Say goodbye to textbooks and say hello to iPads.
The Clark County Nevada school district has launched a $790,050 iPad program. The Apple devices were handed out to 1150 Las Vegas middle and high school students in September. Each tablet is loaded with an interactive-text-book application for their math classes. And just in case a student thinks about running away with the tablet, they are also preloaded with a locator application, which uses wifi signals to pinpoint its location.
One to one initiatives are costly and not all schools can afford the luxury. Like many school districts, Clark County is already facing a signifcant budget shortfall.
The Las Vegas district isn’t the first to invest in such an initiative. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt launched a similiar program in California last year. While the data is still being analyzed, early results show a major increase in student improvement. Like all districts that spend money on educational technology, the real goal is to increase overall achievement numbers.
One to one initiatives are just one of many ways schools are trying to increase technology in the classroom. While it’s too early to measure the effectivness of the program, one thing is for sure, this is a trend that looks set to increase.
