[ipad] Why iPads are not for the Enterprise

[SYNACK]

What I think this highlighted was that any technology can work in a school, so long as there is sufficient willingness to make it work among the staff. If your particular school is like the half that like the iPads at this school then you're likely to be more like Zag. If your staff are like the half that gave them back, then you're more likely get no-where with them.

 

Personally, I'm still entirely dubious of tablets in education. There are many, many issues that need resolving before I'd be happy to jump in with them.

 

Agreed, its the utalisation not the device itself that has the effect.

 

We still have staff who refuse/can't use a touchpad on their laptops because they're to difficult or too inprecise. These same yahoos then turn around and proclaim that touch tablets are the future. You just want to slap them with the chainsaw of understanding sometimes.

[Dos_Box]

the chainsaw of understanding

 

I'm going to steal that if you don't mind

[Marci]

We've rolled out iPads to a large quantity of staff here. Some have purchased them through the school to use for teaching, others use school-owned ones, others bought their own and brought it in. Some staff have said they'd rather stick with netbooks & laptops. Other staff have expressed a preference for Android devices, so we've supported those too. We're gradually sliding AppleTVs into classrooms also as the software is out there to allow MS & Android devices to broadcast wirelessly to them. All the tools are out there to manage these devices, and connect them to network shares, provide safe internet access and fulfill all the other demands made on those devices by the staff for very little comparative cost. As far as I'm concerned we're there to enable the use of technology, not block it. Who are we to judge what a staff member can work best with? That is down to them to discover for themselves. Some staff can do wonders with mobile devices in the classroom. Some staff can do wonders with a regular desktop device. Some staff are lucky if they can string a sentence together on a typewriter. Others have scabs on their knuckles from where they drag on the floor behind them. Whatever they're comfortable with... *shrug*

 

If the infrastructure costs to ensure data / network security etc don't outweigh the benefits, what's everyone's problem (apart from tunnel vision / blinkers)?

Edited July 17, 2012 by Marci

[pcstru]

Some have purchased them through the school to use for teaching, others use school-owned ones, others bought their own and brought it in.

 

Can you elaborate a bit on how you do the staff purchase? Do they own the device? Is there a scheme? How do you avoid tax issues?

[SYNACK]

I'm going to steal that if you don't mind

 

All good, I've been dealing with electritians and their interpretation of network cableing today so I am feeling particularly creative

[Domino]

Instead, the technologies should be looked at in the context of your individual school's needs, and then the issues looked at from there.

 

Or indeed Enterprise, as the thread title.

 

We've not been able to see any value above a laptop. So we're looking at more expensive, less useful and far less powerful devices? awesome.

 

Bear in mind, we're in the City of London, right in amongst all the bankers, headgefunds, etc that all usually jump in on new flashy toys. And we've yet to see a single one used in any kind of business situation, other than maybe reading email. And most people would rather use a smartphone it seems.

 

So, until there's a reason to get one other than 'apps' (ooooh, software ) then I'm staying well clear.

[zag]

Ipads are cheaper than laptops.

[Theblacksheep]

Ipads are cheaper than laptops.

 

£350 for an business spec i3. Windows licences with ess are £30

 

How much are your ipads? and the emerge package?

[Domino]

Ipads are cheaper than laptops.

 

yes, all 4 specs of iPad are cheaper than every possible laptop for every use. well done.

 

Also, that completely disregards the main point of my post for a throw away line: Rocks and cheese are also cheaper - if the iPad's offering no more value, why buy it?

Edited July 17, 2012 by Domino

[glennda]

Ipads are cheaper than laptops.

 

Ipad = £399

Emerge = £99 (based on no site license i think)

Case = £30

Keyboard = £57

AppleCare = £69

Apple TV = £99

 

All in all not quite so cheap

[zag]

The Ipad 2's we buy at the moment are £268 ex vat.

 

I think the standard cheap acer laptops we buy are around £448 ex vat.

 

Obviously Apples to Oranges but tablets are not more expensive than laptops in my experience. Unless of course your wanting to buy windows 8 tablets

 

Emerge is £99 per device and is very expensive I'll give you that one. But you can get a site license which (if we had 100 ipads) would work out at a much more reasonable £33 each.

