500 Free laptops for kids in care
500 Free laptops for kids in care
Following the Government’s announcement in April to provide technology to support children and schools learning, the Council has now received 502 laptop and tablet devices for vulnerable young people in social care aged up to 19.
The Council has then enhanced these with additional educational software, including Microsoft Office, online learning packages such as BBC Bitesize and extra measures to boost children’s online safety at home.
Telford’s Library app, “Libby”, will also be available for young people to download, this allows the young people to use their laptop to borrow and read ebooks from their local public libraries all for free.
The devices have been assigned to young people who do not have access to suitable devices at home to support their online learning during the current partial school closures.
78 4G routers have also been allocated for those who do not have an internet connection at home.
The scheme also provides a further 26 laptops for young people in Year 10 eligible for free school meals who attend maintained schools. Schools have assisted with identifying these young people.
Academy Trusts have been allocated devices directly by the government for academies for young people in Year 10.
The laptops devices will be delivered to schools across the borough this week.
Councillor Shirley Reynolds Cabinet Member for Children, Young People, Education & Lifelong Learning said: “The government scheme has taken a long time to deliver on their offer but now we have these devices we’ve ensuring they are fit for purpose with extra measures to help keep children safe online and access to more learning resources.
“This is scheme will allow children who are yet to return to school to continue learning from home which is so important for all young people.”
I had assumed this had already happened! An issue raised ages ago at the start of lockdown and here we are at the beginning of July, what a shambles!
Over 500 free laptops for kids and a Labour councillor still tries to find a way be negative about it. Millions of people are working from home and IT equipment has been in short supply as companies have been buying up stocks for their staff. Buying and delivering tens of thousands of laptops for councils and schools in under 8 weeks is no mean feat. I struggled to buy one monitor, let alone tens of thousands of laptops.
I’m still waiting for the council to fix the potholes in my street. They’ve had to come back out and paint round them again because the paint wore off waiting. I reported them again the other day and got a response back saying the case was closed as they’ve cleared the encampment! If they can’t fix a pothole in 2 or 3 years they don’t really have any room to be criticising the government for taking 8 weeks to source, buy, configure and deliver tens of thousands of laptops all over the country.
Śuzí Glaze
Give it a couple of weeks there be selling them at cash converters
Good news from the council, and well done all those who secured the financing. Just hope measures are in place to prevent miss use and theft.
Faye Atterbury