payer have to feed them you had them.
Apple has failed in EDU and the blocks they talk about are worthless. Apple needs a iOS Corporate version with logins & account control.
iOS is a nightmare in edu.
iOS is a nightmare in edu.
Forget healthier food? Healthier foods means a better brain and healthier body altogether. Can't be replacing those brain cells with croppy foods obesity is a serious problem in this country.
I work at an elementary school in the inner city in the Midwest. More than half the students are on the lunch assistance program, paid for by, you guessed it, taxpayers because their deadbeat parents would rather sit home collecting government handouts instead of getting a job. They'd be lost if their precious assistance programs were taken away from them.
First, most people who qualify for assistance actually have jobs. But don't let that get in the way of your assumptions.
Second, regardless of why the child needs to be fed do you REALLY advocate letting kids go hungry? How do you even think that a hungry child can learn? These are the workers of the future. Surely even the most conservative, anti-government person needs to be concerned about the future. Or do you actually advocate keeping a portion of the populous poor and uneducated? Why? To what purpose? To perpetuate a poor underclass? Don't worry, there will always be some who are actually needy through no fault of their own and some who are just lazy. But let's not punish the child in either case.
On topic, it's a shame but no surprise this happened. Putting tech in the classrooms is a pretty new concept. There are surely to be missteps along the way.
But as some others have stated, treating teachers better, better pay, more respect would go much further. I never stop being amazed and concerned just how shortsighted our country is when it comes to our future. Teaching should be amoung the highest paid, most respected professions. It is our future we're talking about.
At my daughter's school, they require insurance of $20 per year to handle this issue. I don't complain about that price because her yearly school fees went from around $120 down to $65 (including the insurance!) thanks to having their textbooks on the iPads!!
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All of you saying, "We need better teachers!" are missing the point. There are still many fantastic teachers that are inspiring our children every day. These iPads often save the school districts thousands of taxpayers dollars in the long run due to the prices and replacement rates of printed textbooks. My daughter's SD received a technology grant from the state. They chose to use it to put iPads in the hands of every student from 6-12th grade. While that was a huge bill initially, they are now ahead because when they launched the iPads they were due to replace nearly ALL of their textbooks within the next 2 years. Let's see... $400/iPad/student (they purchased iPad 2's right after the 3's came out, which knocked the price down!) plus purchase of downloadable textbooks... or $100/textbook/student. Average student has 7 textbooks so around $700/student. With printed textbooks, any updates or corrections cannot be done until the next time they are replaced. With the iPads, the publisher is able to push through any updates (if I recall correctly, they said this happens as often as quarterly).
And let's not forget how ridiculously heavy carrying around a bunch of textbooks used to be!! The students now carry a couple of soft workbooks and an iPad rather than 20+ lbs of books. Also, they no longer have to carry a separate calculator or borrow a dictionary/thesaurus from the library as those things are now at their fingertips. Anyone remember having outdated info in encyclopedias growing up? That is a thing of the past for today's students!
As a bonus: the iPads are teaching the students to be technologically advanced...just like their future jobs will be! My daughter emails in her weekend homework on Friday night and usually on Saturday morning she already has her updated grade from the teacher.
LOL are you really this stupid?
There are FREE lunches everywhere in Schools Systems.
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I am not letting kids go HUNGRY their parents are!
Don't have kids if you can't afford them.
And have you worked in a School system? I have worked in three in my lifetime in the IT department and I have seen so much Corruption from Teachers to the ADMINS it makes me sick.
And before you say well they all can't be bad then why do we always pass gun laws like every Gun owner is a bad person?
There are FREE lunches everywhere in Schools Systems.
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I am not letting kids go HUNGRY their parents are!
Don't have kids if you can't afford them.
And have you worked in a School system? I have worked in three in my lifetime in the IT department and I have seen so much Corruption from Teachers to the ADMINS it makes me sick.
And before you say well they all can't be bad then why do we always pass gun laws like every Gun owner is a bad person?
That is why the investigation. There are accusations that the guy that originally wrote the requirements on which Apple etc bid to fill the contract did so in a way that only iPads would meet all the terms. Because someone he was connected to works for the company, has stock in it etc. and perhaps also in Pearson. He didn't really research the schools needs and allow an open process. Given that tax payer money is involved that's a big deal. By slanting the game he defrauded all of a tax payers. His successor is killing that contract to do it right.
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It can't be. This money was from a bond voted on for specific uses around technology. It legally can't be shifted to salaries, food etc. renovations might slide through if it can be proven they are needed to support tech changes. Like wiring a building for Internet access or better electrical service
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And you base that on how many classrooms you have personally researched and observed.
Or are you just so anti tech that you are assuming that teachers are just sitting at their desks not caring if the kids are playing angry birds all day
Good teachers are good no matter what tools you do or don't give them. Bad teachers are bad with or without tech. And kids will find distractions with or without tablets, cell phones etc
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Actually those notions have less to do with it than you think. It's really more about Apple and the executives not wanting to be the ones to decide what charities are worth supporting or not. Because Apple's money in a sense isn't their money to play with, it's the shareholders. Shareholders who have vastly different tastes and values.
product (red) was a way to donate but not be the decision maker. The buyer is. If you think AIDS is 'the gay disease' and 'they deserve it' don't buy the (red) iPod or whatever.
They also let the employees decide where money goes with their match program. So long as it's a legit non profit charity, Apple will match any employee donation up to like $1000 in money or time volunteered (based off paying the volunteer's salary rate for time spent) during a calendar year.
Outside of that, apple does do a few things like the SanFran and Austin Pride parades but those are as much a marketing/PR stunt as a show of support.