I’m quite involved in the Ed tech space and unfortunately it’s an environment where a lot of times it’s more expensive to be poor.
Usually only commercial stuff targeting EDU (like Microsoft at the time) was what I could get. It's no wonder Google has taken over. Single pane of glass for everything, almost fully automated, much more bulletproof than anything else available. I would have killed for that 15 years ago.
Of course, at that time everything was in 'computer labs' and things werent really that bad since the machines were always available on wired connections. Doing a 1:1 deployment to that many people as a soloist with crappy mid-aughts wifi and windows XP would have been a completely different ballgame.
Or look at buying a home. In Utah the mortgage on a house is typically much lower than the corresponding rent would be, plus you build equity. However if you don't have the down payment or the credit to buy, then you have to rent. Your rent will be say $1,500/mo where as the corresponding mortgage would have been $1,100. It actually costs more for your housing because you are poor.
Whenever I say it's expensive to be poor, that's the kind of stuff I mean. Your options are just far more limited, in a way that makes it difficult to get a good deal.