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OSS Not Ready for Prime Time in Education?
cel4145 writes "Inside Higher Ed reports that the Alliance for Higher Education Competitiveness has released a new study, The State of Open Source Software. Is it true that open source is 'not quite ready for prime time' in education? Or, as I suspect, is the study just another proprietary software vendor funded report for discouraging the adoption of open source software?" From the article: "Lack of vendor support is one of the largest hurdles limiting the adoption of open source in higher education, Abel said. 'The biggest thing is it takes more physical labor to implement open source because it isn't pre-packaged,' Abel said. "You have to have software developers that can make this stuff work.'" Are the staffing issues associated with OSS enough to outweigh the benefits?
From the page from A-HEC's website cited in the summary, the title reads:Glancing further down the page, we see this gem:So we are to subscribe to the The Alliance for Higher Education Competitiveness Alliance?
A-HEC might want to get all their ducks in a row before lecturing to us about 'higher education'...
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~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
K-12 teachers are underpaid, and generally lack a lot of computer skills that are necessary to make free-OSS work. Few initiatives exist to get the message out to teachers that there's both remediation software as well as technical skills development source trees available for use, with a few exceptions.
School systems by either OS X or XP these days, and aren't very compelled to get Linux or OSS alternatives for many reasons, including lack of knowledge of what's available, belief that support doesn't exist, fears of application cracks (like they don't exist elsewhere, eh?), and basic fundamental experience with OSS apps and environments in general.
This changes as a younger generation replaces older teachers, but it will take time for educators to get smart on what OSS is, and how to use it effectively for both skills and remediation.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
They don't trust the Kids to fix the problem with the systems. The teachers and Computer Illerate. And the reason the IT Staff is working for the School is because no one else will hire them. So you need 3rd part support to keep things somewhat running. Sure there are some school districts out there that have a good IT policy and OSS software would work great with them. But most that I have seem have no Idea what the C O M P U T E R thing is and really what to do with it.
Odly enough the school offered better computer classes back in the late 80s then they do now.
OSS is fine for education if you have some people who understand it just a little. But most schools compter literate and IT staff means you can reinstall an OS when it crashes and add a Cat 5 cord to the switch.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Ofcourse there are no free lunches.
:)
imho they have 2 options
1) choose a packaged software from a company, pay for it's licence and the support sums later
2) choose oss and hire a developer
i'm for option 2, because unlike the licence&support, it starts to change the software in the direction that you really need to, instead of what a salesman of ZYX-gamma company in mind when he first wrote the whitepaper.
there is no real black and white on this issue, sometimes you have to be compatible with others, then you go for 1, sometimes you want to get specific stuff, then better go for 2
I'd tell you the chances of this story being a dupe, but you wouldn't like it.
What is "Education" supposed to be anyway?
Primary school kids may be too young to do operating systems, (...although a smart 3rd grader can certainly downloard & install OpenOffice with a little supervision ...) but middle schoolers can definitely install OS's with a little supervision, and high-schoolers should be able to keep the computers running in the school district's kindergartens.
Not every kid will have the desire, but if only 5% of your highschoolers have an interest in technology: problem solved!
Any school district that is paying for its office software is wasting Our Money! and if they are not using this opportunity to train up kids to run computer system, that's a waste too.
--- Attorneys Assisting Citizen-Soldiers & Families -
I suspect they are responsible for the lack of good shows on TV, also.
It might be great to get bug fixes in a matter of hours but no sys admin in there right mind should apply patches that are untested unless they don't mind having hoards of users after wanting to kill them. Vendor patches from Microsoft and OSS companies take longer to be released since they have to guarantee it won't break anything. Compagnies like the safaty of having someone to blame if stuff goes to hell.
I'm a big advocate of OSS and all but applying random patches is just careless and stupid. At least wait until you distro releases it themselves. (Supposing you have a decent distro)
Nic
Of course vendor support and/or getting a complete package is a big part of the picture.
