Smart Lockers Reduce Parent Concerns about School-Issued Devices at Home

Take home device programs in schools can provide students tremendous benefits–but while students are the ones using the device, parents are ultimately responsible for replacing it when it’s misplaced or damaged.

That’s why a successful take-home program must have parental involvement and buy-in. Despite common concerns that parents have about school-issued devices in the home, often times there is no alternative option.

For parents who would prefer their child did not bring home their school-issued tablet, a smart locker rental program can provide benefits to the school and its students.

The Case for Leaving Devices at School

If you've ever arrived home from picking up your child at the end of the day only to realize they've forgotten something, you're certainly not alone. Lunchboxes, reusable water bottles, even single shoes somehow get left behind in the pandemonium that ensues when the last bell rings. Some parents are more acquainted with the school secretary who manages the lost and found than their child’s teacher.

While you can make do with a missing lunchbox, it's not so easy to go without a tablet or laptop these days. By leaving the device at school, parents can lessen the chance that devices are misplaced. That’s just one of the many benefits to leaving school-issued devices and BYOD’s overnight on campus. Here are a few others:

• Save $2.8 billion. That’s the number of dollars that electronic devices damaged by kids cost families in a five-year period.[1] Studies show that electronic devices tend to break when kids are using them. When devices are left at school, they’re not as likely to get crushed in a backpack or dropped on the ground when your child is running for the bus.
• Curb device chauffeuring. As we already mentioned, students are notorious for being forgetful. Most parents would rather avoid taking time off work than to deliver a device forgotten at home.
• Improve quality screen time. There’s a reason why they’ve been labeled as screenagers. According to a Pew Research Center study, 65% of parents worry about their teen spending too much time in front of screens.[2] Leaving devices at school is one tactic for parents to limit when and how often kids can go online.
• Limit unsupervised device activity. Even though schools put firewalls in place, parents are sometimes worried about kids going to inappropriate websites on the bus before school, during after school activities, or while unsupervised at home.

Schools and Parents Benefit from Smart Lockers

While there are reasons for taking devices home, this scenario may not always be worth the challenges it brings. One solution to ease parental concern is to give students the option of leaving devices in smart lockers with individually lockable compartments. By implementing a FUYL Tower 15™ Charging Locker in the media center or communal area at school, parents can take advantage of secure overnight classroom charging stations while schools can also benefit:

• Reduce interrupted learning time. Students who leave their device at home or misplace them are not able to participate in lessons—which puts them a day behind in classwork.
• Reduce device loss. Schools that do not provide secure charging can see more than 10-20% of devices becoming broken or going missing each year.
• Eliminate dreaded device dead time. Similar to showing up with no device, uncharged laptops and tablets have the same capacity to disrupt learning time. By empowering students to charge their devices securely at night, schools ensure they’re ready to go when the school day begins.

Rental Program Lessons Financial Impact

With increasingly tight budgets, educational institutions are often looking for innovative ways to invest in the digital classroom. One creative way to deploy a school charging station or smart locker solution and lessen the financial impact on schools is to roll out a rental program. Check out these steps for rental program implementation:

1. The school or district supplies smart lockers with individually lockable compartments in communal areas. Each locker will keep up to 15 phones, tablets, and laptops fully charged and secure.
2. Parents prepay the school to rent out a locker compartment for the entire year.
3. Students are able to access their individual charging locker compartment via a 4-digit PIN.
4. A curfew allows administrators to set time and days where the Tower cannot be accessed by students.
5. Innovative management software allows administrators to remotely open any compartment door, deny access to a reserved locker, receive alerts of abnormal usage, and download a full audit log.
6. Lockers don’t just keep devices safe, they are equipped with power to charge iPads, tablets, laptops, mobile phones, Chromebooks and more.
7. In addition to physical security, the LocknCharge Cloud Platform of the charging locker automatically applies security software updates as they become available. This feature ensures that for Towers connected to a network, security software is up to date and more prepared against cyberattacks.

The best part of all? By charging each student a nominal monthly fee for access to a lockable compartment, FUYL Tower 15™ charging lockers pay for themselves in just a couple of school years.

If you have questions about implementing a smart locker rental program in your school, we’re only a phone call or email away. Get in touch with LocknCharge.

Sources:

[1] https://www.huffpost.com/entry/electronic-devices-damaged-by-kids_n_3862321

[2] https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2018/08/22/how-teens-and-parents-navigate-screen-time-and-device-distractions/pi_2018-08-22_teens-screentime_0-08/