The rapidly advancing world of mobile devices doesn’t stop at the education market, and according to The Washington Post, Apple has academia directly in its sights.
The rapidly advancing world of mobile devices doesn’t stop at the education market, and according to The Washington Post, Apple has academia directly in its sights.
In some schools across the country, textbooks are being replaced with iPads. The idea is to create a more cost-efficient, organized and state-of-the-art learning experience for children. Reducing dependency on paper would have positive environmental effects, and with the ability to store hundreds and thousands of documents on one device, organization is easy.
The news source explains that while the philosophy of switching textbooks for iPads may be ideal and progressive, it currently isn't realistic for many schools. IPads cost at least $500 - for a high school with 1,000 students, that's $500,000 - and even with a discount, it may be too much to bear financially.
Albert Greco, a professor at Fordham University, suggested to the news source that schools would have to buy the iPads for the students, and it would be unfair to expect them to purchase the devices themselves.
"The digital divide issue could be very embarrassing. Because if you don’t have the iPad, you can’t do the quiz, you don’t get instant feedback ... that is an invitation for a lawsuit," Greco said. "I would be shocked if any principal or superintendent would let that system go forward."
While a complete transition to mobile devices across the entire education industry may take years to implement, certain schools have already begun engaging the strategy.
