This week marked the start of school for New York City's 1.1 million public school students. But even though nearly all students will need to attend class remotely at times, many of them started their first full school days without the devices needed to log on. And it may be weeks before they can get them.

While the New York City Department of Education was able to distribute about 320,000 iPads and other internet-enabled devices in the weeks after schools shut down in mid-March, the agency decided to shift the responsibility to principals and individual schools over the summer. But as Chalkbeat reporter Reema Amin told WNYC's Sean Carlson, many principals say they missed the memo in the flood of COVID-19-related guidance issued leading up to the school year, and are dealing with budgetary restraints to boot.

"For the principals who have been able to afford buying some devices, they placed these orders relatively late. And they're hearing from these companies that they're going to have to wait three-to-four weeks," said Amin. "And then there are some principals that we've heard from that just don't have the money in their budget to fill the gap for how many students are going to need something in the fall."

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