Five year computer lease

On last night's Worcester City Council agenda was a memo from Superintendent Boone outlining the five year computer lease being entered into by the Worcester Public Schools.
(In order to commit to something that long, the schools need Council approval.)

The Worcester Public Schools will replace nearly all of the 7,000 computers during the current fiscal year in anticipation of the end of life support cycle for Microsoft XP in April 2014. In order to maintain security and integrity of our operating systems we must upgrade our computers so that the system has current operating system that is protected from virus protection and other software support. In recent years, the technology budget of the Worcester Public Schools has been approximately $600,000 per year (plus additional network infrastructure funds that were available through federal e-rate funds). This level of funding did not allow for the replacement of computers in a six year cycle with new equipment. The district has been purchasing refurbished computers (1-2 years old) and then utilized an approximate seven year replacement cycle. At the end of use most of the WPS computers were over nine years old

The lease is for 7000 computers district-wide, which will go not only in places students will use them, but also will be used by teachers and administrators across the district.