Replace curriculum computers with Chromebooks?

[altecsole]

Our COO has decided that the focus for this year is on reducing our carbon footprint. Part of the approach is to reduce our electricity bill and he's asked about issuing pupils with a Chromebook, and removing our curriculum computers (Windows 10). Pupils would charge their devices at home before bringing in to school.

 

I've been asked to consider how this might work, but it seems like a big ask, bearing in mind the follows:

 

1. Curriculum software requirements - Computing are heavily invested in Adobe Creative Cloud, particularly, Animate, Illustrator, and Photoshop. Music use Sibelius and Cubase. DT use 2D Design. It would need departments to agree to using online alternatives - if there are any. How well Creative Cloud Android apps work?
   
2. File storage - the majority of user files, and shared department files, are stored on local file servers. Users do have access to OneDrive (via our Office 365 tenancy), but this isn't the location for their 'My Documents'
   
3. We've been an Office 365 school since it was 'Live@Edu', so including the Google infrastructure may be confusing for users.
   
4. All the Google education stuff I look at seems to show primary school pupils using laptops, so what about secondary school pupils?
   

 

I have a Chromebook at home, and I really like it, but there is no way it could be my work device. I see that the Surface Laptop SE is on the horizon, but that seems to be aimed at KS3 and below?

 

Has anyone gone through this process already? If so, any tips on the way forward?

[fiza]

paging @rogerdnixon as I believe his Trust use Chromebooks for Curriculum.

[Brimstone]

Adobe firmly stipulate, they only support issues with Photoshop when working with a local disk...

 

https://helpx.adobe.com/uk/photoshop/kb/networks-removable-media-photoshop.html

 

You will get lots of problems...

[robyholmes]

Surely your going to simply move the energy usage from school to home, the carbon footprint is likely to remain largely the same? In fact once you factor in the batteries efficiency when charging and discharging, plus replacements, damage etc. I doubt your going to reduce a carbon footprint at all.

 

If your doing for for allowing better access to IT resources outside of school hours, then yes, I can understand it. But to reduce the energy bill, very odd reasoning.

[Ironside]

Do you use PaperCut? Suggest that to the SLT to show IT contributing to the cause. Also yeah I kind of agree with robyholmes, especially considering that, in my potentially hideously incorrect opinion, the ewaste that cheap and weak laptops become once they reach EOL.

[maark]

Strange reasoning - as mentioned above.

Personally I much prefer google apps to microsoft/adobe for many reasons - ease of use, simplified operating systems, good support, protection from ransomware, more advanced education features such as classroom.

However it would be a huge change from what you have currently and would need a lot of training. You would struggle to replace the Adobe, music and design software with similar packages.

It is fine for secondary but will SMT understand what is involved in changing over and provide support?

[Chris_Cook]

It can be great for replacing general use IT rooms, but you will probably still need specialist rooms for a while yet. Things like music, DT, Media, IT may still require windows/mac. There are options on the horizon, but some teachers are reluctant to change if all their experience is in 1 program. There are things like Bandlab for music, sketchup for DR, some cloud based tools for coding including Google Apps script. There are only a couple of Adobe apps that work on chrome, and I think they are more basic versions at this point in time.

 

Its important to choose good quality devices - same as windows. We've gone for Lenovo 300e's with hard cases this year, and that seems to have helped with broken screens and wear and tear issues. But we've still had 3 broken screens since September. Robustness of the keyboard and case is critical. It looks like a lot of recent CBs have pick resistant keys on them where there are little tabs that click under the case.

 

Insurance is an issue - If your students aren't able to take care of a CB, then you need to make sure you insurance will cover you. One of our insurers has started charging a £50 excess on claims. Not all students are going to understand how to look after it, so will require training and guidance.

 

Storage at break/lunch times is also important. Kids need somewhere to store the laptops that is convenient. Some of ours end up on the football field and basket ball courts, or the kids end up in fights. Few laptops are going to survive a basket ball landing on them from a great height, or a drink getting spilled in a bag. Or torrential rain if the bag isn't water proof.

 

You need to factor in time for managing repairs, forgotten chromebooks, and other issues. Spare's are in short supply at the moment, and this is causing us headaches for some makes and models.

 

This year, we've built up a pot of money for repairs, rather than getting insurance. We can then make the choice of outsourcing repairs, doing them in-house, or just replacing the device if its not economical.

