Maximizing a K12 Budget with Leasing Options
Maximizing a K12 Budget with Leasing Options
School budgets are often stretched thin, and the pandemic has only led to further decreases in public education spending. As state sales and income tax revenues have declined during lockdowns over the last two years, education funding has also declined. The need for funding, meanwhile—particularly for technology in the classroom and in remote learning environments—has obviously increased. School districts across the country are closer than ever to a 1:1 ratio of device to student, and now need to have a clear plan for maintaining and updating their devices. Device-as-a-Service options are a cost-effective and forward-thinking strategy for equipping K12 classrooms with the technology they need, using the budget they have.
Device-as-a-service (DaaS) programs encompass the entire lifecycle of a device: from selecting and procuring the right laptops for a classroom, to transitioning to new laptops once the old ones reach their end-of-life. When combined with services like Lifecycle and Asset Management, DaaS programs mean that school district IT managers don’t have to deal with the hassle of staying on top of updates and maintenance for every device in their district; their service provider tracks, updates, and repairs devices. Rather than adding old computers to the graveyard of broken or outdated printers and desktops that seem to pile up in a forgotten utility closet, the service provider will cart away all old devices for recycling.
Taking Pressure Off of Teachers
The learning curve for teachers in the last couple years was excessively steep as they adjusted their teaching styles to online environments, on top of guiding students and parents through a completely new system. At the height of the pandemic, 71% of teachers in a survey by EducationWeek indicated that they were spending less time on instruction as opposed to other details related to planning and managing instruction, and 87% reported spending more time on troubleshooting technology problems. In interviews about burnout amongst teachers during the pandemic, many expressed feeling a lack of support as they navigated learning how to use the platforms and software that their districts provided for remote learning. The issue of support is not easily fixed by going back to in-person teaching; many of the tools that were adopted during remote learning are here to stay in some capacity.
DaaS programs can support teachers by relieving them of the burden of playing tech support in their own classroom, so that they can go back to focusing on instructing and supporting their students. These programs can also help guide school districts to purchasing devices and software that are effective, but also intuitive enough that teachers and students won’t need to spend an unnecessary amount of time learning the ropes.
Providing Guidance for Wiser Spending
A survey from the Consortium for School Networking found that since 2017, IT administrators in education have largely said that budget and resource limitations have been the biggest challenge they face. These constraints are giving schools fewer quality device options, and causing them to neglect essential details like cybersecurity; the above survey further revealed that the majority of school districts allocate less than 10 percent of their technology budget to network security. As school districts continue to be targeted by ransomware attacks, the limited budget that they do have is increasingly vulnerable. DaaS providers can offer expert guidance for choosing the right security measures, as well as making sure that those measures stay updated.
But when school districts are considering a huge purchase, such as updating their neglected computer lab, it can be difficult for them to know whether the investment will be worthwhile if they don’t already have clear reporting. DaaS programs can offer clear metrics and insight into how the technology districts select is being used, and can recognize patterns of tech problems or inefficiencies that will help make better decisions for future tech tools and funding.
When it comes to the tight, carefully-managed school district budget, DaaS programs eliminate the periodic and unpredictable costs of a piecemeal program which services every laptop individually when it needs repairs or upgrading. DaaS programs tend to offer a predictable fixed monthly fee for service and maintenance instead. Furthermore, customers are able to afford current, quality devices on lease rather than buying older, more affordable devices outright, or buying the latest devices once every ten years.
Vanguard’s Leading Approach
At Vanguard, we listen to your goals and design leasing/procurement options that are customized to your specific needs and requirements. We understand that in Education, for example, payment structure must be matched to a funding calendar and that Corporations have cash flow strategies that must be understood. We strongly believe that our Asset Managed Solutions are unparalleled in our marketplace; we track and monitor assets assigned to users or locations, deployment status, collect signed documents for receipts, use policies, or security requirements, and see real-time inventory and asset utilization. We also offer comprehensive reporting capabilities to share information with other stakeholders and flexible API integration to exchange data with other key systems.
Vanguard is a proud partner of HP, whose DaaS program supports a multi-platform, multi-OS device with predictive analytics and proactive management with security enforcement. The software and services are tailored to clients’ environment with the ability to increase or decrease devices. We can adjust to fit the exact equipment, warranty, deployment services, and even software and peripherals that you would like; all bundled into a monthly fee that makes room for flexibility and customization.
Contact us to speak with one of our experts about developing exceptional DaaS and Asset Managed Solutions for your school district.