 

The only other extra thing we buy as standard is the VGA adapter which is £19.99. You don't need a keyboard or applecare from our trial experience. Case's have proved useful but we leave that for the teacher to decide. We are also looking to provide a £20 itunes voucher so I guess you can include that as well.

 

All in all, ipads are a little bit cheaper if anything.

[edutech4schools]

Think we could do with a primary school forum as some of you seem to have way to much cash to be of much use to me.

 

I would love to be able to get all the equipment listed above but I have to push for a single new server every 5 years and normally get a budget for about 10 laptops / desktops per year.

[glennda]

Think we could do with a primary school forum as some of you seem to have way to much cash to be of much use to me.

 

I would love to be able to get all the equipment listed above but I have to push for a single new server every 5 years and normally get a budget for about 10 laptops / desktops per year.

 

Unfortuantly that is life! Some secondary schools have plenty of money to spend - some don't. I know my old place had a budget of around 150k pa but then there was 950 desktops. 40 printers, 35 servers (mix of physical/virtual) - had around 8tb front end storage with 32tb backend - 100 projectors - Radio station - 8 digital signage screens etc etc.

 

1800 users.

[Jamo]

The Ipad 2's we buy at the moment are £268 ex vat.

 

I think the standard cheap acer laptops we buy are around £448 ex vat.

 

Obviously Apples to Oranges but tablets are not more expensive than laptops in my experience. Unless of course your wanting to buy windows 8 tablets

 

Emerge is £99 per device and is very expensive I'll give you that one. But you can get a site license which (if we had 100 ipads) would work out at a much more reasonable £33 each.

 

The only other extra thing we buy as standard is the VGA adapter which is £19.99. You don't need a keyboard or applecare from our trial experience. Case's have proved useful but we leave that for the teacher to decide. We are also looking to provide a £20 itunes voucher so I guess you can include that as well.

 

All in all, ipads are a little bit cheaper if anything.

 

Isn't it per device per year?

 

How do your staff write reports on their iPads?

How do they create media, or the MANY MANY powerpoints, on their iPads?

Do they need laptops/desktop to complement the iPads?

 

I see it as iPads are a complement to existing services, they can no way replace what is already there. It is an extension though, and they are good at what they do.

[SYNACK]

I think the standard cheap acer laptops we buy are around £448 ex vat.

 

Greif, no wonder your users like the iPads better. I'd rather swallow rocks than use an Acer.

[Marci]

Can you elaborate a bit on how you do the staff purchase? Do they own the device? Is there a scheme? How do you avoid tax issues?

 

School purchases the iPad, staff have a monthly sum deducted off their wage over the course of a year until it's paid back. Once it's paid back, they own the device outright. VAT / Tax side of things - *shrug* how they work all that out is the finance department... the only benefit is monthly repayments out of their wage. They don't get it any cheaper than anyone else in education purchasing direct from Apple.

 

How do your staff write reports on their iPads?

Well at the moment they do it online via ePortal, therefore, they just log onto ePortal from the iPad instead of their previous device.

 

How do they create media, or the MANY MANY powerpoints, on their iPads?

QuickOffice HD, or Keynote, both of which can save & open PPT format (there are other choices out there also... basically, all common file formats are accounted for via various apps and can be produced to work across all platforms). Media - videos can be created in iMovie and exported to MP4. Images can be created in the plethora of image apps out there.

 

Do they need laptops/desktop to complement the iPads?

In some cases yes, in some cases no. That's down to the general IT ability of the individual.

 

I see it as iPads are a complement to existing services, they can no way replace what is already there. It is an extension though, and they are good at what they do.

Depends on the individual and the specific task at hand for that individual. Some staff can work happily solely on their iPad / mobile device. Others prefer the more standard methods.

[Theblacksheep]

The Ipad 2's we buy at the moment are £268 ex vat.

 

I think the standard cheap acer laptops we buy are around £448 ex vat.

 

Obviously Apples to Oranges but tablets are not more expensive than laptops in my experience. Unless of course your wanting to buy windows 8 tablets

 

Emerge is £99 per device and is very expensive I'll give you that one. But you can get a site license which (if we had 100 ipads) would work out at a much more reasonable £33 each.