 

E-safety and cyber bullying are other issues. Parents differ greatly in what they expect if they have to pay for the device. Some want it completely locked down, some want no restrictions.

 

On the positive side, it seams popular with staff, and we've saved a boat-load in printing costs from not doing worksheets etc.

 

It was also very noticeable during lockdown. In one school we only had to look after years 10-13 when issuing CBs for families without. I was personally very surprised at how many familys only had 1 device between them. The other secondary, we had to do a fair bit more work, as we hadn't planned on implementing 1-2-1 devices until the following year.

 

We were an office 365 school about 4-5 years ago, but uptake was slow and painful. Staff were reluctant to use it. Moving to google apps has been a great change. Once staff are show how easy it is and how they can collaborate and share work they tend to just get on with it without pushing.

[Ditto]

I guess we ought to acknowledge the COO's ambition is a noble one. It maybe an interest as a result of legislative demands for some MATs - for those interested see https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/academy-trust-financial-management-good-practice-guides/streamlined-energy-and-carbon-reporting. Also, one video that discusses the topic from a one consultancy's perspective - I'm sure there are/will be many others.

 

The idea of taking the devices home to charge would a good topic for a class to debate! Rightly, it's been shredded here and I think a year5 class could shred it further! On the topic of going down the Chromebook route, I hope @rogerdnixon, as noted by @fiza, can share his immense knowledge on this aspect. Overall, I think it's possible. The biggest challenge will be mindset shift and resistance to change, not technological. Perhaps the COO could think about other ways to tackle carbon footprint first, maybe he/she has? - what about LEDs, solar panels, wind-turbine, insulation, etc. The earlier video talks about these and more.

[rogerdnixon]

OK I'll try to share some wisdom while watching GBBO.

 

As a Trust we have several secondaries that are 1:1with Chromebooks (staff and students), plus 1000's in primaries.

 

Before considering this, make sure your network can happily handle 1000's of devices online at the same time. Obvious I know - but normally the first thing we have to do when taking on new schools.

 

Personally I'd not go 1:1 Chromebooks if you are O365 - they shine in a Workspace setup.

 

To do it you need total buy in the SLT, governors, parents and teachers and it needs to be embedded into the ethos of the school and pedegogy. Technically deploying 1000 Chromebooks is dead easy. Getting the to be used effectively is another matter entirely.

 

We offer varies options to for guardians - from buy all the way to day loans. We get around a 90% buy rate. But that's taken time and a lot of parental we engagement.

 

Basically it takes a fair amount of work to to get off the ground and then to keep running. However, once done tech becomes a seamless part of lessons and computer rooms largely become irrelevant.

 

We do still have some specialist facilities - some Mac's setup with Google login for photography A level for example (although it's coming to ChromeOS).

 

Printing was mentioned - 1:1 does massively reduce this - but most stuff is on classroom. But we sync users from Workspace to Papercut.

 

I'd have proper be on and off-site filtering - we use Securly and their parents app - super popular with parents. Give staff super powers to control pupil Chromebooks - we use either Securly classroom or Hapara Teacher Dashboard.

 

Anyways - feel free to get in touch if you want to discuss.

 

Roger

[altecsole]

Surely your going to simply move the energy usage from school to home, the carbon footprint is likely to remain largely the same? In fact once you factor in the batteries efficiency when charging and discharging, plus replacements, damage etc. I doubt your going to reduce a carbon footprint at all.

 

If your doing for for allowing better access to IT resources outside of school hours, then yes, I can understand it. But to reduce the energy bill, very odd reasoning.

 

I suspect that the bottom line is about ticking a box, and saving money. In fact, asking pupils to charge at home, before coming into school, was a big plus for him. Good points about the carbon footprint of the devices themselves - many thanks.

 

Do you use PaperCut? Suggest that to the SLT to show IT contributing to the cause. Also yeah I kind of agree with robyholmes, especially considering that, in my potentially hideously incorrect opinion, the ewaste that cheap and weak laptops become once they reach EOL.

 

We do have PaperCut, and I've already used it to highlight the impact of printing, but he's not too bothered about that. I've also made the point about the energy usage of projectors, compared to Interactive screens (we only have a few), and that is something we will be looking at too.

