I find it interesting that all students had to pay $80 out of pocket for our TI-81 but the same school district a generation later hands out $800 ipads to entir

I find it interesting that all students had to pay $80 out of pocket for our TI-81 but the same school district a generation later hands out $800 ipads to entire classes like they're candy. I used the same TI-81 from 7th thru 12th grade which was 6 years, but the refresh for ipads at the same district is a mere 4 years. I can't help but notice the TI-81 was essentially kid proof and indestructible but the ipad is (intentionally) very delicate to drive sales. Finally I think I used my TI-81 in math and science classes more hours per year than my son uses his ipad. Mostly we used the 81 to do math, mostly my son's school issued ipad is for "downtime" gaming (minecraft) and youtube watching with some casual internet surfing. The tone of the article implies the $100 graphing calculator was a bad era, but its worth considering things have gotten much worse, not improved at all.