MESSAGE
| DATE | 2003-05-20 |
| FROM | Dave Williams
|
| SUBJECT | Re: [hangout] Alt schools demo
|
The political scene is a large problem, with progress measured in
inches. But the idea of writing a case study for academic publication
is really good. If we can add to the body of literature while
simultaneously creating real programs it could make future attempts just
a little easier.
Colleges and universities, on the other hand, are a two-headed beast. I
remember CS teachers who really wanted people to learn the fundamentals
of operating systems and programming/scripting languages, and one in
particular who required everyone to choose and install a GNU/Linux
distribution in order to complete their assignments.
Outside of the academic departments, universities have IT departments
that are as inflexible as any corporate staff. They are easy targets
for the Microsoft bribery machine, and get deep discounts at volume
academic licenses for just about everything, in exchange for years of
commitment. My old school had Solaris machines running their big Oracle
systems, but were deep in the pockets of Microsoft for everything a
student or teacher would touch (With the exception of some holdouts in
the English department, who kept their Macs!). Every year returning
students would get a free set of disks with the latest Microsoft
software. That way nobody had an excuse for not producing MS Office
documents!
Considering how sensitive professional academics at the university level
can be (not to mention how constrained they are by their departments), I
think we'll have a lot more success at the community level. Unless
somebody knows a way to get through to them, that is.
- Dave
On Tue, 2003-05-20 at 19:09, Ruben Safir Secretary NYLXS wrote:
> Thanks for the inpsiring testimonial
>
> We've installed FS systems in the schools for a little while now
> and I think we've learned a few things from that run around the track.
>
> Certainly there are formable obstacles to getting things done in the schools
> but the largest ones haven't even been mentioned yet.
>
> In any event, when armed with practicle results and a new ciiriculum, we will
> begin to make progress. This does not in any way lessen the need for a
> rapid demonstration setup and for sales, but the Education is largely without
> any serious power and is in a constant tug of war. We will need to eventually
> target up the food chain, but we are also going to need to interface with
> the education colleges, especially Hunter, and possibly Columbia, if I remember
> correctly, which is where these educators get their indoctrination along with
> those mandated master degrees.
>
> After ironing out the teachers lessons at Concord, if that is still on, we
> might look at getting a grant to study the affects of our Free Software
> curriculum (after we write it) in real classrooms.
>
> As for smiling, It'll have to wait until I have time.
>
> Ruben
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