[altecsole]

I guess we ought to acknowledge the COO's ambition is a noble one. It maybe an interest as a result of legislative demands for some MATs - for those interested see https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/academy-trust-financial-management-good-practice-guides/streamlined-energy-and-carbon-reporting. Also, one video that discusses the topic from a one consultancy's perspective - I'm sure there are/will be many others.

 

The idea of taking the devices home to charge would a good topic for a class to debate! Rightly, it's been shredded here and I think a year5 class could shred it further! On the topic of going down the Chromebook route, I hope @rogerdnixon, as noted by @fiza, can share his immense knowledge on this aspect. Overall, I think it's possible. The biggest challenge will be mindset shift and resistance to change, not technological. Perhaps the COO could think about other ways to tackle carbon footprint first, maybe he/she has? - what about LEDs, solar panels, wind-turbine, insulation, etc. The earlier video talks about these and more.

 

Many thanks for the link to the Government publication, that's very useful. We are currently looking at installing Solar panels, and we have widespread use of LEDs. Some of our buildings are very old, so insulation probably needs work. Wind turbine would probably be an issue, though.

 

It can be great for replacing general use IT rooms, but you will probably still need specialist rooms for a while yet. Things like music, DT, Media, IT may still require windows/mac. There are options on the horizon, but some teachers are reluctant to change if all their experience is in 1 program. There are things like Bandlab for music, sketchup for DR, some cloud based tools for coding including Google Apps script. There are only a couple of Adobe apps that work on chrome, and I think they are more basic versions at this point in time.

 

Its important to choose good quality devices - same as windows. We've gone for Lenovo 300e's with hard cases this year, and that seems to have helped with broken screens and wear and tear issues. But we've still had 3 broken screens since September. Robustness of the keyboard and case is critical. It looks like a lot of recent CBs have pick resistant keys on them where there are little tabs that click under the case.

 

Insurance is an issue - If your students aren't able to take care of a CB, then you need to make sure you insurance will cover you. One of our insurers has started charging a £50 excess on claims. Not all students are going to understand how to look after it, so will require training and guidance.

 

Storage at break/lunch times is also important. Kids need somewhere to store the laptops that is convenient. Some of ours end up on the football field and basket ball courts, or the kids end up in fights. Few laptops are going to survive a basket ball landing on them from a great height, or a drink getting spilled in a bag. Or torrential rain if the bag isn't water proof.

 

You need to factor in time for managing repairs, forgotten chromebooks, and other issues. Spare's are in short supply at the moment, and this is causing us headaches for some makes and models.

 

This year, we've built up a pot of money for repairs, rather than getting insurance. We can then make the choice of outsourcing repairs, doing them in-house, or just replacing the device if its not economical.

 

E-safety and cyber bullying are other issues. Parents differ greatly in what they expect if they have to pay for the device. Some want it completely locked down, some want no restrictions.

 

On the positive side, it seams popular with staff, and we've saved a boat-load in printing costs from not doing worksheets etc.

 

It was also very noticeable during lockdown. In one school we only had to look after years 10-13 when issuing CBs for families without. I was personally very surprised at how many familys only had 1 device between them. The other secondary, we had to do a fair bit more work, as we hadn't planned on implementing 1-2-1 devices until the following year.

 

We were an office 365 school about 4-5 years ago, but uptake was slow and painful. Staff were reluctant to use it. Moving to google apps has been a great change. Once staff are show how easy it is and how they can collaborate and share work they tend to just get on with it without pushing.

 

Many thanks for your detailed response. The Chromebook suggestion was, I think, plucked out of the air, and hasn't got as far as our Leadership Team, let alone the wider community. Plenty of other things to consider - cheers.

[Oaktech]

We're sort of going half way with this... Curriculum mobile devices are all being replaced with Chromebooks, mainly thanks to the DfE scheme kickstarting something I've been trying to get going for years! We will be retaining at least one suite of wired windows computers for specialist software and for system familiarity for the foreseeable future.

 

Even taking into account the electricity costs of charging a Chromebook with a 35w USB C charger there is a substantial saving to be had over the 65-90w chargers of our current HP and Dell laptops and the 250w of one 35 seat suite that we're retiring.

[altecsole]

OK I'll try to share some wisdom while watching GBBO.