A lot of teachers have to do their own IT work. In my school, there was an IT supported computer lab (with about 20 three-year-old PCs). If there was a problem in the lab, you either fixed it yourself, or waited three or four days until one of the IT guys from the district office could come out and troubleshoot. This means that something that's familiar (Windows, Office, etc) is a better bet for a lot of teachers, because it's a lot easier to figure out how to resolve a problem with something you're already familiar with. Printing is a good example; if the printer went on the fritz, I already knew the five Windows-centric things to try. If the computers had been running Linux, I'd have had no idea (at that point) where to start.
Another issue is that most teachers aren't geeks, so they want a "just works" system. They don't want to have to fiddle around to get things working--they want to insert the Oklahoma Trail CD and have the students playing the game. Right or wrong, there's a perception that "other" operating systems are more complicated. When you're at school eight hours, then at home grading and planning for a couple hours, and commuting thirty minutes a day, you just don't want to add anything else that takes time.
Both of these issues mean that teachers believe that OSS isn't "ready" for educational use. Of course, a lot of that is perception. Remember that most non-techies are a few years behind the curve, so a lot of them don't know about Linux distros like Ubuntu or about OSS programs like Open Office.
Finally, there isn't really a lot of appealing software out there (OSS or closed source) for educational use. Indeed, there isn't really a strong argument to be made in favor of using computers in the classroom in the first place. In my opinion (which is based on three years of teaching experience), a lot of computer use in classrooms is misdirected--it's generally intended to be used as a reward or an activity to keep part of the class quiet while the rest of the students do something else. It's not that OSS isn't ready for education, it's that educators haven't yet worked out how to fit computers into education in an effective way.
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The article summary (can't read the entire article without subscribing) is addressing concerns that open source can not fill the business specific software requirements for higher education institutions (curriculum management, etc). This is not talking about web servers, word processors or other generic software systems. This open source limitation is true in many industries.
Most open source developers do not have the business expertise to attack vertical software markets, nor do many of the people who know the business requirements have the software development expertise (or time) to actually code a working project that could compete with commercial offerings.
This is where software businesses will always be required. Someone needs to pay the people with the business expertise to work with people having the development expertise to actually produce products that meet the needs of specific customers.
If an existing product were open sourced, modifying and maintaining would be possible. But getting to that initial state for vertical market software is very difficult.
Well, here I am working in schools. Our elementary school labs are almost entirely linux. The kids actually quite like it, the teachers sometimes don't... or at least the older teachers. Now why is that... because people seem to dislike change at older ages.
Last time I setup a basic Open-Source lab (Abiword, OpenOffice, Firefox, GIMP, etc) the kids had figured out tricks that I hadn't even touched. They had gorgeous Impress (Openoffice program similar to Powerpoint) presentations, and were happily playing with penguin games. In fact, if there's anything the kids love about linux most it's the penguins... they draw penguin pictures, have stuffed penguin toys, play penguin games, etc. Of course OSS isn't just about Linux, there's BSD (which we also use) and even windows OSS applications as well (the aforementioned Impress was actually the windows version).
Going back to the games, it seems that in the OS world games are often more "wholesome" than many of the windows components. Of course, part of this is probably due to the fact that many popular linux games are based on old classics (Frozen-Bubble, SuperTux, Pingus == Arcade Bubble Game, Mario, Lemmings)... but that does tend to make it overall kid and/or educational-environment friendly.
I agree with everything except for the atheist comments used in the example. I actually have done what you described and honestly I didn't find it silly. I found the message to be uplifting and pointing people in the right direction whether it be spiritual or ethical. Now, should the person I was listening to be Pat Robertson then it does become a different matter - but again, you cannot judge an entire group based on the fringe. In closing, the exercise you described did not sway me toward atheism, it reinforced my faith.
The Education Suite of the K Desktop Environment (KDE) has made great strides in providing high-quality educational software for schoolchildren aged 3 to 18. The educational applications range from ones that teach vocabulary and foreign languages to math, physics, chemistry, astronomy and computer programming.
