iPads are still the apple of educators’ eyes, but Google Chromebooks are becoming increasingly popular in the classroom.Schools purchased more than 1 million Chromebooks — budget laptops that run Chrome OS — in the second quarter of 2014, Google announced on Monday.
The announcement reflects a larger trend among educators looking to bring low-cost laptops into schools to help facilitate learning. HP also recently announced it would bring to market a budget Windows laptop for $199, and $249 laptops from Acer and Toshiba were announced, giving MicrosoftWindows machines direct competitors to Chromebooks.
Chromebooks’ growth in the education sector isn’t entirely surprising. Schools are looking for low-cost devices, and Google’s cloud-based services such as Google Docs and Drive are free and cut down on software upkeep.
While the iPad continues to flourish in schools, lots of education software benefits from a physical keyboard, so laptops also make it easier for students to create — not just consume — content. Chromebooks could undergo wear and tear from students, too; schools don’t have to worry about repairs for the most part, considering the low price tag.
In December, research firm NPD Group reported that educators were largely opting for Chromebooks in the classroom over Apple MacBooks and Android tablets.
Chromebook computers soared past Apple’s MacBook line in terms of commercial sales, thanks largely due to growth in the education sector.
In an official Google blog post, David Andrade, the CIO for the Bridgeport Public Schools district, detailed why his team selected Chromebooks (models from Samsung, Acer and HP) to serve 23,000 students in Connecticut.
The affordability and easy maintenance of Chromebooks clinched the deal — we could buy three Chromebooks for the price of a single desktop computer and the district’s small IT team wouldn’t have to struggle to keep up with the repairs and updates on aging PCs,” Andrade wrote. “We would also save on support time and costs since Chromebooks update automatically.”
The school district uses Google Apps for Education so students have an email address, as well as Google Drive to move student documents off of its internal file storage system.
