FBI Seizes Los Angeles Schools' iPad Documents 229
An anonymous reader writes: The Los Angeles Unified School District had a bold (and expensive) plan to outfit its students with top-of-the-line technology: its 650,000 students will be given Apple iPads to use for school work. The cost? $1 billion. Unfortunately for them, the project has been plagued with problems. Now, the FBI has seized 20 boxes of documents regarding the district's procurement practices and confirmed an investigation. "Hundreds of students initially given the iPads last school year found ways to bypass security installations, downloading games and freely surfing the Web. Teachers complained they were not properly trained to instruct students with the new technology. And questions were raised after emails were disclosed showing that then-Superintendent John Deasy had been in communication with vendors Apple and Pearson before the contracts were put to bid."
When we give money to the schools ... (Score:3, Insightful)
Schools often tell us that they are lack of fund to give our children top flight education, so we give money and more money and some more money to the schools hoping that they will have enough $$$ to properly educating the children
But when schools get the money, where do they spend it on?
On iPADs !
Instead of spending more money paying high salaries to much better quality teachers, teachers who are more resourceful, more dedicated teachers, and so on, the schools waste money on iPADs !
Re:When we give money to the schools ... (Score:4, Interesting)
In this case I'd like to know what the FBI is investigating. Graft? Or are they investigating the students' "cybercrime" of unlocking the iPads?
Re:When we give money to the schools ... (Score:4, Funny)
Maybe they are looking into how badly the students were ripped off by forcing ipads on them.
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How else do you expect the burgeoning masses of youth to learn how to consume?
Re:When we give money to the schools ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe they are looking into how badly the students were ripped off by forcing ipads on them.
No joke, there's only the vast majority of alternative products that provide the same benefits at a lower cost. I guess they may lack the fruity logo on the back...
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Are you able to provide some examples of the devices that you refer to as being the same as iPads at lower cost?
When I look at major benchmarks such as Geekbench (where iPad Air gets more than twice as high score as fastest Galaxy Tab), or sophisticated reviews of tablets that contain rich varieties of performance assessments (e.g. Anandtech 1 [anandtech.com] or 2 [anandtech.com] where gets similar margin greatest performance than competitors in both general and graphics performance measures), I see iPads generally showing greater perform
Re: When we give money to the schools ... (Score:4, Informative)
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But saying the school has "iPads" sounds better than saying it has "tablets" on advertisements.
The LAUSD is a series of public schools. They don't have to advertise. If you live in their geographic footprint and you have kids, you are required by law to send your kids there unless you pay for both the LAUSD AND a private school.
Re: When we give money to the schools ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Besides, would you rather have other peoples kids in school learning enough so they might qualify for a job, or running around the neighborhood finding "alternate means of obtaining funds"?
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You aren't really paying for other peoples kids to get an education, you're paying back for yours.
Just burned up my mod points, or this would get a +1, Insightful.
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That is of course only if he went to that school system. Home school and private school tax payers are still paying.
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If they hired better teachers, what would the teachers' unions do with the worthless teachers? In this case I'd like to know what the FBI is investigating. Graft? Or are they investigating the students' "cybercrime" of unlocking the iPads?
The FBI Hasn't been forthcoming with that detail yet. Assumptions abound.
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It's obvious isn't it?
The FBI want free iPads too so they are getting the emails so they can figure out how the superintendent convinced everyone it was a good idea, and also to figure what bulk discount they got so they can negotiate with Apple better.
Investigation a Crapshoot (Score:5, Informative)
Remember when a school was caught installing malware on students' macbooks that covertly took pictures of the children in their bedrooms, almost certainly producing child porn? And we even had correspondence that showed faculty used this capability for entertainment?
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/... [slashdot.org]
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/... [slashdot.org]
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/... [slashdot.org]
The feds investigated but simply decided not to file charges against the school for illegal surveillance, hacking, peeping at kids, etc. I guess that would have set a nasty precedent for the NSA activities that were going on, but only discovered a few years later.
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My guess is they're looking for evidence of corruption in the procurement contracts.
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Yeah, $1500+ per iPad is probably a bit high, even with custom software. This looks like a backroom deal between the Superintendent and Apple/Pearson.
Remember when Apple used to give discounted products to schools and students?
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Fire them.
