Apple School Manager

[schoolssupport]

Hi all,

Not sure if this has been asked before but here goes!   I work for a local authority which currently uses the free version of Cisco Meraki MDM.   We have a number of new schools being built which will require 100s of new iPads setting up.  My question covers the use of Apple IDs which all of you know is a real nightmare.  From what I've read is Apple School Manager offers ability to support multiple devices and ID accounts via a MDM.   Does have anyone out there have any experience of Meraki and Apple School manger?

Many thanks in advance!

[jared_f]

I don't have any experience using ASM, but are your users going to be installing applications you only issue? If you use DEP you could skip and restrict Apple ID setup and just issue all apps via VPP codes and scope them to the Meraki MDM app for download. No Apple ID required!

[Melissa]

Hi @schoolssupport! SM is integrated with Apple School Manager, and it does support the shared device model I think you are referring to!

Here is a guide on that! 

https://documentation.meraki.com/SM/Profiles_and_Settings/Configuring_Apple_School_Manager_for_Share...

This is not available on our legacy SM dashboards! You can tell if you are using a legacy dashboard by going to Organization>License Info. See what's listed on the top under Systems Manager. 

[Quinny81]

Hi there,

Just my 'two-pennies-worth' but we shifted over to using ASM and managed Apple IDs for our Junior School pupils last year - we had mixed results and ended just moving back to the old-fashioned way until the whole thing was more polished.

The idea of any pupil picking up an ipad and logging in with their own account was nice, but in practice you are limited as to how many different pupils can use one ipad before you hit the cached account limit and, at the time, there was no obvious way to change this limit or clear cached accounts without a full wipe of the device.

On the management side, though, the SFTP syncing of our MIS data with ASM worked a treat so a general thumbs-up for ASM as a tools for admins.

[vassallon]

@Quinny81 Actually the biggest limitation on shared iPad use is the size of the iPad. Here is some great documentation on shared iPad use.

Use Shared iPad from the Education Deployment Guide

This link is pretty handy too for deploying iPads in Education:

https://www.apple.com/education/it/

[vassallon]

@schoolssupport So ASM is a wonderful tool that you should be using. It makes iPad management in my mind much easier. We use it here for Apple Classroom Management and Apple Schoolwork management. You also get the 200 GB of storage with ASM created accounts. It also makes app management and deployment much easier that using Apple IDs for app purchasing.

If you have any questions please feel free to reach out to me. I'm in a school district with 4500+ iPads and have quite the experience with using ASM and Meraki together. 

[jared_f]

@vassallon Are students assigned the device with their AD username and password or do they log in with their Apple School Manager address? I don't have access to ASM so I can't really play around with it. It seems like you sync ASM with your SIS and then ASM with Meraki. Then the education configuration takes care of the rest when you check the box to configure with ASM. Is there anyway to map student AD username (i.e. student ID) and match it with their ASM so an administrator doesn't have to re-assign the devices on already deployed iPads to get the education configuration properly scoped.

[vassallon]

@jared_f We have the students login with AD credentials during setup this will associate their ASM accounts to an iPad. That is correct you sync from SIS to ASM and ASM to Meraki. 

Here is how it looks for one of our student accounts within the owner screen.

ASM Student Owner Account

[traustie91]

Hi @vassallon , this is old thread but I'm in desperate need of assistance and thought you might be able to assist, would be greatly appreciated! 

I have ASM and Meraki MDM in all of my schools. I was wondering how get these two to synch devices between, do I enrol the devices on both platforms or how do I connect it? 

I've used Meraki MDM for long but just started using ASM. It would be lot of work to input all the devices again in the ASM. 

Would be very appriciated if you could assist me on this. 

[BlakeRichardson]

@traustie91  ASM includes what used to be called DEP and VPP (Device enrolment program & Volume Purchase Program) 

What you need to do is have your devices enrolled in DEP, then you need to assign them to Meraki, this is all done within the ASM dashboard. 

Then in Meraki > Systems Manager > DEP you should be able to see these desives, assign them with settings and tags.