[ubuntu-za] Free and Open Source Software in Schools

Fri Mar 13 08:46:34 GMT 2009

13th March 2009

Dear Hilton

It was good talking to you earlier on this morning.

Thank you for the advice.

Please could we start putting something in motion to get a full commercial
proposal of how to provide a sustainable solution for the computer needs
of St Mark's College Jane Furse, both the primary as well as the secondary
schools.

This should include all consulting costs and visits to the school.
It should also include detailed assessments of the state of the equipment
at St Mark's and how much it will cost to repair existing equipment or
purchase new equipment to bring the computer labs up to standard.

The proposal should also refer,with specific examples, to existing schools
that are using FLOSS successfully to teach the various grade 8 to grade 12
IT courses.

The proposal should also compare the costs of going the Microsoft route as
compared to the Edubuntu route. A middle route should also be considered
and that would be using FLOSS applications on a Windows XP operating
system.

Thank you,

Regards

Phillip Pare

Hilton Theunissen wrote:
> Hi All
>
> Having deployed over 200 tuxlab school computer labs and 75 digital
> doorways to promote learning and teaching in south africa on floss
> platforms with open content, I might be able to add value to the topic.
>   I have accumulated 8years of every day experience dealing with
> learners, teachers, education officials, parents, ngo's, floss and the
> IT industry companies. I will post as much as I can over the coming
> days. To date I think we still have the largest number of ubuntu ltsp
> servers running in SA if not Africa
>
> We in fact just completed a 10Gb floss software stack for a client that
> plan to role out to a large very large number of schools throughout SA
> and africa
>
> Peter I am with you with establishing small computer clubs in SA
> schools. Focus on those that will end up in the industry. Given the
> nature of the floss community philosophy,etc. The floss cc  would better
> understand the community support and "fix-it-yourselve" model.
>
> The past two days I have been dealing with a school that are considering
> migration to m$ because floss software, content,etc does not comply with
> the SA curriculum or the IT exams. They are also arguing that neither
> community support model or the high cost of FLOSS cost works for them. .
> Microsoft contacted me to find out the history of this lab which has
> been running for 3years. After speaking to the volunteer I want to
> suggest that we stay away from a charity school project. Do it
> commercially or stay away until the DoE supports floss fully.
>
> We have several very successfull schools but that is in the minority.
> Saxonworld primary school in johannesburg is a very successfull
> commercial model. We did so well over the past year that school extended
> the network to teacher workstations into every classroom. 55 diskless
> fat terminals running from single ubuntu ltsp.org server.
>
> Getting back to floss in schools - do it commercially and use new
> hardware. Deploy a full-time IT teacher. Purchase propriety Educational
> content - must be delivered via browser. Set your SLA for a visit twice
> a week in 1st 6-12months. Upgrade software every 12months.  Have a
> certification roadmap - Ingots delivered that for tuXlab schools. We
> have e-learning solution for OpenICDL but the adoption rate is not good
> at all.
>
> My 2cents for now.  the tuXlab sites is not up for now. TuXlab schools
> are running and supporting themselves. Approx 130 operating throughout
> SA supported both commercially and by volunteers. An evaluation study is
> available from the shuttleworth foundation website. Over 70000 learners
> use these open source labs in SA.
>
> You welcome to contact of the list to find out more or adopt a floss
> school in your area to support.
>
> I vote for Ubuntu school computer clubs. Target 2010 by 2010, focus
> group must be private and ex model C schools. That would translate into
> 8% of the number of schools in SA.  If the club consist of minimum 10
> members that will be 20100 ubuntu propeller heads.
>
> Watch out for word on the iLab solution. Hitting the market soon.
> Kind regards.
>
> Hilton Theunissen
> Inkululeko Technologies
> Tel: +27 11 462 9124
> Fax-to-mail: 086 604 2553
> Mobile: +27 72 900800 1
> E-mail: hilton at inkululeko.co.za
> E-mail: hiltontza at gmail.com
> ****Please visit********
> http://www.tuxlab.org.za
> http://www.theingots.org
> http://scns.uwc.ac.za
>
>
> Johan Mynhardt wrote:
>> From personal experience, being out of school since 2005 (end 2005), and
>> currently working in an office set-up, it is clear that most students in
>> secondary school don't really learn anything. They fool around in class
>> because
>> I think they think that they know everything and some of them do.
>>
>> My thought is that by introducing them to the open world of other
>> software and
>> operating systems, they will be encouraged to broaden their skills in
>> computer
>> use. Give them something valuable to talk about. Not complaining to each
>> other
>> about which viruses they had to fix, but instead they can share
>> information on
>> the latest skills they developed while figuring out something that
>> belongs to a
>> bigger project, such as all OpenSource projects.
>>
>> I would encourage schools to make use of FOSS inside the school in every
>> aspect
>> that they can. Back in school I had typing as a subject and they only
>> used MS
>> Office and some old typing books. Around that time I made friends with
>> KTouch, a
>> typing application that tracks your progress and statistics. Also, the
>> thing