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In Europe if you suck at your job then the company needs to offer you training and support to get better before firing you. I can see why US unions would want to make firing people harder if the natural response of employers is to just replace under performing staff immediately.
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Yes, they did.
Local CBS 2 story [cbslocal.com]
Re:When we give money to the schools ... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's actually not that hard to figure out where the costs of educating our students go (buildings, transportation, fuel, energy, maintenance, books, supplies, etc.), but you have to actually be willing to *look* instead of just blowing a fuse about some imagined problem.
Yes, there are bad teachers. Yes that sucks. But teachers, in general, don't get paid what they would if they were in *any* related industry. As a result, most of the people you get who teach do so because they *want* to be teachers.
Your own math shows the problem with teachers' wages. You have (well paid) teachers being paid $2333.33 per student per *year*. That's just $1.08 per student per hour, assuming (falsely) that teachers don't actually work outside of school hours. You can't get a *babysitter* for $1.08/hour (it's actually illegal to pay them that little), much less someone who is expected to *teach* the kids something useful. When you account for the time teachers *actually* spend working, it's closer to $0.65 per student per hour.
That also doesn't account for what many teachers (especially those in poorer districts) actually have to pay in order to actually do their jobs. I grew up in a thoroughly middle-class district, and at least *two* teachers I knew of spent roughly a quarter of their take-home pay on supplies students needed that the school didn't provide, and they couldn't afford. As I understand it, that's not atypical for teachers in poor districts, so you're now looking (using your own numbers) at a teacher who is earning $0.50 per student per hour of actual work.
The best part about your bitchy, self-entitled rant about how coddled teachers are? You're not even responsible for a whole $0.01 per student per hour. You just have a bug up your ass about how expensive it is, even though you don't realize how *cheap* it actually is.
Teachers want the technology to be able to prepare their students for a world in which technology is the *life blood* of the economy and the labor force. You want students who can enter college, trade schools, or even the work force who are *already* familiar with computers and technology, because if they're not they'll be behind the curve, and very likely stay that way.
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teachers, in general, don't get paid what they would if they were in *any* related industry. As a result, most of the people you get who teach do so because they *want* to be teachers.
That's one way of looking at it. The other way of looking at it, is that by not paying teachers very much, the teachers you get are the ones that couldn't do any better (i.e. they are worse than the teachers you would get if you doubled teacher salaries and could attract better talent).
You can't get a *babysitter* for $1.08/hour (it's actually illegal to pay them that little)
You can't pay a teacher $1.08 an hour either... I'm not sure where or why the jump from $1.08/student/hour to $1.08/hour happened...
If we paid teachers $10/student per hour, they'd be making $300/hour which would probably b
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Principal. I gather you had the bad teachers you're complaining about?
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You have forgotten that the principle under your theory is looking after all the kids in the school..
Principle is right. I'm not sure if I'm being whooshed or if you actually had a bad teacher.
Let me see... http://blog.oxforddictionaries... [oxforddictionaries.com]
Principle is a noun. Its main meaning is ‘a fundamental idea or general rule that is used as a basis for a particular theory or system of belief’.
A principle is also ‘a rule or belief about what is right and wrong that governs the way in which someone behaves’.
Principle can also be used as an uncountable noun to mean ‘morally correct behaviour’:
Principal is most commonly found as an adjective meaning ‘main or most important’.
Principal is also noun, and its various noun meanings are linked to the adjectival sense (i.e. ‘most important’). A principal may be the head of a school, college, or other educational institution, the leading performer in a concert, ballet, opera, or play, or the most important person in an organization or group:
From the GP sentense, I would expect that he is talking about the head of school?
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The schools do not need more money, they need parents to be parents, and teachers to teach (instead of being cattle drivers and nursery attendants)
Kids need to be instructed in the basics first, then add other things on. Read, write, respect & social values (by community not state and absolutely not federal), maths. Then move on to rhetoric, arts, sciences, trades, music etc.
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Sorry, that was a silly question, of course you are, because you're an idiot troll. Try harder next time.
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Social values by community? Are you *trying* to push us back into the era of segregation?
Sorry, that was a silly question, of course you are, because you're an idiot troll. Try harder next time.
What has segregation got to do with social values by community?
Social values by community is like obscenity, the values are set by the people of that community.
So: Do you take off your hat when you enter a building? Social value by community.
Do you hold the door open for a female? SVxC.
