When Paterson School District learned last week that over 13,000 Chromebooks ordered in June won’t arrive until October, they began scrambling to refurbish thousands of district laptops and tablets so that students without their own devices would be able to start school remotely in a few weeks.
Superintendent Eileen F. Shafer said they still expect to be 4,000 short unless something else comes through.
Schools across the country are facing similar delays in procuring technology, as everyone scrambles to be remote.
“We have the money to buy them but we can’t find the product,” Shafer said.
It is just one of myriad challenges the state’s school districts face as they try to ensure a good, equitable education for students in the middle of a pandemic. As more districts decide to start the school year virtually, the question of technology looms even larger.
Across New Jersey, especially in economically disadvantaged communities, many students lack the computers and internet access necessary for the kind of remote learning that lets students meet virtually with their teachers and classmates.
Census data shows that while statewide, 90% of New Jersey homes have computers and 84% have broadband, the state’s poorer cities often have lower rates. Among cities including Camden, Newark, Trenton, Atlantic City and Paterson, the percentage of households without broadband ranges from 30-40%. For the same cities, between 18 and 25% don’t have computers.
And while districts, with help from federal CARES Act funding, are working to address those technological needs with varied success, there isn’t much they can do for parents who have to go to work and have no childcare, or those whose homes lack the space and quiet for kids to concentrate on schoolwork.
At Trenton Central High School, laptops are unloaded for distribution to students for use at home during the school shutdown Wednesday, April 8, 2020.Michael Mancuso | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
The issue of getting technology and internet access to students is not new. After schools closed in March and it became clear they wouldn’t quickly reopen, districts scrambled to get laptops or tablets to students, sometimes with principals even dropping them off at students’ houses. They worked out deals with cable and internet companies to get internet to those who didn’t have it.
Michael Yaple, a spokesman for the Department of Education, said ongoing technology needs vary widely because some schools already had strong 1:1 device-to-student programs and many had to start almost from scratch.
“With nearly 700 school districts and charter schools, there’s bound to be varying levels of progress,” he said.
In addition to nearly $300 million in CARES Act funding schools can use for technology, Yaple said the state’s new digital divide initiative will give schools another $54 million to close the digital gap, including by providing devices and insuring internet connections.
Some districts are in pretty good shape. The Camden City School District already had laptops for high school students. Since schools closed in the spring, chromebooks and tablets have been distributed to 92% of all students, thanks to a combination of repurposed funding and donations, said school spokeswoman Alisha Brown. The other 8% either already have devices or didn’t pick them up, she said.
The district — which will be all remote this fall — also worked with Comcast to get hotspots in neighborhoods where kids needed internet access.
In Elizabeth, where the school year will also start off remote, school spokesman Pat Politano said that the district worked out a similar deal with a cable company for internet hotspots.
The district already had devices for all students grades three and up, Politano said, and many of the younger kids made do through the spring with paper packets of work. With the purchase of 9,000 more laptops and tablets, all 28,300 students will have devices and the district will hold live, virtual classes starting Sept. 8. The tablets for the youngest kids — who likely can’t type or spell yet — will work via facial recognition software, he said.
Things haven’t gone as smoothly in Paterson, despite the fact that the district also had 7,000 devices for all high school students before the pandemic.
The 29,000-student district had planned for a hybrid approach of in-person and remote learning, but last week joined the growing number of districts to decide to start the school year all remote, after Gov. Phil Murphy announced that districts could delay in-person instruction if they could prove it was a necessity.
The district purchased another 1,660 devices in the spring, but did not have the funds to buy the $3.4 million in laptops it needed for all students, Shafer said. When the federal CARES Act funding made that possible June 2, international sanctions due to alleged human rights violations at a manufacturer farther down the production chain delayed delivery of 13,845 Chromebooks needed for students, Shafer said.
“Some districts probably had the money and were able to buy them sooner. Unfortunately we’ve been underfunded for so many years,” Shafer said. And when they finally did have the money, they couldn’t get the items manufactured and shipped due to the sanctions.
Since the news came in, the district’s IT Department has pulled together 6,000 district laptops and tablets from various buildings and has been putting software on them so students can use them at home while they wait for the Chromebooks. All will have internet access, thanks to a deal with Altice, she said.
“The district is also considering buying 1,000 Chromebooks – new, used and refurbished – to help close the device deficit the district currently faces,” the district said in a statement. “After these measures are taken, the district will still need another 4,000 Chromebooks for students.”
Shafer said she has been in talks with companies that might be able to help them source new devices, and anyone who has a lead should get in touch with her.
“We’ll continue to push for new devices so that students can all have new devices and not refurbished ones,” she said.
Politano said school officials everywhere are trying their best to bridge the digital divide because every student deserves a level playing field when it comes to education, remote or not. But they’re asking for a little understanding and flexibility as the school year begins.
“We can’t say in one breath, ‘these are unprecedented times,’ and then in the next breath expect everything to be like it was before this or to have an answer for everything,” Politano said. “We’ve made it better and we’re going to keep making it better. That’s all any of the school districts, teachers, students can do until this worldwide health emergency gets better.”
Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.com.
Rebecca Everett may be reached at reverett@njadvancemedia.com. Tell us your coronavirus story or send a tip here.
"start" - Google News
August 17, 2020 at 06:00PM
https://ift.tt/3kOAxbs
As more N.J. schools start year remotely, getting tech to kids still a challenge - nj.com
"start" - Google News
https://ift.tt/2yVRai7
https://ift.tt/2WhNuz0
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "As more N.J. schools start year remotely, getting tech to kids still a challenge - nj.com"
Post a Comment