Re: Spreading the word (was Re: [Fwd: Re: [seul-edu] Want to present at LINUXWORLD NY/2002?])

[James Oden <joden@eworld.wox.org>]

> 
> On Thu, 02 Aug 2001, zeruch [Joseph Estevao Arruda] wrote:
> Well, our organization focuses on educational applications for
> Linux below university level.  I don't know how we would cater
> to businesses--try to convince them there's money to be made in
> putting Linux into the schools?  _That'd_ be a hard sell! 
> There's not much money to be made in educational consulting in
> _any_form.
While I agree that SEUL's focus should not be toward businesses,
as consultant and ex-employee of a school system, I think that there
is definately money to be made helping schools implament open source 
solutions.  The problem here is not that money can't be made, but
more that both sides (the consultants and the schools) do not understand
the value of open source applications.  School systems will spend 
thousands, some times tens of thousands of dollars on software licenses
and then find that they still don't have exactly what they want, and
in order to get what they want they must either:

	1) Train individuals within their staff.
	2) Hire outside consultants to properly configure and 
	   setup things.
	3) Not do anything and limp along with what they have.

With open source solutions, they still pay for training and sometimes
for consultants to come and help (in which case training should be 
involved), but they do not pay for the software licenses.  So with the
Open Source solutions and consultants, they schools system gets a much
better deal that in many instances can be customized to meet their
precise needs.  Also, when the money is not being spent on consultants,
they can now train the people they couldn't train because the money
has not gone to pay for licenses.  This is just my take on things though,
and of course it could be full of holes.

> I agree with you, Joe.  I'm just coming to believe that these
> venues aren't the best ones for us to spend our limited
> resources on.  I think we should be attending educational
> conferences, rather than commerce-driven Linux ones.  The
> trouble is, I don't know which conferences would be the best to
> attend, what it would take in time and finances to attend them,
> and what kind of presentations would work best for them. 
I think that the presentations should be oriented towards showing 
them how they can get the same results with Open Source software.
Find applications they are using and do presentations to show how 
they can use Open Source in their schools to their advantage.  
Probably the first sort of presentation should be something like:

	Implementing Open Source Solutions in Your Schools

This would have to be a high level presentation that presents things
like:

	1) What is Open Source
	2) How Can it Benefit Your School
	3) Show various applications.
	4) Shows some very cogent analysis of dollars spent
	   on software -vs- dollars spent on training to use
	   OS software.
	5) Definately give them various source on the web they
	   can check out that would let them get more  information.

On the issue of what kind of conferences, I know that in NC that 
they have a conference dedicated directly to technology in schools.
It is the NC ETC (forgot what ETC stands for).  I have presented
my Tech Tracker application several times (three years in a row) at
this conference.  There is also a national technology conference 
for the AETC  organization (I think that is right).  At anyrate,
if you guys wanted to present something in the next NC ETC conference,
I can try to help you make that happen.  Generally it is my old boss
at Lee County Schools that gets me into the NC ETC for Tech Tracker, 
and I think she would be interested in helping you guys do the same.

Let me know if you are interested.  Probably we should discuss the rest
off line.  At anyrate, if you are interested I will bring this up with
Cindy and find out what we can do.  Also, if travel is an issue,
I would be willing to represent you here also, as I will probably be 
at the conference presenting Tech Tracker. 

Oh that would be another strategy by the way.  Spend a session or
two showing off a particular application that solves a particular 
problem.

Cheer...james