>> about notes and assignments: providing the students with FOSS you
>> empower them
>> to achieve the same results that previously only the students with
>> wealthy
>> parents could achieve. Here I point out to image editing and design
>> tools such
>> as Adobe Photoshop and CorelDraw, which can be replaced by GIMP and
>> Inkscape for
>> example.
>>
>> OpenOffice can be used by each and everyone and there is no excuse for
>> formats
>> not being compatible.
>> As far as I can remember KDE had an education suite which included
>> astronomy,
>> chemistry and language games/tools/applications.
>>
>> This all would not be an M-web (*click* just like that) process. It will
>> have to
>> happen gradually. But as they say, How do you eat an Elephant? Piece by
>> peace.
>> We as a community that fight for user's rights and freedom can surely
>> achieve
>> something great. Like a piece of yeast, we spread through the dough.
>>
>> Like PÃ©ter mentioned, some students will end up in a Computer Science
>> field one
>> day, only by the little exposure which they got at school. I consider
>> myself one
>> of them :)
>>
>> I for one will banish anything not FOSS from my home. It has to start
>> sometime.
>> Ladies and Gentlemen, the time is now. Not some day when we start
>> something big.
>> Everyone just have to do his little bit of influence. In the meantime,
>> support
>> open standards, and real standards. Not some substandard.
>>
>> PÃ©ter Nel wrote:
>>> This schools approach is a great idea.
>>>
>>> Some random, yet semi-structured thoughts:
>>>
>>> * what exactly does "FOSS in Schools" mean? Is it,
>>>   ** that STUDENTS should use FOSS in all subjects in School, and/or
>>> at -Home- to do their assignments?
>>>   (I'm unsure of what kids use PC's for in school these days, when I
>>> was in school it was mainly for the "computer science" subject and
>>> home assignments)
>>>   ** that The school itself should run its admin systems on FOSS?
>>>   ** The teachers should run FOSS @ home setting up
>>> notes/assignments/exams, etc
>>>   ** the computer lab?
>>>
>>> I think focusing on one area, or dividing the Wiki into specialized
>>> areas, would be more effective. For instance Sections (from most to
>>> least general) on:
>>> * School administration software.
>>> * Software for teachers
>>> * Software for general subjects
>>> * Software and resources for Computer Science in schools
>>> * The School Computer Club
>>>
>>> Remember alot of schools are already sold on Windows -- are they lost
>>> to us? what about info/links on dual booting, or virtualizing?
>>>
>>> This being true in in my case, CompSci students often know more than
>>> their teachers in some (most) areas, and are sometimes able to
>>> initiate projects or interest in extra ciricular activities like the
>>> "Computer Club"; ... "HOWTO: Start a Computer Club in your School! --
>>> link-> "...
>>> They may also (being the the star CS student) be able to influence the
>>> CS teacher.
>>> The CS teacher, can in turn influence other teachers, and then
>>> eventually the school itself.
>>>
>>> Also, some of these students tend to go on and study computing
>>> further, eventually making it their profession - even though the whole
>>> school, or even the computer science lab, had not been converted, they
>>> would carry that influence with them into the world - and the really
>>> bright and enthusiastic ones, might actually become more influential
>>> in the IT world than their cookie-cutter i-wanna-be-bill-gates
>>> counterparts; or at least lower FOSS resistance in their workplaces.
>>> One could therefore also have links to introductory material on "stuff
>>> not covered by the syllabus" - esp. cross-platform stuff (like java
>>> programming), and/or software packages that run both in linux and
>>> windows (e.g. OO.org, FireFox, etc.) - things that would lower the
>>> barrier to experimental cross-over; we used to code in pascal.. there
>>> are for instance versions of free pascal in the ubuntu repos (can
>>> anyone say bonus marks!?).
>>>
>>> * Kids are easier to inspire, than adults..
>>> * Teenagers tend to respond to ideas of freedom, and self-empowerment.
>>> * Teachers reward young people that take initiative, and would put in
>>> extra effort to open doors for them (even go read up on FOSS)
>>>
>>> It would be more likely that a computer club would adopt and
>>> experiment with FOSS, than converting a whole school would be.
>>>
>>>
>>> et cetara
>>>
>>> PÃ½ter Nel
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> "They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security,
>>> deserve neither liberty nor security"
>>>            - Benjamin Franklin
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>>> Today's Topics:
>>>>    1.  Free and Open Source Software in Schools
>>>>       (William Walter Kinghorn)
>>>
>>>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>> Message: 1
>>>> Date: Thu, 12 Mar 2009 13:53:38 +0200
>>>> From: William Walter Kinghorn <williamk at dut.ac.za>
>>>> Subject: [ubuntu-za] Free and Open Source Software in Schools
>>>> To: "ubuntu-za at lists.ubuntu.com" <ubuntu-za at lists.ubuntu.com>
>>>> Message-ID:
>>>>     <81DF9FB413A687439AC309E7E914C8E408CE43B936 at SMLSMBXSTF01.dut.ac.za>
>>>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>>>> Hi All,
>>>> Please add Documents, URLs, Programs in Ubuntu or not in Ubuntu, to
>>> this wiki, these must be free, so that schools have free use of them
>>>> http://wiki.ubuntu-za.org/Free_and_Open_Source_Software_in_Schools
>>>> you will need to register
>>>> William
>>>> "This e-mail is subject to our Disclaimer, to view click
>>> http://www.dut.ac.za"
>>>
>>>
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