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Georgia County to Pay Apple $69.9M for iBooks, Pending Board Approval
by , 5:10 PM EST, February 9th, 2005
Georgia's Cobb County will pay Apple $69.9 million over the next four years to provide 63,000 iBook G4 laptops to teachers, middle and high school students, provided the school board approves the deal.
Two days after word of the possible deal first leaked out, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported late Wednesday that Superintendent Joseph Redden disclosed to school board members the cost of the program. Cobb County said it had managed to negotiate the best price yet in the country for such a program, with each iBook G4 coming in at just $271.26. When support, training, and maintenance are factored in, the cost jumps to $350 -- still 70 percent less than retail.
Board members will vote on the first phase of the plan March 9, which calls for providing the iBooks to teachers this spring. The second phase will be to provide the computers to high school students in early 2006, with the last phase being to provide the computers to middle school students at an unknown future date.
Observer Comments
Wed Feb 09, 2005 6:36 pm Subject: Cobb County math?
Being a DeKalb County resident myself, I never hesitate to poke fun at my suburban neighbors...
My math shows $350/computer x 63,000 computers = $22 million (approximately). The numbers here show this working out to around $1,100 per computer. Still not a bad deal, depending on the configuration, when you factor in support, but a far cry from $350. So what am I missing here?
Anyway, for all those Cobb teachers and administers who receive their iBooks first, there's a handy calculator in the Applications directory.
Wed Feb 09, 2005 10:17 pm Subject: The Last Educators That Bought iBooks Were Fired
Wed Feb 09, 2005 10:51 pm Subject:
QuoteRealityCheck wrote:
At least they have guts, but don't tell them about what happened to the other educators that bought iBooks, the voters kicked them out of office. Check the facts:
http://www.macobserver.com/columns/thebackpage/2003/20031106.shtml
And it had nothing to do with being Macs. It had to do with buying ANY laptops and the perceived cost for support, as well as funnelling that much money to one district. If you had actually read the article, you would know that.
Once again RC proves that he is a fool.
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