Passaic City Public School Narrows the Digital Divide with One of New Jersey’s Largest 1:1 Computing Deployments

Roll out of 5,000 Samsung Chromebook 550s to provide equal opportunities to students and empower an educational transformation
Passaic City, N.J., March 13, 2013 – Passaic City Public Schools and Samsung Electronics America Inc., today announced the deployment of Samsung's Chromebook 550 to all district students across grades 7 though 12 in a 1:1 computing program aimed at providing the district’s educators and students with the technology and resources needed to bridge the digital divide. In a phased deployment, Passaic City Public Schools is rolling out 5,000 of the innovative thin-client laptop devices that operate on Google’s Chrome operating system, making it one of the largest K-12 Chromebook deployments in the United States.

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“This 1:1 initiative with Samsung Chromebooks is the culmination of many years of planning aimed at realizing our goal of narrowing the digital divide for our student population,” said Passaic City Public Schools Interim Superintendent Dr. Lawrence Everett. “With access to Samsung Chromebooks every day and all day at school, and also in their homes from later this year, Passaic students will now have much greater opportunities to obtain the 21st century skills that are so essential to success once they graduate and enter the workforce or college.”

“Samsung believes in the potential for technology to transform the K-12 learning environment, and we are focused on providing school districts with solutions to enhance student engagement and empower teachers,” said Tod Pike, senior vice president at Samsung Electronics America’s Enterprise Business Division. “We’re excited that Passaic City Public Schools chose Samsung Chromebooks for this important project that will open up new opportunities for its students to learn in a more collaborative, rich and globally engaged way.”

Passaic City Public Schools is an urban district with 14,500 students located in northern New Jersey just 12 miles from New York City. Almost all of the students in the district qualify for free and reduced lunch, and district surveys have found that up to 50 percent lack access to the Internet at home, far below state and national averages.

The Samsung Chromebooks provide a number of benefits for school districts such as Passaic planning large 1:1 computing programs:

• Lower cost to purchase than many traditional PCs and other fully configured mobile devices. The newest Samsung Chromebook is priced at just $249.
• Always ready for learning. Samsung’s Chromebook 550 boots in just 7 seconds and wakes from sleep mode almost instantly simply by opening the lid. This means students are up and running quickly, reducing class disruptions.
• A computer that takes care of itself. For an additional one-time fee of $30 per device, Google provides schools with the ability to remotely manage users, apps, and policies across the entire fleet of devices via a web-based console, as well as 24/7 support directly from Google.
• Reduced Total Cost of Ownership. A study by IDC showed that, in comparison to a traditional PC, Chromebooks reduced total ownership costs per device by up to $935 over a three-year period.

“In the past, if you were to deploy 5,000 laptops, you’d have to image them, keep all software updated and perform maintenance on a regular basis, putting a significant strain on IT resources,” said Joshua Koen, Director of Information Technology for Passaic City Schools. “With the Samsung Chromebooks, when we want to deploy a new app or update, we just add it to the management console and it applies to all 5,000. The bottom line is, this massive deployment would simply not have been possible for Passaic City Schools with any other device.”

In preparation for the deployment, Passaic City Schools has also undertaken an overhaul of its infrastructure, making Wi-Fi available for the first time throughout all its 16 schools. From fall 2013, students will also be able to take their Chromebooks home each day and the district has plans to install directional access points on the roofs of its school buildings to provide Internet for students who lack broadband at home.

About Passaic City Public Schools
The Passaic City Public School District is one of New Jersey's largest school districts with an in-district enrollment of about 14,500 students. Located approximately 12 miles west of New York City, Passaic has 14 elementary schools, one middle school and one high school. For more information, visit www.passaic-city.k12.nj.us or follow us on Twitter at @PassaicSchools.

About Samsung Electronics America Enterprise Business Division
As a global leader in Information Technology, Samsung’s Enterprise Business Division (EBD) is committed to introducing new business experiences across a diverse spectrum of industries from retail to healthcare, hospitality to sales. We believe technology brings business and customers together — to better share, collaborate and discover new opportunities. With a market-oriented approach to innovation, EBD is a division of Samsung Electronics America (SEA), Inc., a U.S. subsidiary of Samsung Electronics Company, Ltd. (SEC). For more information, please visit samsung.com/business., call 1-866-SAM-4BIZ or follow Samsung EBD via Twitter: @SamsungBizUSA.

About Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.
Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. is a global leader in technology, opening new possibilities for people everywhere. Through relentless innovation and discovery, we are transforming the worlds of televisions, smartphones, personal computers, printers, cameras, home appliances, LTE systems, medical devices, semiconductors and LED solutions. We employ 236,000 people across 79 countries with annual sales exceeding KRW 201 trillion. To discover more, please visit samsung.com.