 

The only other extra thing we buy as standard is the VGA adapter which is £19.99. You don't need a keyboard or applecare from our trial experience. Case's have proved useful but we leave that for the teacher to decide. We are also looking to provide a £20 itunes voucher so I guess you can include that as well.

 

All in all, ipads are a little bit cheaper if anything.

 

So an ipad over 3 years, forgetting about the emerge server of cost:

 

£268 (ipad2)

£297 (3 year emerge)

£19 (vga)

£20 (itunes)

-----

£604

 

Sounds expensive

[Jamo]

Who pays for the device when they get broken or break down? If it becomes a 'requirement' to complete their lessons does it become the schools responsibility to pay for the staff's devices?

 

Do they not mind typing on a screen? I find it really annoying, but I suppose I have grown up with keyboards and am able to touch type, which seems impossible on a screen.

[localzuk]

So an ipad over 3 years, forgetting about the emerge server of cost:

 

£268 (ipad2)

£297 (3 year emerge)

£19 (vga)

£20 (itunes)

-----

£604

 

Sounds expensive

 

Arguing about cost is nearly entirely pointless. As someone said earlier - apples and oranges. The iPad is not a full computer device. It can't do everything a PC can do, but that doesn't mean it is a useless device when placed in the right 'niche' in a school. £604 over 3 years is not expensive.

 

Laptop + warranty + Windows, Office etc... + support costs (admit it, laptops have a much higher support requirement than desktops and tablets) and you'll easily surpass £604 over 3 years.

[edutech4schools]

Very good post about surface.

 

Microsoft's foray into flatland | TG Daily

[Marci]

Indeed arguing about cost is daft. They differ for every establishments' individual implementation, eg: We don't use or need "Emerge" or VGA adapters.

 

Who pays for the device when they get broken or break down? If it becomes a 'requirement' to complete their lessons does it become the schools responsibility to pay for the staff's devices?

If it's their device, they do. If it's the school's device, we do. We can get full spares and self-repair outside of warranty. Inside of warranty we take them to the AppleStore. We have a few spare iPads as well just in case. But as said, apps do create stuff in standard formats. Staff have access to and save to network shares. In case of emergency, there's nothing stopping them accessing the same resources via other methods / devices.

 

Do they not mind typing on a screen? I find it really annoying, but I suppose I have grown up with keyboards and am able to touch type, which seems impossible on a screen.

Down to the individual. We accomodate iPads for those who WANT TO USE THEM. We're not forcing them on people. It's their choice. If they choose to use one it's assumed they're happy with all the quirks. I can type just as quick on the iPad's screen as I can on my desktop keyboard. You simply get used to it thru continued use, same as with anything else. Some have gone out and bought their own bluetooth keyboard, that's their choice.

[Theblacksheep]

Arguing about cost is nearly entirely pointless. As someone said earlier - apples and oranges. The iPad is not a full computer device. It can't do everything a PC can do, but that doesn't mean it is a useless device when placed in the right 'niche' in a school. £604 over 3 years is not expensive.

 

Laptop + warranty + Windows, Office etc... + support costs (admit it, laptops have a much higher support requirement than desktops and tablets) and you'll easily surpass £604 over 3 years.

 

I'm not arguing about cost, i'm pointing out the full cost over a 3 year period if you want to supply SIMS (which that school does), its not simply a £260 purchase. Schools need to evaluate what the devices actually achieve (yes they are apples and oranges, but they are both achieve the end result of feeding you) and how much it will cost them over a period. I've also not said it is useless.

 

Sorry, even with a replacement power supply, ess licencing we're still under £500 per laptop over 3 years.

 

Support costs is debatable, some we don't see at all, some we do. Depends very much on the end user. Its not something that was added to the raw ipad cost, so wasn't considered with the raw laptop cost.

Edited July 17, 2012 by Theblacksheep

[zag]

How do your staff write reports on their iPads?

How do they create media, or the MANY MANY powerpoints, on their iPads?

Do they need laptops/desktop to complement the iPads?

