Best, Cheap Technology for a Science Classroom

I asked my resident ed tech specialist, and given the budget constraints, if you're comfortable with Raspberry Pis, you could make kind of mini mobile devices using a set up like http://www.adafruit.com/products/1014 + http://www.adafruit.com/products/1601 + http://www.adafruit.com/products/814. He is not a fan of the quality/longevity of most of the cheaper Android tablets in that price range, but I didn't ask about the XO specifically. One awesome thing is that the Linux beta for http://www.vernier.com/downloads/logger-pro-linux/ is currently free, if you end up with or are using any hardware running Ubuntu. Unfortunately, it looks like Chromebooks start at around 250 each (but it sounds like you're looking for tablets anyway?)

If the XO does look like something you may want, it's at Amazon for jhttp://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00BPPQY8G/metafilter-20/ref=nosim/ right now...

Pretty much all of your necessary qualifications can happen through Google apps - you can share pictures, videos, docs, presentations, etc. through Drive. You can also video edit using a Chrome extension called Pixorial that runs through Drive. There's also WeVideo that is free and works on any device. But honestly, if enough of your kids have smartphones, their video making capabilities will be dramatically increased by using their own devices. My students use iPhones (sometimes even my personal one and my old iPhone 4) to record and then edit in Splice (also free). Those videos are of much higher quality than those made using the cheap windows/nexus/android tablets. Last year, I had a heavy focus on digital media production in my flipped Project-Based Learning 9th grade English class. The only tech we had is what students brought (maybe 60% had smartphones, and another 10% had tablets), my own iPad 3, my two iPhones, my two MacBooks (a 2008 dinosaur and 2012 gen) and an iPad mini I got through Donors Choose. That was enough for groups to create elaborate videos in a reasonable amount of time. Gmail me (same name as here) if you want more details on how I did that.

Hmm... the XO seems to have a lot of complaints about the battery quickly fritzing, which is definitely crucial for my work. Unfortunately, smartphones are not an option. I am at a charter school, and there is a network-wide policy banning phones from being turned on within a block of campus, and even my principal could not grant an exemption. If a network auditor came into our school (which occurs weekly) and saw phones being used, I would be in enormous trouble and possibly let go. I saw that there are some ways to get the Samsung Galaxy cheaply. Either the Galaxy or the Nexus seems like the best option for me. Now I just need to figure out how to get it!