The College Board and Texas Instruments are education profiteers.
Because the College Board has a near monopoly on SAT-type testing, and because they mandate that the only calculators that can use on SAT’s and AP’s and the like are Texas Instruments, they have managed to essentially price-fix the cost of TI calculators.
When I was in High School, years ago, my AP Stats course used TI-83 calculators. They were something like $130 then. They still list at $145, and can be had for $100. That’s an insane amount of money for something electronic with such limited capabilities. For the price of four TI-83’s, I can have an iPad- which can do so much more. It’s a crime.
And it’s been done intentionally. Texas Instruments has been able to keep the price of it’s calculators high via the College Board’s mandate that they are the only acceptable calculator for standardized testing. Our schools pay an absurd premium for sub-par equipment because of the equivalent of price fixing.
The industry of education is based not on providing the best possible product, but on producing the biggest possible profit.