 

I see it as iPads are a complement to existing services, they can no way replace what is already there. It is an extension though, and they are good at what they do.

 

Yep exactly. We don't require staff to just use ipads and nothing else. They all have department office computers and a staff computer work room to use at any time.

 

I think the main advantages of the tablets are classroom teaching (in front of kids).

 

They do School reports via the terminal server from home usually which can be virtually any device. Most of the time its their home computer.

[jmak]

For me it comes down to cost benefit analysis:

 

What is the learning outcome of the device?

What will it cost to support? (set up, maintenance, replacement etc)

This applies to everything we spend money on in school: laptops, cameras, pens, books, staff.....

 

If there's a benefit to learning outcomes, then we should facilitate it. I work in an infant school and my instinct is that touch interface devices will probably offer most benefit to our youngest pupils - not that there's nothing in it for older students, but the 3 year olds I work with struggle with a qwerty keyboard but can already use an iPhone when they arrive. Also, if we are trying to make our pupils "digitally literate" they should have access to as wide a range of technology as possible. We already have a child in school who uses an iPad as an "assistative communications device" - he has speech difficulties and it turns symbols and typing into speech in real time, allowing to take part in main stream lessons. Cost of iPad + App less than £500. Previous device with similar,but more limited functionality and heavier was over £2500 - again you need to know why you're buying it and work out whether it's good value for money. In this case, the iPad won hands down.

 

Personal experience, I own a windows 7 laptop, an iPad, Android phone, iPod touch and work in a Windows Server / client environment. All have their advantages - the iOS devices are the only ones that have worked out of the box and have needed no support. Up time is 127 days on my iPad - since I upgraded to iOS 5.1 which only required one click to accept the update. In the classroom, two really big strengths are it turns on instantly and the battery lasts all day. In terms of use, the iPad is great for accessing content, Garageband is very heavily used, I have a great app for training for associated board aural music exams, great recipe book, works well for streaming music and TV to my hi-fi and TV, but for preparing documents, I find a PC is much quicker. As someone else said, for what it's designed to do, the iPad is very effective and reliable, but trying to make it do something that wasn't in Apple's list is probably not time well spent.

 

We should be aiming towards 1-2-1 availability of computing devices, but until that day comes, devices are going to need to be shared. I'm hoping that Win 8 tablets make that easier - I know it's do-able with iPads, but they're not designed to make it straightforward.

 

In general, making all of the unrelated operating systems play nicely is difficult - at the minute I think that will be overcome by using SaaS applications, so that everyone always has the same version of applications to work on (and should be much less hassle for me to manage) but that's some way off too.

[Mr_Jiminy]

My experience of a variety of XP tablets was that they were clunky, had cheap low spec CPU's, relatively low-res screens and the wireless integration of XP to networks was..well..let's just say 'not the best' due to the use of cheap onboard wireless chipsets and the lack of dedicated managed wireless to handle the traffic. Oh, did I mention that they were not exactly cheap either (strange because the internal components certainly were)?

Yeah, it's not a new idea, but doing it right in the enterprise, is.

I almost forgot to mention that more than a few required use of a stylus as well. And lets not talk about the on-screen keyboard.

Hang on, I'll take off my rose tinted specs now and recall the cupboard full of them that I 'managed' because users disliked them so much. I'm rather looking forwards to Windows 8 on a tablet tablet after remembering all of that now

 

Brings back 'unhappy' memories of circa 2003-4 when a client of mine (middle school), invested (wasted) 15k of ICT budget (all of their ICT budget for a year), on a provision of Compaq tablet devices. Oh how I larfed (in despair).

 

I advised the client not to buy said devices, and to strongly consider going down the laptop route, which would double the provision... Needless to say, the above text suggests I was largely ignored. The client ended up with a device which was unresponsive, with a screen so pathetic, it made the device mostly unusable.

 

Anyway, the point I'm making is this - whilst the school had a vision of the future, they had in fact invested a large some of money in what were in affect a one trick pony... The one trick part being the aesthetics, which is where the ipad ties in.

 

I look forward to Microsoft releasing the Surface, as well as the offerings from Dell and the like... Interesting times a head.

Edited July 20, 2012 by Mr_Jiminy