Do you use sir when addressing an older individual? SVxC.
Racists see racism in everything. Those of us who are not, do not.
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...respect & social values (by community not state and absolutely not federal)...
So if my kid goes to school in an area that's predominantly Catholic, she'll be taught to venerate the Virgin Mary and that birth control goes against the will of the Almighty? In spite of the fact that I'm a Buddhist and do not share these values? Thanks, but no thanks.
(Translation: Your Ebbul Fedril Gummint fetish is out of place in this discussion.)
no, racist asshat (Score:2, Insightful)
No, it's a small subset of black people, just the ones that Fox News loves to showcase. Most black people, like most white people, are decent people. There's a small group of black people, like the small group of white people you belong to, who are unmitigated assholes.
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Around here the schools compete to have the most badass video sign out front. Teachers get laid off due the diversion of funds.
Nonfungible budgets (Score:5, Insightful)
But we don't just give them money, we give them money dedicated to specific items. If there is grant money available for computer equipment then you have to write a proposal for computing equipment and you can't spend it on ordinary teachers salaries. If you turn down a grant because it is too specific then you get your budget cut because you obviously have enough already.
Better Teachers... (Score:3, Interesting)
We lost most of the great teachers in the United States when we embraced gender equality. It was definitely the right move, but it cost our country untold billions in terms of the price to education.
Not many decades ago, women could not go into most high-earning-potential fields. Teacher was one of the few fields of instruction open to them, and as a result, a LOT of the smartest women in the country went into teaching. And there are a *lot* of smart women in the country.
You still have smart women teachi
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On top of that, within a week of issuance, they were hacked [cbslocal.com] by the kids to break the security "locks" the district had installed.
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Not really new. Apple has long been in the business of convincing schools to buy equipment they don't need, and it started with the Apple ][. Schools are told that they need to get kids ready for the new computer age, they get a bunch of computers, but then they have no training, no one knows what to do with them, and they end up getting dusty either in a warehouse or a seldom visited computer corner of a library or classroom.
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We had a Burroughs programmable calculator. We wrote programs for it using assembler.
AYBABTU (Score:2)
Yours obviously was.
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What do you expect? As usual the administration was more willing to fund equipment, not teaching positions. It made headlines and to the uninformed it read like the admins were giving the students what they need.
govt procurement processes (Score:5, Informative)
Government purchase procedures for purchases over a small amount typically require large amounts of paperwork from vendors, submitted in various stages to ensure transparency and fairness. "Run down to Walmart and get it for one-third the price" isn't an option specified in the procurement process.
The idea is to make sure they don't just run down to their brother's shop and pay five times the going rate. Unfortunately, it means buying mainly from middleman companies who are in the business of getting government contracts. It can be REAL lucrative to contract for computers - you put in a bid for to top of the line computers at $3500 each, installed. The process takes 18 months before you win the bid. You meet with the government agency and the start planning their migration process. Eventually delivery is scheduled, around six months after you won the bid. At that point you buy some computers that meet the specs you bid two years ago, paying $600 each. Six months after that you collect the $3500 each from the government.
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Duh. What did you expect? (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's look at the premise:
1. Students usually know WAY more about technology than their teachers.
2. Students also have usually WAY more interest in it than their teachers.
3. They also know WAY better how to use the internet than their teachers.
4. Students have WAY more time to spend on breaking security than their teachers have time (and money) to spend on security.
5. Information flows VERY freely on the schoolyard, especially when being able to transmit that information ups your social status.
Am I really the only one who is not only not surprised that this happens, but who would have been SEVERELY disappointed if it hadn't?
IPad is an insult to technology (Score:2, Insightful)
IPad is not a computer. It's a dumb appliance or toy. Just because the kids can use doesn't mean they know anything about real technology.
Re:IPad is an insult to technology (Score:5, Insightful)
It's all about the software and the peripherals. And the kids appear to have figured out the software part on their own, even though the intent was that they couldn't, let alone wouldn't.
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I have calculators that are more powerful than the computers we used back at school. That doesn't mean it is a smart idea to go and spend a billion dollars on pocket calculators for everyone.
Re:IPad is an insult to technology (Score:5, Insightful)
An iPad is a more power computer than any I had access to all through school
Yep, if you're talking about the innards.
It's also a more capable general-purpose computer than those Apple II-series computers and early MacOS 6/7/8 machines
Nope.
