Isn't it amazing just how quickly good news can run out of steam? Barely more than two weeks ago we were flying high on the news that Apple's long-declining and stagnant sales to the education market actually rose by a whopping 16% last quarter-- a victory made even sweeter by the fact that sales from all the other manufacturers had declined "by double digits" during the same period. But it's been a rough couple of weeks for Apple's education progress, and if you follow this sort of stuff, you may have long used up any smiles from the sales increase figures.

For example, remember Henrico County in Virginia? Those were the folks that really put Apple back on the education map in a big way in 2001 when they announced that the county would be leasing some 23,000 iBooks-- the "largest portable computer sale to education ever"-- in order to Macify every single middle and high school student and teacher in the county. Well, since the existing lease expires in part at the end of the upcoming school year, Apple suffered a bit of a setback last week when Henrico turned down its offer "to renew and extend" the lease for four more years. No, really! According to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, the Henrico County School Board decided that the existing three-year-old iBooks will be fine for another year or two.

Now, sure, iBooks are durable and everything, but it's worth noting that the entire program will be "the focus of a series of evaluations this year," and Henrico's unanimous decision not to renew the lease just yet subtly implies to us that Apple won't score quite as highly on its exam as we'd like. Reportedly Henrico passed on the deal because "the cost of opting out after a year... was relatively high," which makes it sound like Henrico's hoping to bail on the project as soon as the original contracts are up.

Oh, so you think we're paranoid, do you? Granted, the Henrico board wanting to keep its options open may simply be good business sense, but we sense a larger conspiracy at work, here. Come on, who passes up the chance to trade in 18,000 three-year-old computers-- ones that have suffered for three full school years at the hands of a horde of middle- and high-school students, no less-- for 23,000 brand new ones ready and waiting for more abuse? We sense an exit strategy, that's all we're saying.

But wait, it gets worse: Henrico County isn't the only high-profile Macs-in-schools site to give us a funny tummy this past week. Remember when Maine bought iBooks for every single middle school student in the entire freakin' state? Well, the Associated Press is reporting that Maine just hasn't been able to scrape together the funds or support required to extend the program to all high school students-- and even Apple's compromise deal (which requires that enough individual high schools sign up to account for at least 8,400 laptops, which is probably something like 25% coverage) still hasn't been met. Maine's commissioner, at least, is keen to keep the program growing, but says that it can't happen unless "more schools sign up" and Apple "lowers the minimum participation level."

So Apple's struggling with both the Henrico and Maine deals and you're probably sporting a frowny-face over what it all means for the company's education prospects. Well, buck up, saggy-mouth; those setbacks are clearly a bummer, but BusinessWeek has a ray or two of sunshine to share, reporting that "the nation's fifth-largest" school district is 70% Mac and 30% Dell-- and "wants to move towards an all-Apple shop." To that end, Broward just bought 4,500 new iBooks, which is a far cry from the 23,000 units Apple tried to push to Henrico or even the 8,400 it can't sell to Maine, but according to Phil Schiller, these smaller deals are where it's at: "A year ago, you would hear about big deals like Maine or Henrico County. Now it's moving out to smaller school districts. It's a lot more deals of smaller sizes."

So maybe that 16% increase in education sales last quarter wasn't just a fluke, and Apple's presence in the schools can strengthen even if the Henrico/Maine deals start to peter out. Our suggestion? Save the wailing and the gnashing of teeth until you see the education sales figures for Q4 when Apple reports its quarterly results in October. If you see a decline, well, that might be the time to panic and froth at the mouth. Besides, there's better weather for it that time of year.