Verizon will soon start charging a $20 fee for anyone upgrading their smartphone with pretty much no loopholes to get out of it. Yes, a carrier is introducing a new fee without much explanation and customers are forced to deal with it. Shocking, I know. The new fee goes into effect April 4.

The East Alton school district in southwest Illinois announced earlier this week that it will be launching a one-ton-one iPad deployment for all students in grades three through eight (plus shared iPads for kindergarten through second grade). The announcement is far from unique. Many schools across the U.S. and throughout the world have already launched similar programs – some of them on a much larger scale.

One of the interesting points about East Alton’s decision, however, is that the school district isn’t buying the iPads for its students – a least not initially. Instead, the district has signed a four-year leasing agreement for the iPads. The decision highlights Apple’s often overlooked leasing programs for both business education customers.