Back in the mid-‘80s, when overhead projectors and Trapper Keepers in Day-Glo colors were all the rage, schools averaged about one computer for every 92 students. Today, nearly three-quarters of districts average at least one device for each student.[1] Educational organisations have been leading the charge on mobile deployments (e.g. iPads in the classroom) for almost a decade, employing charging and storing solutions for shared devices to protect their investments and make life easier for teachers and staff.
Schools that employ charging and storing solutions for their mobile devices take advantage of three significant benefits: ensuring devices are fully charged and ready to use, securing them from accidental loss or theft, and simplifying how shared devices are distributed.
1. Ensuring Devices Are Ready to Use
With school-owned and personal mobile devices in heavy use, they’re bound to lose their charge at some point during the day. Plugging a device into any available outlet may seem like the obvious solution, but outlets are hard to come by and do not provide protection against breakage or theft. On-demand, centralised and secure charging towers offer a modern convenience without expensive infrastructure updates to the school.
One learning information systems coordinator in Wisconsin has first-hand experience with the challenge of students needing to charge their devices throughout the day. “Kids were leaving devices wherever there was an open outlet. At one point, an outlet in the cafeteria was being used so frequently that it disrupted the lunch line,” explained Kim Bannigan. Find out how the DeForest Area School District supports an open learning environment with LocknCharge’s easy-to-manage charging stations.
2. Securing Devices from Loss or Theft
An effective school safety and security program addresses both physical and online threats. Since January of 2016, there have been over 700 cyber incidents reported about K-12 public schools and districts in the United States.[2] In the UK, over four-fifths of schools have experienced at least one cybersecurity incident.[3]
10% of mobile devices break or go missing in the first year of deployment, and 41% of data breaches are due to lost and stolen mobile devices. One critical way to secure your devices from physical attacks is to keep them out of the wrong hands in the first place. Implementing durable, secure charging stations will offer theft protection and safeguard devices when not in use, providing significant savings on replacement hardware while avoiding costs incurred from compromised data. Ultra-secure locking systems protect mobile devices from theft, breakage and loss, giving educators peace of mind that their devices are always safe and sound.
Find out how LocknCharge’s durable, secure and transportable Carrier Carts protects the technology investment for one California district, ensuring that students can benefit from the mobile devices for years to come.
3. Simplifying How Devices are Distributed
From inputting endless data to raising standardised test scores, it’s no surprise that teachers feel overwhelmed. A quality of work survey found that educators and school staff find their work twice as stressful as the general workforce.[4] Technology shouldn’t add to the stress of managing numerous day-to-day duties. By simplifying how devices are set up and distributed, educators can spend more time teaching and less time tracking down and handing out devices.
Retaining high-performing teachers is key to a productive classroom. If teachers feel unsupported as new technology is introduced, attitudes can quickly go from excitement to frustration. Easy and efficient mobile device workflow in the classroom can mitigate that frustration and improve teacher satisfaction. Innovative features in a charging solution like charging status indicator lights and mobile device baskets can simplify daily device distribution–giving teachers more control over how they use their class time.
When educators feel supported by their district, they know that their personal well-being is important. Time-saving baskets allow teachers and students to quickly and safely distribute devices every day, putting up to two weeks of class time back into the hands of teachers every year. Also, simple and organised cabling cuts setup time in half, easing the burden of a device deployment on your school’s IT team. Staff will feel supported and know their time is valued when they find more time freed up to focus on forward-thinking initiatives.
All of these benefits ensure that devices can provide the level of utility and productivity that educators demand. Is your school or district in the research or pilot stage of deploying devices? No matter the stage of your organisation’s mobile device deployment, we invite you to understand better the drivers behind workforce mobilisation and best practices of those deployments in our eBook on Mapping the Mobile Device Journey.
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[1] 2018-2019 ANNUAL INFRASTRUCTURE REPORT – CoSN
[2] The K-12 Cyber Incident Map – The K-12 Cybersecurity Resource Center
[3] Pupils Flagged as Cyber Threat to UK Schools – Infosecurity Magazine
[4] 2017 Educator Quality of Work Life Survey – American Federation of Teachers