This goes to show that the educational sector is considered a high priority by many KDE developers, which is good because contracts with educational institutions account for a great percentage of software revenue. And of course, they have the satisfaction of making the kids (and consequently our future society) smarter, better informed, and more ready to tackle the challenges they'll face.
K-12 teachers are underpaid, and generally lack a lot of computer skills that are necessary to make free-OSS work.
We're not talking about K-12, we're talking about Higher-Education, ie College.As one of the admins for my the Engineering College at my university, I have these comments:
We have a handful of professors who refuse to run windows. We have more faculty that are involved in research projects with undergraduate students they found was more productive on linux. We have deployed group workstations for them.
We've also had a number of faculty, as well as students, requesting that we install linux and dual-boot the cluster machines. We've already nailed down the process of adding linux workstations to our windows domains allowing a roaming home-dir as well as access to the same shared drives and personal storage users have access to when they log into WinXP. We will be converting our labs starting spring break to a dual-boot WinXP/Ubuntu combo.
On our back end, all of our servers except a web server running an app that requires IIS and the domain controllers run Gentoo linux.
Unfortunately, much of the software we deploy and will not run on linux, or only exists on the linux platform in professional versions, while we can deploy cheap/free student copies for windows. We've been installing OSS windows software whenever possible including OpenOffice for some time and I've seen many students using it even though MS Word is installed.
The rest of the university is an entirely different story, however. They are a Dell/Windows shop and will remain as such. I used to work support for them and I'm not sure I'd want to some english professor who only uses a computer because typewriters are out of style* that he has to use OpenOffice on linux rather than the MS Word on Windows that he's been familiar with for some time. Hell, I wouldn't even want to tell our engineering professors that they have to use linux, now. Linux is a viable option in higher education, and we use it extensively. However, as an alternative it's not there yet. I hope to think that by providing this option we will help push some of the students to dual boot their own computers and give it a closer look.
*This is a grossly unfair stereotype. I'm sure there are english professors who would love to have linux. However I included it because it sounded good and I know this man. He's gets very ornary when computers come up and basically said the above.
I played around with Moodle because I was doing research on the SCORM API. Moodle has a module for SCORM 1.2 that is about 90-95% SCORM compliant. I found the installation and administrating of Moodle to be very good. If I was the IT Admin at a small college (at least) I would be comfortable having students use it.
-Dipster
exactly what I was thinking too. Not only did I see this report as a sign that OSS was gaining in ED, but also a sign that we should start seeing the schools with good CS departments start building their own software in the near future. And sharing it with the other schools too. There's no competition between schools with regard to who has the better online bookstore, online admission system, etc. Sharing these tools allows each location to spend more on actual education and phyical infrastructure.
OSS can also create something more than 'busy work' for the Junior/Senior/MBA/Doc students while providing them with potential jobs at the Universities later. If Carnegie Mellon built a kick butt online admission system on LAMP, others would/could/should use it and all of a sudden, CM students are experts in this and can become the support structure for the other schools.
In the same sense, I think our local, state, federal governments should be doing the same thing. How silly is it that one cities building permit system is not openly shared with other cities? Proprietary software does not allow this and each city must pay out the nose for custom applications which they'll be told has to be rewritten every 5 years or so...
25% already using OSS and more than another 50% considering it is a big win IMO. The tipping point is getting close.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
In my experience of secondary education in the UK, the lack of support is a key issue in holding back the acceptance of FLOSS in schools. Not the kind of join-a-mailing-list-and-ask support at which most FLOSS packages excel (I find Debian especially good for that) but a different kind of support which is harder for individual package developers to put in place. From what I see, most hard-pressed teachers and heads want someone they can ring and to whom they can, essentially, say "I want to buy one of those" whilst they point to a solution that someone else is already running. The next problem for them is "if I buy that, where can I get a technician to run it?"
They don't want to roll-their-own FLOSS implemenation, they just want stuff that works and needs no wizard to keep it running.
Most schools in the UK can't even pay enough to get good *windows* support technicians, let alone get support for a GNU/Linux guru.
As more are brave enough to go ahead anyhow, the situation will ease but this is a classic symptom of a technically-led young sub-industry - infrastructure like support services will only develop when an emerging pool of early adopters grows to sufficient size.
