On Fri, Jul 04, 2003 at 12:39:44PM +0100, Chris Puttick wrote:
The point is this: it is no harder to install, maintain or configure a Linux/open source solution than a Windows or Mac one. It just looks
In some cases considerably easier than trying to make do with Windows. Very few people even install home computers in the first place.
harder... There's an assumption that because someone can configure their home Windows PC, they'll be quite capable of designing, installing, configuring, maintaining and managing a Windows based network with 1200 users on 300 machines, 8 servers running 20 essential services including email, web, AV, firewall, desktop control, printing management, MIS and any number of poorly written and documented specialist applications. But if it's
Some of these applications include parts of "national initutives" or EDI software which an LEA has decided schools must use.
not Windows, then they won't be able to.
If anything, someone who thinks they know what they are doing because they have a home Windows PC, even a trivial peer to peer network, is a positive menance in a school. (N.B. I'm not just talking about children here.)
Fact: both the above assumptions have no basis in reality. Good IT solutions are not bought, they're made. And made by people who have the capability to
Dispite the myth of "Off the Shelf" systems.
do so, rather than just lucky. This is why outside of education, the salaries paid to IT people mark it out as a highly paid occupation. Sensibly enough, few of the highly paid and respected IT professionals from outside education are tempted by a 50% cut in salary and a 100% reduction in status (there are a few naive ones who felt that money wasn't everything and assumed that their professional standing would always command the respect of their work colleagues - but then they start work in the school ;-) ).
Which isn't just an issue "saluting those with a PGCE" but also many LEA people appear to have issues with non-teaching staff.
Before anyone assumes that this is just bitterness, after 3 years I have managed to comfortably demonstrate that a school that allows itself to be guided in its IT strategy by people with sufficient knowledge and interest to do so spend less and gain more; enough that my salary and that of at least some members of my team is now enough to discourage a move (back) to the commercial sector. What's actually driving this mini-essay is that over and over again I hear of or experience incredibly misguided IT decisions that cost the school/LEA much money and time, which then cost more money to fix. Much time is thus spent without an effective IT solution to aid the
Assuming the "more money" actually does qualify as a "fix" :)
department/school/LEA in delivering high quality information systems that effectively support management or teaching and learning. Teachers in particular then become very disillusioned with IT, and start to assume it's a burden rather than a boon.
The change that is desperately needed in education in the UK is the involvement of quality IT staff at the highest level; people who schools can turn to for, and receive from, useful, informed and independent advice about the best way to achieve high returns from the IT investment.
The sad thing is that this is rarely available - the advice source is either not knowledgeable or financially biased to a particular product set. I've
A common form this bias often appears to take is by seeing going to the latest version of Windows or SIMS as being an "upgrade". However different the new version might be from the old. Both in terms of user interface and abilitry to administer. Whereas anything else, including Open Source Systems must "prove itself".
just been interviewed for a Masters dissertation on the use of open source software in schools. One of the questions was "Do you think the money provided by the government for schools IT has been sufficient to achieve the targets set?" My instant answer, "No... But it should have been."
-- Mark Evans St. Peter's CofE High School Phone: +44 1392 204764 X109 Fax: +44 1392 204763