Cy-Fair ISD commits to laptops for students
All Cy-Fair ISD students would receive a district-issued laptop and gain access to a wireless Internet hotspot in the 2020-21 school year under a plan that received approval from school board members this week.
Cy-Fair trustees unanimously voted Tuesday to spend up to $44 million on Google Chromebooks and hotspots in the coming months as the district prepares for many students continuing to learn from home amid the novel coronavirus pandemic. District administrators plan to distribute Chromebooks to all 116,500-plus students by the winter break and provide Internet hotspots on an as-needed basis.
The commitment ranks among the most ambitious efforts in the state to ensure students have the technology needed to communicate with teachers and complete their online coursework virtually.
“When you’re going through an unprecedented time, you do unprecedented things,” said Cy-Fair Superintendent Mark Henry, who runs Texas’ third-largest district.
While Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath mandated Tuesday that school districts offer daily in-person instruction — barring a legally-ordered campus closure — they also must provide an online-only option in 2020-21 to students who want to learn from home. If early survey results from other districts are any indication, tens of thousands of Cy-Fair students could remain online-only to start the school year.
Cy-Fair officials said they own about 40,000 Chromebooks, many of which have been distributed since the closure of schools in midMarch, and plan to buy another 75,000 in the coming months at a cost of roughly $39 million. The timeline for obtaining and providing laptops will depend on suppliers, said Karen Fuller, CyFair’s director of infrastructure, communications and networks.
“We know that the supply for those devices, we can’t get 75,000 devices in by Aug. 1. That’s a huge order to place,” Fuller said. “Our goal is by the end of this fall semester, every student will have a device, regardless of needs.”
Administrators plan to provide laptops to children with the greatest academic and technology needs first, such as students with disabilities, at-risk students, English language learners and high schoolers taking advanced courses. Children opting to remain virtual-only in August also likely will receive priority for laptops.
Cy-Fair officials also plan to buy 20,000 hotspots and pay data costs, for a total price of about $4 million. Staff have distributed about 4,100 hotspots to date. The hotspots will come with an unlimited data plan, allowing students to stream live instruction from teachers and log on to the district’s online education platform. Only district-issued Chromebooks will be able to connect with the hotspots.
Cy-Fair administrators plan to use revenues from a $1.76-billion bond package approved by voters in 2019 to pay the Chromebook costs. General operating revenues will cover the hotspots.
“I think it’s a wonderful investment into all of our students, whether they’re receiving instruction in a classroom, in a building or at home,” Cy-Fair Trustee Julie Hinaman said.
Debrah Fortenberry, the president of Holmsley Elementary School’s parentteacher organization, said the technology will become “essential” for many families at her children’s campus. About 70 percent of Holmsley students are considered “economically disadvantaged” by the state.
“When they shut down in March, there were a lot of kids here who didn’t have laptops, didn’t have internet access,” Fortenberry said. “Cy-Fair did offer the paper packets, but you could only come and get them at a certain time, so it was hard for working parents. And the packets weren’t as good as a computer.”
Beyond the obvious academic benefits, Internet-enabled computers also allow districts to better track athome student attendance and engagement, which will dictate how much funding public school districts receive in 2020-21.
School districts throughout the country have scrambled since March to obtain computers and wireless Internet hotspots, often placing orders for thousands of devices at a time.
In Houston ISD, the state’s largest district, Interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan declared in May that her administration hoped to provide a district-issued laptop to all 209,000-plus students by the end of the 2020-21 school year.
However, she later said the plan would require the passage of a new bond package, which looks highly unlikely ahead of the November election.
In Fort Bend ISD, the Houston area’s fourth-largest district with about 76,000 students, staff have issued 7,100 laptops and 1,835 hotspots to date.
Aldine ISD officials, who serve about 67,000 students in one of the region’s lowestincome districts, have distributed about 22,100 computers and 4,000 hotspots. Administrators have agreed to buy another 19,400 Chromebooks, though no more hotspots are on order.
“The district is continuing to look at ways to ensure all students have access to connectivity,” Aldine Chief Communications Officer Sheleah Reed said in an email. “That includes working with apartment complexes and wireless vendors to provide access to students in our district. We have also expanded the signal strengths at each of our campsues and are promoting them as places where students can access the internet.”