Remember when Maine took education computing to a whole new level by providing iBooks to every junior high school student in the state? Well, bad news, folks: just when it looked like the education tables were really starting to turn in Apple's favor, the company missed its shot to put iBooks in the hands of all 130,000 sixth graders across the entire state of Michigan. Instead, according to an Associated Press article, state officials "are recommending Hewlett-Packard Co. to provide laptop computers and other technical services" for the state's "Freedom to Learn" program.

And what makes the loss particularly galling is that the pilot program upon which Michigan based its decision to launch such a monstrous undertaking used iBooks. That's right; "the smaller pilot project used Apple Computer and awarded technology grants to 10,000 students at 146 schools" last year. So let's see, here... Michigan tests the waters with iBooks and finds that, oh boy, the whole one-to-one wireless notebook idea works splendidly! Then, when it's ready to scale the program up by more than an order of magnitude, it blithely decides that it's going to go with HP notebooks instead of iBooks, because really, how different could the user experience and support issues possibly be?

Does anyone else hear the Three Stooges music playing in the background?

All we can say is, Michigan may well be in for a world of hurt when it eventually discovers that it just introduced a layer of complexity and pain it never bargained for. But do you want to know how HP beat Apple to this sweet deal? Get this: Michigan passed on sticking with iBooks because HP "agreed to charge no more than $275 per student per year." $275?! Sheesh, talk about lowballing a bid. This is for laptops, mind you. HP's cheapest laptop is $724 (and that's only after rebates). And sure, that $275 is "per year," but even if the plan is to make HP's cheapest laptops last for three years, considering that HP also has to provide "technical support, insurance, and training"-- as well as wireless networking equipment, we expect-- that $275 a year isn't going to go very far. Oh, and since Michigan is already planning to siphon $22 million out of its $39 million laptop fund to cover a state budget shortfall, well...

We'd love for Apple to have won this bid, no question, but not at a price that's just going to wind up costing the company buckets of cash. Yes, we know Apple has buckets of cash to spare, but it already has the Maine initiative as a selling point; Michigan would only have been gravy, and really expensive gravy at that. Here's hoping that Apple wins more big education deals, but not if they're just going to be money pits.

Oh, and the other bright spot? Dell didn't win this one either.