An iPad is an appliance for running apps, not a general-purpose computer. Go ahead, just try to program on it, or hook it up to manipulate some random gizmo.
Sure, it can be done -- by someone with the right development tools (which wont run on the iPad) and skills. A far cry from what school kids could teach themselves to do with Apple Basic or Hypercard.
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There are dozens more. Nothing is stopping kids from programming and compiling on an iPad.
...except for Apple?
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I wouldn't mind a game of pac-man...
No, I don't like tablet computers. As I said elsewhere in this discussion, I don't see an application for them that justifies them over a conventional computer. On the other hand, if there are peripherals like keyboards, stands for them to sit like a screen, etc, then they can be useful like a conventional computer.
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an iPad sucks to type on
Sounds like an interface problem. Perhaps difficult but not insurmountable. With proper languages and structured editors, you may not need to "type" your program. You're not a typist after all, are you?
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Closed hardware is certainly shittier than open hardware, but exaggerating the point is counterproductive.
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An iPad is just a laptop with the keyboard and mouse replaced with a touchscreen input. It also doesn't have other peripherals like hard disk, USB connectors etc. But it is still, just a regular computer that is more portable than a laptop.
What kids don't know about technology. (Score:2)
Let's look at the premise:
Better yet, let's look at your premises and see how many of them are true.
If you hand a kid a gadget he or she has never seen before, it is likely that he or she will fearlessly and successfully figure out what to do with it in short order without the slightest thought to reading instructions or seeking help. Kids are growing up with all the wonderful devices and applications that stymie their elders.
Yet these same kids are likely to give little thought to the most efficacious or safest ways to use technology. Part of being young is to ignore warnings and directions. This combination of intuitive ability and lack of examination can lead to less productive and even dangerous use of technology by Digital Natives.
Here are some examples of what I mean:
Kids don't know how to search.
Kids don't know how to evaluate.
Kids don't know how to stay safe.
Kids don't know how to search
The simple process of varying search terms is not common to many young searchers: 10.2% responded that kids 'never' do this, and 71.2% said they 'sometimes' do. Only 2% could boast that their students always know to do this. Narrowing a search is another simple skill utilised far too seldom, with 20% reporting this never happens.
As to Boolean searching, the gap was the greatest: 56.2% said students never use these methods, which suggests to me a lack of instruction. No one reported that students always know to employ these techniques.
But here is a bigger problem: 'bouncing'. David Loertscher, PhD, used this very appropriate label to describe...a common practice: moving quickly from one resource to another without closely reading any material. Granted, this type of skimming may be used early in a search to find promising information, but it is not productive if a reader doesn't carefully follow up on that information.
Kids don't know how to use technology for learning or productivity
It is not enough for youngsters to be masters of their sophisticated cell phones, social networking sites, and gaming devices. Yet these are the three primary areas where kids concentrate their interest and use. Teachers are assuming too much if they take it for granted that students are experts at using applications that are available at school such as office suites, mind-mapping software, graphics tools, etc. Granted, they are likely to be quick to learn, but they do still need instruction and guidance.
Kids can use Excel for all kinds of great graphs, timelines, tables and other projects, but only if they are exposed to the software.
Kids do not know how to be smart and safe online
Because [content] filters offer a false sense of security, the teaching of safe internet searching and communicating is often given short shrift. After all, the filters are keeping out all the bad stuff, right? Wrong. Here are some problems with this line of thinking: Filters both over- and under-block. Even the 'tightest' filter can sometimes let objectionable material pass through. At the same time, a great deal of valuable information can be blocked. I have within the last year asked students to search for terms such as 'triggerfish' , 'sperm whale', and 'breast cancer', only to be blocked.
Teachers and administrators often have a false sense of security because the filters are in place. Thus, they do not actively teach students about safe internet use. When these youngsters go home, to the mall, to the public library, etc, they may be babes in the woods due to the lack of instruction about safety.
What kids know (and don't know) about technology [curriculum.edu.au]
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The kids don't have that goal, and they circumvent those limitations by other means.
Not being able/willing to alter their search pattern is easily overcome by numbers. You have hundreds of kids looking for a way to break the safety of their device. One of them succeeding is enough to multiply the effect because bragging will instantly set in and copying behaviour has always been the staple of the school yard. There is no need to refine your search input if you simply multiply the number of people searching.
