Thanks for your email, Lee.
A friend and I have been brainstorming how to start a small company or organization to do some of what you described, particularly provide support, training, documentation, and customized software for P-16 educational institutions. Our personal interests are more related to open source integration in teaching and learning activities than to technology infrastructure and school administration. During our brainstorming, we came to a similar conclusion as you that the revolution will have to come from small public schools and districts, private schools, and charter schools. We haven't made much progress because she has a full-time job, I'm in my last year of graduate school, and neither of us has the start-up funds to get things moving.
However, I (and probably my friend) am willing to contribute to a group effort. I think having a funded organization--similar to the Apache Software Foundation perhaps--will be important for sustaining the effort. I recall reading that some U.S. government agencies has funded projects related to open source projects. The Humanitarian FOSS project ( http://hfoss.org/), funded by the National Science Foundation, is one example.
Regards, Joan
On Jan 23, 2010, at 6:34 AM, lee rodgers wrote:
This is the kind of discussion that I've been looking for, the reason I joined this mailing list years back.
For K-12 schools what is missing is a stable, working clearing house & interest from the FL/OSS community. It would also require some real funding, working disk images, how-to's & hands-on laboratories, & a plan to get it into the hands of school users & admins.
From what I see the education profession is talking out of their butts about digital media. The school districts IT dept's have it sweet. The districts go for weird frills like smart boards & expensive drawing tablets instead of understanding ubiquity. If you pin them down on using commercial software & the problem of homework & bootleg software, their eyes glaze over.
As a teacher at a small school I ran into a real need that - as far as I know - has not yet been met. I was able to roll up my sleeves & improvise, building a digital media lab with a mix of Linux & Windows. It was a rough ride in spots but it was doable, I did it for a charter school. I saved easily a few thousand dollars in server, workstation & software licenses on 70 workstations & 3 servers. I would restart the project again - I also did a lot of development at a private school a couple of years back - but instead it looks like I'm going back to SQL database administration for now. If I could find interest locally or funding I'd be back in it.
From what I can see the revolution will have to come from small schools, from below, the small districts, indep. private & charter schools. If someone can come up with a plan, endorsements & some funding, I'm interested in working on the effort again.
/Lee
From: Bryant Patten <opensource@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: schoolforge-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Fri, January 22, 2010 5:06:20 PM
Subject: Re: [school-discuss] M$ Elevate America
On Jan 22, 2010, at 4:02 PM, Tim Dressel wrote: > Being one that has both feet intermingling with FLOSS and the > commercial side, I think you are right, it is important that the FLOSS > community step up to the plate to put together a comprehensive > training package, course list, and promotional materials. In the K-12 space, there are several of us scattered around the U.S. that are trying to bring the INGOTs program ( www.theingots.org ) to the U.S. This would cover the student certification.Does anyone know the current state of the Red Hat Academy initiative? After the Open Minds conference, Vern Ceder and I talk with Jim Lacey, the head of the Linux Professional Institute, about some kind of teacher certification for FOSS experience. He seemed open to exploring the idea and maybe now is the time to pursue it. > > I would enjoy being part of a group that could create a package > similar to the Elevate America portal Count me in. Bryant ***** Bryant Patten Executive Director The National Center for Open Source and Education www.ncose.org
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