CPS Faces A $23 Million Loss Regarding Technological Devices
Chicago Public Schools have supported students during one of the greatest challenges that many families had to endure during COVID-19. This is the lack of school device access for students to be able to continue on their education. As well as, continuously keep attending and completing their assignments to fulfill their academic goals. Especially during those times, when everything shifted to being online via Zoom, Google Meets, etc.
The city of Chicago took action to provide computers to those who needed them for academic purposes. However, this situation has now taken a turn, according to the Inspector General of Chicago Public Schools annual report, it showed that during the 2021-2022 school year, about 77,505 technological devices were reported lost or stolen. In this statistic, it included specifically the $23 million worth of devices, such as laptops, hotspots, and iPads.
Unaccounted Lost and Stolen School Devices
In fact, between 2020-2023, Chicago Public Schools spent a total of $308 million on about 311,000 laptops. Nonetheless, after many incidents taking place, an investigation happened to try to figure out what happened to the missing devices. It is understandable and expected for schools to have some missing and perhaps even lost devices. Yet, this situation was alarming because of the amount of devices that were going missing and out of sight.
In fact, during the investigation, it was noted by the report that every single device from three dozen schools were unaccounted for. Meaning that no one knows what happened to them, or were even aware that they were missing in the first place.
An Uncovered Incident
Furthermore, there was one circumstance where shows that schools did have many devices unaccounted for. According to the CPS Inspector General, Will Fletcher, “Our work uncovered an incident where there were a pair of siblings, a brother and sister at school who between them lost 9-10 devices, [and] there’s no record or indication that the district reached out to the family mentioned this was an issue try to figure out what happened.”
It’s incredible that the school district didn’t take notice that this was becoming repetitive and recurring situation for these siblings up until getting to the point of loosing around 10 devices. And it makes it a bigger issue that the school didn’t even reach out to the family to actually try to figure out what was going on, and overall for the family to have accountability.
What Has Been Done to Solve this Problem
The reality of this problem is that very little has been done to actually solve this problem. And now unfortunately it is too late, according to the 20th ward Alderwoman Jeannette Taylor, “This is a disservice to our young people this $23 million because now we have to figure out how to raise that money. This was wasteful.”
There was indeed an “effort” according the Inspector General report, that CPS did spend about $2.6 million on software to track and recover computers, but they didn’t actually use it. Also according to Ald. Taylor, “CPS should have had something on those laptops computers and tablets to lock them instantly.”
CPS Statement
This shows that not just families are to point fingers to but more so to schools administrations that their job is to be responsible and to keep on track the devices being provided. Apparently now, the district reports that it has recovered 12,000 laptops so far.
As Chicago Public Schools did state the following, “Our CPS team will work to streamline our system for tracking resources, including devices, while enforcing compliance with board policy. In a district where more than 72% of students are from economically disadvantaged families, it is crucial that we are sensitive to our families as we conduct any device recovery efforts.”
Written by Jeanette Sanchez
Sources:
WGN 9: CPS report shows $23M worth of technology unaccounted for
News Nation Now: Chicago schools lost $23 million worth of technology in 1 year
New York Post: Chicago Public Schools lost $23M worth of laptops, iPads and other devices in 1 year
Featured Image Courtesy of California National Guard Flickr Page-Creative Commons License
Inset Image Courtesy of Kennedy Library Flickr Page-Creative Commons License
