
Apple Tries to Win Back Students and Teachers with Low-Cost iPad - rbanffy
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-23/apple-will-return-to-its-roots-with-education-tools-and-new-ipad
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blakesterz
My kids have now had both iPads and Chromebooks, and the Chromebooks were
obvious winners in every single way. The teachers and kids both like them,
they're clearly better for actual school work and learning, everything is just
better. It's just a nice bonus that they're way cheaper.

~~~
greedo
My kids have both iPads and school issued Chromebooks. They hate the
chromebooks, only using them for homework. They call them "CrummyBooks." The
build quality is terrible, battery life is terrible, and to my kids, they're
locked down way too much (some of this might simply be the wifi
restrictions/filtering at school).

Initially our school district planned iPads, but backtracked over cost. We
were initially excited for them, so that our kids wouldn't have to carry so
many heavy textbooks. But the quality of the textbooks on the Chromebook are
terrible. It's as if the publishers simply took galley proofs and dumped them
into a pdf.

~~~
Harvey-Specter
> the quality of the textbooks on the Chromebook are terrible

Would you expect the textbooks to be better quality on the iPads vs on the
Chromebooks? Why?

~~~
greedo
No, I just expected them to be better, more like an ebook than a crappy PDF.
If I could move the textbooks to my daughter's iPad I would, but they're
licensed and I haven't tried to work around the DRM.

~~~
seba_dos1
Textbooks that cannot be read on a different device due to DRM? That's some
really ugly distopian stuff. Feels so wrong on multiple levels.

Back when I was in school, I was getting some of the textbooks second hand
from the year older students and selling mine to the younger ones, on a fair
organized by the school.

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gbraad
It is not the hardware you need to spend the most on... It is to the inflated
cost of apps, like Oxford Dictionary, etc that charge more due to the Apple
Tax. The lower cost of the iPad is not enough incentive for us to upgrade any
time soon.

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tomswartz07
My previous job was in K-12 tech, and I still keep in contact with my old
boss.

When I started at that position, the school district (~5k students) was nearly
100% Apple. Nearly every device was the low-cost polycarb Macbook. The
district purchased them with a heavy investment from "Classrooms for the
Future" program, which covered a large portion of the cost.

Since that time, Apple retired the less expensive model and (same as they
still are) trying to position the iPad as a replacement.

Here's the problem though: Students are never going to be effective at long-
term use on a tablet. Can you imagine writing a grade 12 level book report on
a touch screen? Budget-wise, the district would only be able to purchase the
iPads, a case, and that's all. Bluetooth keyboards would not be able to fit in
the budget.

Compared, feature for feature, and price- Chromebooks and other traditional
low-cost laptops are much more effective to the success of getting technology
into students' hands.

In fact, they currently run one of the largest 1-to-1 Linux laptop deployments
in the eastern US: [https://technology.pennmanor.net/11-laptop-
program/](https://technology.pennmanor.net/11-laptop-program/)

~~~
ecshafer
You worked for Penn manor? That is pretty cool. At Philadelphia fosscon last
year I saw a presentation by the it director at Penn manor (who is who I
assume you are talking about). It was a really interesting talk, and it was an
impressive achievement. More than just the saving money or more foss use in
schools, I thought the program was especially cool for how it taught actual it
and computer skills to the children.

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canuckintime
The Apple Pencil should be a key strategic advantage for the iPads and should
be compatible with every model if not included in the box outright. Instead
Apple restricts the Pencil to the Pro models. Microsoft won the Business world
by owning the document format. Apple could win the education world by owning
the handwritten notes format [1] if Pencils were standard

What is Tim Cook's vision for education? Nobody fucking knows. One year Apple
is trying to sell iPads claiming it's "whole new kind of computer" then a few
months later they are wondering "what's a computer". Without a compelling
vision the iPad will continue to flounder.

p.s. I want a 7.9" iPad Pro

[1] there is no open source .txt equivalent for hand written notes. We'll need
one if OneNote/Apple Notes ever takes off

~~~
duncanawoods
I put some effort into seriously transferring over note-taking and journaling
to an iPad Pro and Pencil. The initial experience was so delightful that I
thought it could be amazing.

\- I initially liked the experience of writing on glass - its fast and the
responsive but quality seriously suffers - letter roundness and stroke
subtlety is lost to become spider-scrawl. This meant that reading it back
later became a deeply unpleasant and difficult experience reducing the value
of writing anything at all. I committed to it and it didn't seem to be a
technique issue but a combination of the zero friction pen/screen interaction
and how strokes are recorded and rendered. The one thing I did not try was a
screen protector to add more friction.

\- electronic store of handwriting did not not prove useful. It became a worse
experience than flicking through loose leaf paper which you can layout,
rearrange, pin up etc. There is no handwriting recognition or anything to add
value like searching. If I ever wanted to make ink digital, I could take a
photo in 2 seconds.

\- There is something psychological and so special about ink, paper, flow
experience. When you write with ink, you make a mark on the world. The
experience and art is lost on a screen. Its also pretty weird when the screen
gets hot and it increases the time you are staring closely at a screen which
is more fatiguing than taking a break to stare at paper.

\- IOS is just a bad productivity platform - copy text out of a webpage/ebook
into notes? Ugh. Get a pdf onto the iPad. Ugh. It hobbles the user at every
turn. Delight turns into impotent rage at anti-user design decisions to keep
you buying media from Apple. I found I either wanted real text notes and all
the high quality text tooling I am used to on a laptop or the real pen and ink
experience for the flow and flexibility.