One more consideration (Score:2)
There's an extra couple problems that he didn't state:
1. There's a lot more students than there are teachers and faculty. Probably around 20:1. Still, consider these two numbers: out of 15k students in the initial release, 'almost 200' bypassed the security(followed sources). That's under 2%. Of course, it'd still spread. That was the first week cracks.
2. The students have nearly 24/7 physical access to them. That's never a good recipe for continued security.
Of course, given the incidents of faculty
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The main point is that ONE student is all it takes. Word spreads fast on the school yard if there's someone that can make your locked-down school iPod a gaming machine, and the laws of schoolyard status dictates that he'll be more than happy to "help" you.
Teachers cannot compete with that.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I just don't get it (Score:4, Insightful)
Well you answered your own question there, people want new shiny. Advertising is waaaaaay too effective on some people.
I think it's good that students got around the restrictions and are doing things they weren't intended to do. As the old saying goes, you don't learn to hack, you hack to learn.
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Well you answered your own question there, people want new shiny. Advertising is waaaaaay too effective on some people.
and let me guess, you are one of those people, smarter than average, upon which advertising has no effect? thank god for people like you that can tell us what to do.
the article doesn't give the cost of the iPad, but educational institutions don't pay retail. that, and the $1B included upgrades to networking infrastructure to support the devices, which would have been required no matter what.
while certainly shiny, iPads are pretty capable devices that can run applications for just about anything. they are ea
Re:I just don't get it (Score:5, Interesting)
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Because people offering grants are only interested in "new-shiny" not ordinary books and teachers and people voting for school budgets are only interested in "new-shiny" and not ordinary books and teachers.
Schools have to pursue the money that is offered with the hope that they can turn a bit into something useful.
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I can't understand why schools are in such a massive rush to buy iPads before they've even figured out how to use them, and where they fit into the curriculum.
Because it's easier than thinking.
And because more kids can be taught to use iPads than can be taught to appreciate literature or mathematics. More "fair" that way, you see.
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Re:I just don't get it (Score:5, Insightful)
What we're seeing is a lack of killer-application to justify these tablet devices over traditional computers. We're not seeing textbooks that are cached in their entirety on the devices and can function without an Internet connection, we're not seeing educational software that gives the students extra assistance or heuristically learns the students' weaknesses to address them. We're seeing the pencil and paper skills simply be transferred to a much more expensive medium with little tangible benefit and a lot of opportunity for loss.
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I generally agree however I've got to say: my community colleges smartboard + projector combo is super awesome. People who don't want to take notes and would rather focus on what the teacher is saying can do so, and then download a .pdf from the instructor's website. It's really slick.
While it's great that students can focus on the teacher, the process of putting the concepts in your own words and writing them down helps the process of understanding. When I studied I would may times create summaries and "posters" from my own notes, which helped me learn the concepts.
Good job, FBI (Score:3)
$1 billion for 650,000 iPads (Score:3)
That comes out to $1538.46 per iPad, in case you were too lazy to figure it out and checked the comments to see if it was already done.
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That's why it's so expensive!
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talk about too lazy. did you even look at TFA?
"To date, the district has spent $70 million on the project, purchasing a total of 90,713 devices."
that works out to $771.66 / device, which is pretty good considering it includes the network infrastructure, device administration, and software costs.
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Ouch. I hope that includes textbook licensing.
$300 for the iPad
$150 for insurance on said iPad
$100 server licensing for things like blackboard
$300 licensing for all the custom apps and control programs
$200 per-unit cost of training the teachers and administrators on the things, including the back ends.
$400 cost to license electronic versions of their text books
etc...
Still, the sheer cost smacks of some corruption in the selection process.
$1500 per ipad!? (Score:3)
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Excuse me but... (Score:2, Interesting)
"Hundreds of students ... found ways to bypass security installations, downloading games and freely surfing the Web."
"Teachers ... were not properly trained to instruct students with the new technology."
It sounds to me, like the children didn't *need* to be instructed, as they found some other pretty good uses for them, above and beyond what the teachers could ever hope to instruct them on. Unless by "instruct" they meant, how to curtail children's exploratory curiosity and make them fall in line, then sur
A Plan without a Plan (Score:5, Interesting)
The iPads were distributed without any planning about accountability. No one knew who would be responsible if an iPad were lost. (Without a parent's approval, the minor student could not be held legally responsible.) No one knew who paid for repairs. No one knew what was to happen to the iPad when the student moved to a different school district. No one even knew how the iPads would be used within the curricula.
