They have like 5 different saas programs/platforms they use. They also have video platforms. Reading, library checkout, digital media, quizzes, tests, who knows.
If I was a kid without add, I would for sure have it having to use that stuff at 11 years old.
I'm not sure who thought doing away with pen and paper and a simple book in front of you was a good idea.
I assume it was an IT/software salesperson with ability to give kickbacks.
Do you believe a Mac or Windows laptop would have been more reliable given the abuse they were subjected to?
I see adults with absolute garbage looking iPhones. Some people just do not care. Others do. There is some amount of 'psychological' you can do to fix some of it. But at the end of the day you will have a mix of 'sorta broke', 'broken', 'did you ever take it out of the box'.
Then on top of that. There is a level of junk products. I have a high end laptop I absolutely baby. That thing is a piece of rubish and in a year or so I am going to gladly get rid of it. It has major defects ~2 years in. The previous 3 laptops I had were in very good condition for 5+ years each until the plastic literally started detreating. The same ODM's making that laptop are also making chromebooks. My only option to fix this is by buying used parts of sites like ebay. Or be without my primary computer for 4-8 weeks. Chromebooks margins have to be decently thin or they would not sell them that cheap. Which probably means the things are kind of junk too.
Removing student access to technology is overly punitive and does not support the intended learning and development outcomes of attending school.
To ostracize a child because they damaged their laptop is psychological abuse.
We can just help them take better care of it and reinforce the reasons why and train them to do so! :-)
Wait to see what happens to devices made of glass !
Jest aside, any device lasting even two or three years in a school environment is kinda of a big deal given the daily abuse it will get.
I've seen an explosion of online homework recently and it's all confusing and either way to easy or waaayyyy too hard with very little of the partial credit and recourse that an actual person grading a paper assignment has.
The sorts of kids with laptop issues were not the children with high parent involvement.
The only thing that really works are repeated reminders and attentive consequences, over a sustained period of time.
Also, adults don't typically have coworkers grab their laptop and smash it because they're disliked.
A big issue with chromebooks in particular: there's many discreet models of different sizes and builds, that all require different parts, and don't get renewed every year.
One school ordering 400 12" HP chromebooks for instance will have no guarantee to be able to order another batch 2 years later, even of an equivalent machine that could be a straight replacement.
Perhaps Dell has a more stable offering given they probably understand these problematics better ?
The second sentenxe doesn't follow the first - it's a flavor of Zeno's paradox, after 5 years, you'll be left with 4/5 x 4/5 x 4/5 x 4/5 x 4/5 of the original batch.
You made a mistake: it's not that 1/5 of the computers spontaneously break every year. It's that 1/5 of the students treat their computers roughly.
Assuming that laptops get collected over the summer and re-distributed each year, you should actually expect that 100% of each tranche of laptops would need to be replaced every 5 years.
That's fair. I guess, it's more accurate to say that you'd expect a number of laptops equal to the size of the initial tranche to be destroyed after the first 5 years.
Although if I was running IT, it'd definitely keep track of the "destructive" students and issue them the oldest equipment, in which case, we'd be back to something closer to my original statement.
And anyway, if 1/5 of laptops needed major repairs and some of them got it, those go back into circulation. Are they still original laptops? (Ask my grandfather's axe...)
It's not the case that there's a constant 1/5 probability of failure each year. Many failure modes are based on cumulative stress/degradation; so the probability of failure can go up over time.
Some failure modes go down over time; maybe there's some manufacturing defect, and those that have the defect fail early, while those that survive past the first year will have lower chances of failure early on.
But in this kind of environment, the cumulative stresses are much more likely than the early failures.
Anyway, it doesn't matter much either way, even if there's a few that survive, they will be having wear and tear to the point you wouldn't want another student to have them (or maybe as a replacement for a broken one); you wouldn't want some year 1 students to get a new ones while others get the year 4/5 leftovers, they'll resent it for sure.
Second, they'll be paid off after a few years.
You absolutely could design it to last 20 years with batteries that are easy to pop out and pop in as easy as changing a double aa but your customers won't pay a premium over a more disposable machine and indeed if your customer has a good experience over the 3-5 they actually use it for you make MORE if your hardware is designed to need replacement.