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Probably: Lock-in to Google's proprietary walled garden. Probably loaded with school spy-ware too. Unfortunately a lot of parents won't care, and the school sy

by cliffy 7y ago

Probably: Lock-in to Google's proprietary walled garden. Probably loaded with school spy-ware too. Unfortunately a lot of parents won't care, and the school system won't give them a choice either. However, it leads to shit like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robbins_v._Lower_Merion_School_District https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robbins_v._Lower_Merion_School... The ideal is BYOD. If all you really need is a web browser, then let parents and kids decide what to use together. If you really give a shit about cheating use analog quizzes/tests. It's not perfect, but the old ways are easier to police.

derefr 7y ago
> The ideal is BYOD. These aren't the student's devices; they're enterprise-MDM workstations that the kids happen to carry around. Think of them as a computer lab that the kids don't have to go to; not as Personal Computers per se. They're probably logged into them with a school-issued GSuite email rather than their personal Google Account, too, and told to not use these computers for non-school activity. (I'm not intimately familiar with the Chromebook education initiative, but if it's anything like Apple's initiative with iPads, then that's how it's set up.) And no, the school wouldn't ever be okay with not using Mobile Device Management; MDM is how they ensure that a classroom full of laptops all on a LAN together aren't spreading malware like the digital equivalent of a kindergarten in flu season; and how they ensure the devices don't get spyware installed onto them by someone else (some stranger; or someone's parents!) to steal kids' contact info and location details with the goal of kidnapping or worse. I'd actually think that BYOD would be worse in such a case, as you'd have to contaminate your personal device with an enterprise MDM profile in order to get it on the network. Better to just tell the kid that they can have a personal device, but they also have to have this school-managed device, and that they should think of them as separate things and not use one for the activities better suited to the other. (This also neatly solves the "school spy-ware" worry as well, because if the students are only doing school-work on their laptop and are just using their phones+ISP data plans to text/email/etc., then the school sees none of that.)
- joezydeco 7y ago
  My district is using Google's edu initiative and it's pretty much precisely as you've described. They even filter email so kids can only mail inside the district's domain and can't accept outside email (although I've noticed I can share documents with my kids, which has come in handy).

by cliffy 7y ago

derefr 7y ago

> The ideal is BYOD. These aren't the student's devices; they're enterprise-MDM workstations that the kids happen to carry around. Think of them as a computer lab that the kids don't have to go to; not as Personal Computers per se. They're probably logged into them with a school-issued GSuite email rather than their personal Google Account, too, and told to not use these computers for non-school activity. (I'm not intimately familiar with the Chromebook education initiative, but if it's anything like Apple's initiative with iPads, then that's how it's set up.) And no, the school wouldn't ever be okay with not using Mobile Device Management; MDM is how they ensure that a classroom full of laptops all on a LAN together aren't spreading malware like the digital equivalent of a kindergarten in flu season; and how they ensure the devices don't get spyware installed onto them by someone else (some stranger; or someone's parents!) to steal kids' contact info and location details with the goal of kidnapping or worse. I'd actually think that BYOD would be worse in such a case, as you'd have to contaminate your personal device with an enterprise MDM profile in order to get it on the network. Better to just tell the kid that they can have a personal device, but they also have to have this school-managed device, and that they should think of them as separate things and not use one for the activities better suited to the other. (This also neatly solves the "school spy-ware" worry as well, because if the students are only doing school-work on their laptop and are just using their phones+ISP data plans to text/email/etc., then the school sees none of that.)

joezydeco 7y ago
My district is using Google's edu initiative and it's pretty much precisely as you've described. They even filter email so kids can only mail inside the district's domain and can't accept outside email (although I've noticed I can share documents with my kids, which has come in handy).