For 8 years, I was an elected school board member in a quite small but high-performing school district. At the closest, we are about 1 mile from the Los Angeles Unified School District. Ours is a rather affluent community. We do not give our students personal electronics. We make PCs available in our high school library, which also serves as a public library where adults can also use PCs.
Re:A Plan without a Plan (Score:5, Insightful)
Think of the (poor) children (Score:2)
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How exactly is Apple an industry leader? They dont hold a majority in any of the markets they are in.
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I think they meant the Fashion Industry, not the IT Industry. Their hardware sales far exceeds the revenue from, for instance, Coach handbag sales.
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Here's another [govtech.com] :
The software side was Pearson. LAUSD is now allowing Chromebook purchases.
Modern Problems (Score:2)
It was a great idea but the fundamental issues barring it from being successful were completely ignored. Organized Labor always wants training and work studies to be completed and approved before anything gets rolled out. I've dealt with this working with Airlines and trust me, you don't change work rules or add tools to the environment without Union buy-in. The training issue keeps coming up and to be fair, the support structure and training should have been thought out well before the first tablets were
Re:Modern Problems (Score:4, Insightful)
"It was a great idea"
Why and how?
"Organized Labor always wants training and work studies to be completed and approved before anything gets rolled out."
You prefer your children to be taught by untrained people using untested methods?
"I've dealt with this working with Airlines and trust me, you don't change work rules or add tools to the environment without Union buy-in. "
In other words, you don't get to change work rules on heavier-that-air flying machines without buy-in from those that operate said machines into the air? Nonsense, I claim, great nonsense!
"You've now given 10s of thousands of tablets to kids so they can watch youporn all day. Congratulations LA Unified School District."
And then again, how and why was this a great idea?
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I think putting cutting technology into the hands of students is a great idea. The caveat is that they are mature enough to understand how to take care of it and use it. Kids nowadays are much more advanced than we'd like to think and have access to things both good and bad that I never had when I was growing up. Getting in front of it and leveraging this for educational purposes was a laudable cause.
How do unions equate to an educated workforce? You can also be an outstanding teacher and not be part of
lol (Score:2)
This was clearly what was going to happen, from the beginning. I think I got modded troll for suggesting it was a bad idea way back when. lol
The only place a school should have a computer that students have access to is in the computer lab (or other classes that would require them like typing or whatever) Sure, there should be classes that prepare students for the rudiments of computer use in case they don't have a computer at home. But when it comes to the rudiments of what should be taught in highschool:
Governor Sununu (Score:2)
How are these iPads connected? (Score:2)
School system is looking for a magic pill (Score:2)
These ipads smack of the same mindset that too many people have about losing weight. They don't want to work for it.
Teaching kids these days is tough. Parents are doing less so schools are expected to do more.
Campaign contributions (Score:2)
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The real lesson these days is how to be a good little slave to your masters.
Hate to disappoint you, but that's what Prussian schooling has always been about.
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"When we learned about computers in school it was not on locked down, corporate monitored, carefully controlled computers. "
Were they conected to the Internet?
"The real lesson these days is how to be a good little slave to your masters."
That's been the case since the XVIII century.
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"They didn't need to be connected to the internet. They were connected to the real world that students lived in, by means of floppy diskettes from home."
I have to say that despite Tanenbaumb's on bandwidth and stationwagons, your latency working on diskettes makes comparing your times with current ones a question of apples to oranges.
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. . . a carefully-timed momentary disconnection of the ethernet cable during startup to provide uninhibited exposure to all the illicit material our developing minds could lust after. Even at the time I was filled with a sense of awe & pride to witness our secret resistance in action.
This is a useful skill in the real world. In no fewer than three AD workplaces, I've seen people's accounts get locked (for one reason or another: IT had the wrong end date for the term position, too many failed login attempts, etc). Unplug the cable, log in, then plug the cable back in. Network drives won't work, but anything stored on the hard drive will, Email works, and internet works (even when you need to authenticate on the proxy). Good workaround when waiting for IT to unlock.
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How about the guy getting paid under the table to accept these contracts?
You can't even appear to be biased in positions like that.