School boards slammed with loaner tech requests
Student needs for devices strong as virtual learning remains popular option
Students needing devices for online learning have been put on a wait list by the Toronto public school board — the vast majority of them kindergarten students.
The Toronto District School Board has already shipped 7,300 Chromebooks and iPads to students this school year, with 96 still in need of a Chromebook and 800 awaiting iPads, spokesperson Ryan Bird said.
The large demand for iPads is by the board’s youngest students, for whom Chromebooks are not appropriate devices for virtual learning, he said.
Each day, the board receives about 100 new requests for loaner devices — from families who have no devices in the home or are in need of additional devices so children don’t have to share them.
For students in need of technology, many are already working on borrowed or shared devices, or those on loan from their local school, Bird said, given most appear to be logging into the online learning spaces each day.
“We anticipate a new delivery of iPads in November — about 1,000” for the kindergarten students, Bird said.
He said the global demand for devices as COVID-19 has forced kids in countries around the world to learn online — and their parents to work from home — has led to a shortage and longer-than-anticipated delivery times. While teachers at some boards have expressed concerns that the large loaning programs have depleted resources in schools, most boards said additional funding from the province and elsewhere has helped avoid that.
Last spring, when schools across the province were shut down during the first wave of the pandemic, school boards delivered tens of thousands of devices like laptops, or internet sticks to students who needed them.
About 50,000 were distributed to Toronto public students alone, with Peel and York public boards sending out about 20,000 each.
The province also announced a partnership with Rogers Communications and Apple to provide devices pre-loaded with free wireless data.
Kayla Tishcoff of the Peel District School Board said it does not have a wait list for devices.
In York Region, requests for devices are processed twice a week “as such, we don’t have a wait list,” said spokesperson Licinio Miguelo. At the Toronto Catholic board, spokesperson Shazia Vlahos said students who need devices now have them, but “in some instances, there has been a lag between receiving the request for a device and delivery. We have not taken any computers out of in-class learning since we purchased new devices back in March.”