GCS iPad Update
September 27, 2013
Find My iPhone
This has been a week of missing iPads. On Tuesday when an iPad was reported missing, we searched in lockers, looked under bleachers, and made announcements. It did finally turn up in a classmate's backpack. Because all our freshmen have red cases and sophomores have blue cases, it's understandable that occasionally, someone would accidentally pick up the wrong iPad.
Another iPad went missing. This time the iPad was accidentally left on a table in the commons. We have no idea who might have picked it up. We are limited in our ability to track our iPads because they are Wi-Fi only. We can’t locate them with pin-point accuracy. Our monitoring system allows us to lock the iPad, and we have activated that function.
To ensure that your child’s iPad is as secure as possible, I would encourage you to install and activate the Find My iPhone app on your child’s iPad. After you’ve installed the app, go online to https://www.icloud.com/#find and make sure that your son/daughter’s school iPad is listed under All Devices. The iPad will be listed by the name we assigned it. To find the name of your iPad go to Settings > General >About > Name. The name will be uc-m-student- A NUMBER. Make sure that number is the same one listed on Find My iPhone.
The benefit of having this app is that you can login on a computer and find your iPad and make is sound an alarm. As always, if you have any questions about this, have your son/daughter stop by and see me any morning from 8AM-9AM under the TV in the main hallway.
$10 Fee for Deleting Restricted Apps
I check to make sure that none of the restricted apps have been installed. The students are doing a very good job of respecting this rule. There have only been a few occasions where I've had to track down a student and delete apps.
Going forward, if I have to delete an app from your child's iPad, you will be charge $10 per app.
Students have been told that they cannot install any apps from the social networking or games categories. To clarify the restricted apps, I emailed students and told them that the following apps were not allowed: Snapchat, Instagram, Vine, Facebook, Twitter, KiK, Chive, and Youtube.
There are other apps that allow users to view Instagram and Youtube that are not the actual app. For example Padgram is another Instagram app. Similarly, ProTube and VideoTube are apps that allow users to watch YouTube videos on the iPad. These related apps are also not allowed.
The purpose of these restrictions is to help our students understand that the iPads are a school device not an entertainment center. Restricting apps seems to help us fight the battle against distraction.
California's New Eraser Law
With this provision in place, sites like Facebook would have to allow users under 18 a means by which to delete pictures or posts that may paint them in a negative light.
After reading several news articles, I think this new law should come with a huge warning label. The fact remains that once you post something online it is virtually imposible to unpublish or unsent.
It would be like sending an email to someone then deleting it from your account without considering that the recipient still has a copy, or even forwarded the email to 100 people. How could you ever delete all of those forwarded emails?
I think we should continue to teach our children to be careful what they are posting online. Reputations can be damaged with one irresponsible post.
Resource for Students
I'm sharing this information with you so that if your student panics late one night during the first couple of weeks of school, you will have a place to go for help.
First, I have tried to put all of our iPad resources on a web site. This is always a good place to start. Click here to visit GCS iPad Central.
If you want or need to look at the tutorial I'm sending to students today regarding Notability, our notetaking app, and eBackpack, click here.
Look at the iPad
Christina Jontra
Grace Community School
Email: cjontra@gracetyler.org
Website: gracetyler.org
Twitter: @jontracation