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Built-in software ‘death dates’ are sending thousands of schools’ Chromebooks to the recycling bin
(www.mercurynews.com)
this post was submitted on 25 Jul 2023
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Technology
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Why are schools pushing so hard for enslaved Linux laptops?
Easier to manage for IT would certainly be my bet, and appealing cheap contracts. Even those Acer Aspires so many schools used were double the price of these Chromebooks, so suddenly youre talking about nearly halving a ~$100k cost. Schools want things locked down and enslaved, they couldn't care less that they are Linux under the hood. They don't think like you and I.
Yep, this is it. I volunteered for my school's IT department in high school, this was basically the logic. The laptops are cheap and easy to manage/administrate. Whether or not they were Linux was a non-issue.
Edit: also, since chromeOS is basically just a browser, there wasn't much that could break, and if something did break everything was stored in google drive anyway, so you could just factory reset the device and hand it back to the student without needing to buy any kind of higher-level support contract.
Right? It's basically short term thinking on the school's part.