A week later, I returned the 12" pro and pencil - the initial wow-factor
turned into loathing. Its worse than the cheapest pen and paper.

~~~
arrythur
I completely agree, except my experience was on a Surface Pro 4. Let me start
by saying it's a fantastic product and the experience of writing/erasing with
the pen was great. I commit to it for a few months in college and while it was
fun to write on, I found that it became more of a hassle when I would try to
study or refer back to my notes. I would be switching tabs constantly on
OneNote then back to a browser, then back to my notes, etc.

With traditional pen/paper, it leaves your computer fully available for
research, videos, or quick references without having to switch around. Great
products overall, but the experience is still lacking in that regard.

------
usermac
I just came from a state-wide, three day tech conference for K-12. I came as a
technology person and thought I might just attend the sessions for teachers
and boy did I get my eyes opened—Google Classroom is a major hit. Teachers
really, really like Chromebooks. This is major.

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giancarlostoro
I will never understand why they don't just rebrand the Macbook Air as just
the Macbook... The new Macbooks look ridiculous to me. They look more like
something that could be called the Macbook Air instead. They should swap the
names. And if they did that and THEN got rid of the Macbook Airs (currently
the Macbooks) I would not be bothered by that. I think Macbooks are hideus
compared to how nice they used to look before they discontinued them. But
that's beside the point. I hope they figure this simple trick out. It would
make their line up way better. Not like they haven't changed their OS name
already.

~~~
eanghel
I love the 12 inch MacBook. It's super small and light and I can carry it in
just a sleeve, and the battery still holds for many hours. Granted, it's not a
powerhouse and I mainly use it for presentations and very light coding, but
there's the Pro model if you need more. Each tool has a purpose, and the 12"
is great for my needs.

The current Air is larger for no particular reason and has a lower res
display, so it's obviously the budget version.

~~~
LyndsySimon
I have a 13" MBP (2017), and it fits in the sleeve I bought for my 12" Windows
tablet (Samsung TabPro S). Battery life is adequate to great, though it feels
pretty low-spec. I'm not sure if that feeling is because it _is_ comparatively
low-spec, but because I recently bought a desktop for gaming and am comparing
it to that.

------
sykh
With budget constraints I don’t see how the iPad can compete with cheaper
alternatives. The only real advantage I see for the iPad over Chromebook in
the education market is that one can digitally markup documents on the iPad
and take handwritten notes on it.

I use an iPad Pro to grade math homework for my online students. I wish they
all had iPad Pros (or Surface Pros) but I can’t force them to buy an iPad for
one class. It would be nice if the college required their usage but there
aren’t enough compelling reasons to do so at this time. I’m skeptical that
there will be enough after Tuesday’s event.

~~~
canuckintime
> The only real advantage I see for the iPad over Chromebook in the education
> market is that one can digitally markup documents on the iPad and take
> handwritten notes on it. I use an iPad Pro...

The 'regular' iPad (and presumably this cheaper iPad) do not support the Apple
Pencil. There are Chromebooks with wacom pen support e.g. Samsung's Chromebook
Plus/Pro [1]. Those Chromebooks start at $499. The iPad Pro starts at $649
(+$100 for the Apple Pencil).

[1] [https://www.samsung.com/us/computing/chromebooks/all-
chromeb...](https://www.samsung.com/us/computing/chromebooks/all-chromebooks/)

~~~
sykh
I know only the Pro model of the iPad supports the pencil. I'm assuming -
hoping! - these new iPads do as well. I did not know about Chromebooks having
pen support. Given this I don’t see how Apple can make a compelling case for
the iPad.

When the iBooks development software came out I was excited. I create my own
materials for my college math courses and I wanted to write a book. But iBooks
is only on Apple devices so why would I spend time creating materials for
iBook? Apple needs to open up some of their stuff if they want a wider
adoption in education.

------
diogenescynic
Update the iPad Mini... it’s been 2.5 years.

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macspoofing
A low cost pencil, paper, and a book is all you really need.

~~~
throwaway-1x9
Yea? Are they going to teach programming with pencil and paper?

~~~
jrimbault
How do you teach programming without pencil and paper ?

~~~
leadingthenet
On laptops?

You do know they have the ability to keep notes, right?

~~~
apotheothesomai
How long does it take to draw diagrams and modify and annotate them over time
on note taking apps? You can do it in seconds by hand. The situation applies
to drawing arrows between phrases and such too. For some things, the simple
way is the best.

It's not one or the other, even in the classroom. Computers didn't kill
handwriting or print, and latter don't hinder the use of computers. They all
complement each other.

Useless tangent: In my experience (= K-12 + 10 years at universities) the best
way to lock things in ones head is to take quick handwritten notes and then
reread, correct, and enter them as notes on one's computer.

~~~
leadingthenet
I didn't make myself clear. I agree, I use pen and paper every day to
complement my laptop use, and it's miles better for some things than can be
accomplished digitally even today.

It's still doable to only have a laptop and use that for everything, if not
practical or quick enough in many cases. Pen and paper is nice to have, but
it's not 100% required.

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bengale
Seems to be a lot of Chromebook comments. Has anyone actually seen one used in
the real world? I contract at a bunch of different places and I've never seen
anyone use one in a business setting. I'm not sure just learning how to use an
iPad is better but I definitely see those being used.

~~~
noxToken
I know of two people who used Chromebooks around 2015. One of them basically
used it as a light laptop. Took notes with it, traveled with it, etc. The
other guy used it as his primary computer. In spite of him praising it
whenever someone would ask about it, he was always complaining about how
difficult it was to use as a development machine. Once you got external
software properly installed and configured, it was fine.

Hearing him complain was reminiscent of using Linux in the early 2000s. No one
really wrote consumer applications for Linux at the time, and driver support
was a nightmare. Once you figured out all the warts and quirk, it was fine.

This was 3+ years ago though, so I imagine things have improved in that space.

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knodi
Maybe that they can try and win back us developers with better macbooks. And
stop being so stingy with space.

