extended control of ipad restrictions in school

[dianoia]

Hello,
we have been using jamf teacher for several years to block certain apps or functions during lessons to prevent distractions while working.
There are now two problems that cannot be solved in this way:
1. we also have a rule at our school that iPads are not to be used during breaks.
2. many teachers find it too time-consuming (or simply forget) to activate the lessons they have created with the special permissions/restrictions at the start of lessons.
hence the question of whether it is possible for me to severely restrict the iPads from the ground up and that the apps and functions required for a specific lesson have to be activated - in other words, exactly the opposite of the way it has been handled so far.
if this is not possible, are there any other suggestions for how we can overcome the problems mentioned above?
Thank you very much for your help!

[ryan_w]

Are you asking to restrict the iPads during a holiday break or during breaks during the school day?

Are your iPads managed by JAMF School already?  If so, are they supervised?

[dianoia]

Hi,
thanks for your reply.

We would like to restrict the iPads during the breaks during a school day.

All iPads are managed and supervized by jamf school.

We are using the jamf teacher app to control the iPads during lessons. But if a teacher doesn't put the restrictions in place at the beginning of every lesson, the pupils are very distracted and use every opportunity for extracurricular activities.
So our idea was that the ipads should be restricted and only be unlocked by the teacher during lessons if necessary.

[GregBobbett]

There are ways to set timers to profiles that would apply/remove at set times. It seems to be a funky workaround to the specific timings issue. You can also add Holidays to the organization and there's a few setting you can adjust to allow it to use those. Check this document for setting the Time Filter and Holidays Device Profiles - Jamf School Documentation | Jamf.

[ryan_w]

Thanks, that makes sense and I like the idea behind that.  I don't know if that is possible, but hopefully I can do some testing if time permits.  Maybe someone else will see this that has tried it before.  

[mlo]

As we have the very same idea I'd like to add a question:

How do we enforce a profile like this the moment a student enters school grounds and remove it, when he leaves?

[GregBobbett]

There is a way to create 'Regions' or 'iBeacon Regions' for your school grounds that can be used to activate/deactivate certain profiles. Adding Regions in Jamf School - Jamf School Documentation | Jamf and iBeacon Regions - Jamf School Documentation | Jamf

I have not played with it, so I'm not sure how well it works.

[mlo]

I can define Regions but where do I set the activation/deactivation of a certein profile?

[David5vor12]

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@mlo wrote:

I can define Regions but where do I set the activation/deactivation of a certein profile?

You create a Smart Device Group and add the profile(s) you want to install. Then set the filter accordingly. Im not sure of the exact name of the menu item but you will find it in the list. [iBeacon Region] [is equal to] [Region you created] something like that.

iBeacons depend on the student allowing location services when starting the Jamf Student App for the very first time. They also have to allow the app to use location services to also run in the background. This has to be re-confirmed every 14 days or so. Thats why iBeacons is hardly an option.  

If you can get a static ip address from your ISP - you can setup regions based on ip addresses - also leaves a lot of loopholes for the students - but is definitely more reliable then iBeacons.

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[David5vor12]

Apple has set the direction with the way profiles work. You take an iPad out of its box without any restrictions, then restrict it. Jamf just follows this approach. However in a school setting this leads to the school always being one step behind. If teachers don't restrict or the restriction fails for some reason, students are always on the better end of it.