 

As a Trust we have several secondaries that are 1:1with Chromebooks (staff and students), plus 1000's in primaries.

 

Before considering this, make sure your network can happily handle 1000's of devices online at the same time. Obvious I know - but normally the first thing we have to do when taking on new schools.

 

Personally I'd not go 1:1 Chromebooks if you are O365 - they shine in a Workspace setup.

 

To do it you need total buy in the SLT, governors, parents and teachers and it needs to be embedded into the ethos of the school and pedegogy. Technically deploying 1000 Chromebooks is dead easy. Getting the to be used effectively is another matter entirely.

 

We offer varies options to for guardians - from buy all the way to day loans. We get around a 90% buy rate. But that's taken time and a lot of parental we engagement.

 

Basically it takes a fair amount of work to to get off the ground and then to keep running. However, once done tech becomes a seamless part of lessons and computer rooms largely become irrelevant.

 

We do still have some specialist facilities - some Mac's setup with Google login for photography A level for example (although it's coming to ChromeOS).

 

Printing was mentioned - 1:1 does massively reduce this - but most stuff is on classroom. But we sync users from Workspace to Papercut.

 

I'd have proper be on and off-site filtering - we use Securly and their parents app - super popular with parents. Give staff super powers to control pupil Chromebooks - we use either Securly classroom or Hapara Teacher Dashboard.

 

Anyways - feel free to get in touch if you want to discuss.

 

Roger

 

Many thanks for taking the time to reply - that's very helpful.

 

Our current Wi-Fi setup would definitely need replacing before we could move forward on this.

 

Is all your data stored in Google? Moving our existing data to the cloud will be a big undertaking.

[altecsole]

We're sort of going half way with this... Curriculum mobile devices are all being replaced with Chromebooks, mainly thanks to the DfE scheme kickstarting something I've been trying to get going for years! We will be retaining at least one suite of wired windows computers for specialist software and for system familiarity for the foreseeable future.

 

Even taking into account the electricity costs of charging a Chromebook with a 35w USB C charger there is a substantial saving to be had over the 65-90w chargers of our current HP and Dell laptops and the 250w of one 35 seat suite that we're retiring.

 

I've dug out our old power meter, so I'll take some accurate readings of power usage so we have a benchmark for moving forward. I doubt the PCs in our classrooms are pulling 250W, but it will be interesting to find out.

 

Many thanks.

[localzuk]

Shifting to 1:1 Chromebooks requires a root and branch rethink of how you use IT in your school. Simply trying to use existing technologies on an entirely different platform is doomed to failure - you are just going to take working technologies and make them work worse on a platform they're not intended for.

 

We have issued Chromebooks 1:1 in our 2 middle schools - Y5-Y8. Our plan is not to entirely remove Windows suites from the schools though, we have left in place enough IT suite provision to handle curriculum computing lessons - so they can use things like Kodu and other more chunky apps. The Chromebooks get used everywhere else.

 

So, I'd start at the very beginning personally - what is your school trying to teach. Is it possible to teach it on purely web based technologies right now? And work from there.

[Oaktech]

I've dug out our old power meter, so I'll take some accurate readings of power usage so we have a benchmark for moving forward. I doubt the PCs in our classrooms are pulling 250W, but it will be interesting to find out.

 

Many thanks.

 

I've just gone on the maximum that's possible from each technology.

 

Just for reference our suite idles around 50w per PC including the monitor. they have 250w PSU and using Kodu and Chrome and and an Office package they jump up to 90w+

[altecsole]

Shifting to 1:1 Chromebooks requires a root and branch rethink of how you use IT in your school. Simply trying to use existing technologies on an entirely different platform is doomed to failure - you are just going to take working technologies and make them work worse on a platform they're not intended for.

 

We have issued Chromebooks 1:1 in our 2 middle schools - Y5-Y8. Our plan is not to entirely remove Windows suites from the schools though, we have left in place enough IT suite provision to handle curriculum computing lessons - so they can use things like Kodu and other more chunky apps. The Chromebooks get used everywhere else.

 

So, I'd start at the very beginning personally - what is your school trying to teach. Is it possible to teach it on purely web based technologies right now? And work from there.

 

Agreed. I've been asked to look at it from a technical point of view, and report back. The complete change to the way we currently work will be something Leadership will need to agree on, and sell that to teaching staff.