Every 3 years due to forced upgrades or just old style deprecation over 3 years.
iPads don’t deprecate in 3 years, nor require forced upgrades. They get nowhere near as much support as a regular Linux laptop (which is what schools SHOULD be using) and even less than Windows laptops pre-11, but if they’re being replaced every 3 years, that’s just policy, not an actual need. Currently the oldest supported iPad is going to hit 8 years since release in a month. The newest unsupported one is going to hit 9 in a month. So yes there’s forced upgrades, but that’s in like 8 years.
I work as a software engineer and most companies have had a minimum 3 year lifetime policy for company laptops. Reasoning being, after 3 years there’s a higher chance of failure, and there have been enough advancements in hardware that upgrading might save SOME dev time. If it fails before 3 years, you get a new one. If you want to keep it longer, you can keep it. But if you want a new one, it should be 3 years old first. I don’t get why school iPads need to be replaced this often, but I reckon there might be a lot more wear and tear and THAT could be the reason for a 3 year replacement policy. It’s simpler than just replacing individual units every now and then.
I have taught math for 4 years in my local school. The iPads were used by the 3rd and 4th grade students. And they never left the classrooms and were well supervised during use.
Starting in 5th grade, they were issued Chromebooks. Google Classroom was used for assignments and other communications. And since Mommy and Daddy had to pay for them IF they were damaged, they held up quite well. The IBM Education model is very robust. Not fast, but robust.
iPads don’t deprecate in 3 years, nor require forced upgrades. They get nowhere near as much support as a regular Linux laptop (which is what schools SHOULD be using) and even less than Windows laptops pre-11, but if they’re being replaced every 3 years, that’s just policy, not an actual need. Currently the oldest supported iPad is going to hit 8 years since release in a month. The newest unsupported one is going to hit 9 in a month. So yes there’s forced upgrades, but that’s in like 8 years.
I work as a software engineer and most companies have had a minimum 3 year lifetime policy for company laptops. Reasoning being, after 3 years there’s a higher chance of failure, and there have been enough advancements in hardware that upgrading might save SOME dev time. If it fails before 3 years, you get a new one. If you want to keep it longer, you can keep it. But if you want a new one, it should be 3 years old first. I don’t get why school iPads need to be replaced this often, but I reckon there might be a lot more wear and tear and THAT could be the reason for a 3 year replacement policy. It’s simpler than just replacing individual units every now and then.
I have taught math for 4 years in my local school. The iPads were used by the 3rd and 4th grade students. And they never left the classrooms and were well supervised during use.
Starting in 5th grade, they were issued Chromebooks. Google Classroom was used for assignments and other communications. And since Mommy and Daddy had to pay for them IF they were damaged, they held up quite well. The IBM Education model is very robust. Not fast, but robust.