Schools are keeping up with the times by bringing iPads to students. A recent 'Pew Internet' study on tablet ownership conducted in June of 2013 shows that 34 percent of Americans over the age of 18 own a tablet.

Schools see the importance of acclimating children to the unique environment of a tablet. While keeping content filters in mind at all times. Unfortunately, these filters don't always work as planned - as school admins found out after updating to iOS7.

Updates Lead To Big Problems

What happened? The filters that existed in iOS6 suddenly disappeared when a slew of iPads were updated to iOS7 (across the nation). The new OS was, after all, updated on 200 million iOS devices throughout the U.S. Thousands of those tablets were owned by schools, and used to teach children how to operate a tablet. That's a big issue!

A Closer Look

It seems the update took away more than the filters. A feature allowing administrators to manage the devices remotely to check in on student activities was also rendered inactive once the devices were updated to iOS 7.

As some of the districts allow the devices to leave school property, these filters and remote functions were essential to ensuring the safety of students. Now, this safety measure has been removed, and so have the students' right to take the iPad home at night. In short: the update to iOS7 was one of the worst things that could have happened for some districts! Not to mention a bunch of unhappy students and parents - imagine the problems!

A Big Problem

This poses a big problem for schools all over the U.S. The time it takes to set up each individual iPad is more than a little time consuming. Administrators have to wipe the newly updated devices clean, and then reinstall everything once again.

Some administrators, hearing of the plight of others so frustrated by the problems, have gone so far as to block their own districts' devices from checking for updates. They intend to continue with iOS 6.1.3 until the problem is corrected by Apple. Thankfully, Apple has responded to the issue quickly.

A Fix Is Coming

A spokesperson for Apple has told press (and the worried public) that repairs are on the way. Apple has promised a complete fix by the end of the month. But is this too late? The damage has already been done in some instances (picture a lot of kids with iPads discovering a lack of content filtering!).

Apple's discussion forum contains a thread that is 22 replies in length, all people listing complaints related to iOS7 update issues. How many people have hit the site so far? Right now, that number is 972 views and counting. In other words, the iOS7 update that some districts went through have now made the thousands of purchased iPads completely useless. At least Apple has responded quickly to this problem!

Updates are often littered with bugs, but this is a big deal for all those kids that had a good amount of time alone with the unfiltered Internet. What's your take?

Photo by Stacy Spensley Via Flickr Creative Commons