Tips for Transitioning Your 1:1 Device Program

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Article: Tips for Transitioning Your 1:1 Device Program

May 13, 2021

digital tablet on table in classroom at school

Sped up by Coronavirus school closures and remote learning requirements, many districts reached their 1:1 device program goals years ahead of schedule. In the Newark school system, 98% of the district’s students now have access to laptops or tablets. Buffalo Public Schools hit a milestone late last year of a device for every student, up from an average of six devices per classroom. Even if all schools don’t yet have a device in the hands of every student in need, they have distributed millions more laptops, tablets and Chromebooks than ever before.

The demand of parents working from home and kids learning remotely, coupled with component scarcity, have resulted in massive shortages of Chromebooks and laptops. As a result, acquiring a device for each student has not been easy. And that’s just the first step of a successful 1:1 device program. Many obstacles remain in areas related to teacher training, funding and internet access.

Another hurdle districts will soon face—how to best transition back to in person learning. As EducationWeek explains, “At some point in the future, whenever it’s deemed safe for school buildings to reopen, students will be returning those loaner devices. Then, the process starts to transition tens of thousands of brand-new laptops into devices intended to provide a digital boost to learning inside school buildings.”

Set Up Your School for Success this Fall

Come fall, whether devices are staying in school or going home every night, the restrictions caused by COVID-19 have added a new set of challenges to laptop and tablet charging, storing and redistribution. You need proven classroom device management solutions to make 1:1 programs more efficient for students and less burdensome on school staff.

Challenge	Solution
Summer Vacation Are you faced with the daunting task of bringing all of your loaner devices back and servicing before starting the new school year?	Arrange for safe drop off and pickup. With our robust online management portal for FUYL Tower, IT Admins can manage Smart Lockers remotely. Parents place devices in a compartment at a scheduled time; staff then tracks the activity to see when the compartment was accessed, reset PINs, open doors and more.
Return-to-School Planning When students return full-time to classrooms, does your faculty fear device storage, charging and redistribution for their new 1:1 device program? Are you stressed that devices won’t be charged when in-person learning resumes? Does the idea of cabling/unwiring all of your charging carts keep you up at night?	Invest in an open-concept charging cart. End your cabling nightmares and improve employee satisfaction with easy-to-cable open-concept charging carts. Joey Carts are super easy to cable, making setup a breeze. Baskets securely store and transport large numbers of laptops, tablets, and other technology when not in use. By placing the devices in baskets, devices are quickly loaded and unloaded into a cart, allowing them to be charged in batches very easily.
Broken Devices Broken devices put an increased burden on school staff and resources. With 10% of devices going missing or broken during each year of mobile deployment, the burden can quickly compound. There’s no denying that your new school-owned devices will need repair during the school year. When students and faculty have equipment that breaks or is lost, you need a way to get it back without putting your staff or parents at risk.	Streamline your break/fix program with a Smart Locker. By designating a smart locker as a device repair drop point, school staff no longer waste valuable time tracking down and collecting broken devices. Reduce device downtime by streamlining your frictionless break/fix workflow. Employees and students can easily drop a broken device in the FUYL Tower and retrieve a new device while theirs is being fixed.
Cybersecurity Not using your pet’s name for a password is a great first step to securing your school’s digital assets. But an even better one is keeping devices out of the wrong hands in the first place. Did you know that 41% of data breaches are due to lost and stolen mobile devices? It’s essential to protect your students and your school by securing devices with digital security and physical security when not in use.	Secure your devices from physical attacks. Implementing durable, secure charging stations will protect devices and the data on them—not to mention decrease costs. A centralized point of secure charging helps schools provide a repository for tablets and laptops, reducing breakage and loss. The critical oversight of not protecting your devices when not in use can create painful hassles for students, teachers and administrators alike. By using a secure device charging station, you’ll minimize per-student and per-educator device costs.

Check out more proven solutions to address 1:1 challenges such as forgotten or dead devices.

Most experts express optimism that the majority of K-12 students will be back in-person full-time this fall. When students and educators return, classrooms won’t be the same as they were pre-pandemic. Be prepared to address the challenges of students and staff returning with their loaner devices too. Charging, securing and managing hundreds if not thousands of laptops and tablets may seem overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be. We specialize in facilitating deployment for 1:1 device programs and shared device programs, and we’re here to help.