Apple today announced that it will supply 30,000 new iBook G4s to Broward County Public Schools for use by all of its students in kindergarten through twelfth grade. The iBooks will greatly increase students’ access to the latest technology for learning, authoring and communication.
“We’re excited to work with Broward County to provide students with the best learning tools available,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s executive vice president of Worldwide Sales and Operations in the press release. “Thousands of schools across the country have improved academic achievement with the help of Apple’s education solutions, and the addition of 30,000 iBooks will do much to help provide students with necessary 21st century skills.”
“As one of the nation’s leading school districts, Broward County Public Schools has long used technology to enhance teaching and learning,” said Dr. Frank Till, superintendent of Broward County Public Schools in the press release. “The new iBooks are ideally suited to meet the needs of our students, and demonstrate Apple’s commitment to education.”
Designed with education in mind, the new iBook is encased in a sleek, durable polycarbonate plastic enclosure and offers improved performance with either a 1.33 GHz or 1.42 GHz PowerPC G4 processor. Providing up to six hours of battery life for all-day use in the classroom, iBook features AirPort Extreme 54 Mbps 802.11g wireless networking. Every iBook also comes preloaded with Mac OS X and iLife ‘05, allowing students and teachers to make the most of digital movies, photos and music in school projects and presentations. The lightweight iBook fits easily in a backpack and its slot-load optical drive has no protruding trays or doors that can break. The new iBook also includes a scrolling TrackPad to easily scroll through long web pages or pan across large photographs and Apple’s Sudden Motion Sensor technology to help protect a spinning hard drive if the notebook is accidentally dropped.
[UPDATE, 9:54am EDT: Added “Florida’s” to headline.]
Related MacDailyNews articles:
Cobb County iBook saga: allegations that school leaders pressured employees to pick Apple – July 11, 2005
Lawsuit to halt Cobb County’s 63,000 Apple iBooks for education plan goes to court today – July 08, 2005
Cobb County’s Apple iBooks in schools saga continues with lawsuit – June 04, 2005
Lawsuit filed to stop Cobb County’s Apple iBook program – June 01, 2005
Cobb County school board approves Apple Mac plan; could eventually distribute 63,000 iBooks – April 29, 2005
Henrico school board dumps Apple Macs, picks Dells with Windows – April 29, 2005
Cobb County school officials intend to move forward with Apple iBook program – April 21, 2005
Cobb Commission chief urges delay in Apple iBook program, says issue has become too emotional – April 20, 2005
No conflict of interest in ongoing Cobb County Apple iBook saga – April 19, 2005
More controversy in Atlanta-area school district’s plan to buy Apple iBooks – April 16, 2005
Cobb County Georgia approves first phase of plan that could equip schools with 63,000 Apple iBooks – April 15, 2005
Atlanta-area school district on verge of deal for 31,000 Apple iBooks – April 12, 2005
Cobb teachers voice concerns over using Macs for proposed laptop program – March 29, 2005
Cobb County Georgia meeting discusses plan to equip schools with 63,000 Apple iBooks – February 24, 2005
Report: 90 percent of emails opposed to Georgia’s Apple iBook program – February 10, 2005
65,000 Apple iBooks for Georgia schools one of the largest school laptop programs in the country – February 10, 2005
Georgia school district to propose 63,000 Macs for students and teachers – February 07, 2005
Where can my kids sign up?
Unlike Henrico who will now be fighting the virus wars instead of having there kids learn anything. There is one upside, they will learn all the various utilities to fight viruses, spyware, and trojans. This way the next time they vote on which platform they’ll use they can all scream out we want Apple!
Stop the deal! I can get them iBooks for $50 each!!!!!
So true.
“their” and “there” – They’re two completely different words.
Their = posessive pronoun (their kids)
move along.
who hoo – that means my son won’t have to carry his 12″ PBook to and fro!
Too bad I just graduated from one of the high schools in this county…oh well, I have a nice iMac G5 for personal use…
There’s some basic information missing from this article–specifically, what STATE this county is in. It’s Florida, by the way.
Surely some dork on the school board will complain and they’ll reversre the decision and change to Dell because they’re cheaper and the machine is different but they do the same thing as the “expensive” Apples with the Appleworks OS.
SB- reverse!
Another school crying for lack of funds, can’t afford to pay teachers yet 30 million suddenly shows up. What happens to these computers next year? Do they give them to the students or will they reuse them and for how many years. There are other classes that do not require a computer, why don’t they get desktops and share them? The life span would be greater and they would only need half as many. This is why they are always out of money, its not there money so it is easy to spend unresponsively.
Maybe with iBooks in the schools they will be able to count votes without high priced lawyers, like in Y2K.
How can the learn without a wide shaped screen?
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MacGoog, What is irresponsible spending is the palacial adminstration buildings that the school boards always find the funds to build. Meanwhile the students are sequestered to portable buildings and temporary classrooms. I think Broward County should be congratulated for investing in their students instead of investing in their middle management.
Some one correct me if necessary, but the article is slightly misleading. According to Broward County’s web site (Ft. Lauderdale area), there are 272,000 students in the Broward school system from K-12. Maybe those 30,000 computers are for the use of all Broward students, but it appears that all Broward students are not getting one for personal use as in other school districts.
Sorry, but I would think it a waste for my Kindergartener (now going to first grade) to have his own computer for school. I want him to learn to read and write FIRST, then learn to type. He already asks to type his name rather than write and we only have 1 family machine.
Its just unnessecary spending. Kids that age dont really take proper care of their belongings. 4th or 5th grade may be a good starting point, younger than that may be more of a hinderance to learning than an asset.
a room of 20+ machines for 1 class at a time use would be a much better investment instead of 400+ machines for Kindergarten to 4th graders having their own.
After botching deals in Henrico and Cobb Counties its nice to see that the folks at Apple aren’t completely asleep at the switch…
Any bets on how long it’ll be before a garnd jury is asked to investigate improprieties between Broward school officials and Apple’s ed sales weenies?
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