LAUSD launches its drive to equip every student with iPads

Two local elementary schools became the first to roll out tablet computers in a $1-billion effort to put iPads in the hands of every student in the Los Angeles Unified School District.

For Broadacres, in Carson, the tablets were an exhilarating upgrade for a campus that had no wireless Internet and few working computers. Technology was only marginally better at Cimarron, in Hawthorne, where the computer lab couldn't accommodate an entire class. LA schools Supt. John Deasy has pushed for the technology, which will cost about $1 billion — half of that for the Apple tablets and about half for other expenses, such as installing a wireless network on every campus. The vast majority of the cost will be covered by school construction bonds, a payment method that has sparked some concerns and legal and logistical hurdles. Not everyone is sold on whether the tablets will improve learning.