Because of that, and because of the need for a recognised brand in this area, I have worked on solving some of those issues through Cutter which does provide a pre-packaged and commercially supported 'solution' for shools. Others will probably do so as well. Mostly it's a matter of time but nobody should really be surprised by that finding.
Being an ex-teacher, and knowing well what they're paid for, and the hours that go in, let me add some things in that aren't otherwise revealed in your anecdotal research.
There are five categories of teachers: aids, those lacking masters or other needed credentials for a 'full license', fully licensed (usually with master degrees), administrators who teach, and special license teachers. In post K-12, there are part-timers, full-timers, tenured, research (e.g. non-teaching but supervisory), administrative, and a slew of small 'other' categories. They all teach, have different skills, and only the top couple of tiers make comparatively decent money.
The hours in a day are variable. Many spend ten or more if they supervise or sponsor clubs or other extra-curricular activities. They often work weekends doing the same thing, often for additional if low pay.
They get a few holidays that the rest of us don't. Most of my summers were spent teaching, or taking classes to stay up in my profession. I didn't get to slack but for a couple of weeks, which is less than my professional peers did. I got a nice holiday break in the winter; that part was good. Others in my profession, do, too.
And, I put up and dealt daily with extraordinary discipline problems, not to count the developmentally disabled and disadvantaged individuals, each with their own circumstances. It's what I was paid for. Today, the problems are more severe and the regulatory/compliance environment problems are exacerbated by parents that don't have time for their children, or let WoW or an Xbox or Family Guy babysit them while they deal with their own stressed out, post-divorce lives. Add in the sociopaths, the drug-enabled, and the litigation prone, and it's a mess. I feel for both students and teachers who are there to learn and teach. It's not easy. Yes, other professions have their stress and they're also crappier jobs, and those that are entirely thankless. But teachers and students are the next generation and embody the hopes of the current ones, and ones past. My hat is off to them, a phase that translates to my respect for their difficult job.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
What does that leave, exactly?
Or, I could just, you know, decide for myself what is right, based on my experiences and readings, and believe in reality, rather than thousands of year old mythologies because hank told me to.
Or have you only comfort...that stealthy thing that enters the house and guest then becomes host, then master - KG
The latter one is worrying my boss. I support an OS CMS (Dokeos), OS electronic porfolio (OSPI), OS image management system (MDID) and a few others. I'm the only guy here who understands them- everything else here is Windows/IIS other than the portal. What happens when I leave? You put out an ad for "Academic technology person: Blackboard experience" and you'll get dozens of applications. Put one out for Sakai, Moodle or the even more obscure Dokeos and you'll be lucky to get one. You need to get someone who can program, who isn't afraid of unfamiliar code and who can still do the rest of the job.
Can you buy support from someone like RedHat? Sometimes, but a lot of academic stuff is pretty obscure, not used by more than a few dozen schools and highly specialized. We have support for our OSS portal (uPortal) but frankly it sucks- the latest upgrade was a nightmare, managed by paid support people who could barely understand the system. We're still trying to figure out all the details in various places because a key person left suddenly.
At least with a company you have someone to blame. It may not help (I'm fighting a commercial company with utterly worthless support and a badly broken product right now) but I can point the finger at them and say "It's their fault, not ours!"
"Seven Deadly Sins? I thought it was a to-do list!"
It might be great to get bug fixes in a matter of hours but no sys admin in there right mind should apply patches that are untested unless they don't mind having hoards of users after wanting to kill them. Vendor patches from Microsoft and OSS companies take longer to be released since they have to guarantee it won't break anything.
If there is a critical bug preventing me or my users from getting something done, sometime it is worth the risk to apply "untested" patches. Also, a lot of the wait time in getting patches from vendors is NOT due to testing. It is due to company priorities. If you are experiencing a bug that isn't affecting most other users, you're often SOL until the next service pack. And you may not even get the patch then.
Of course, this depends on the size of the company and your relative importance to them. I've personally worked directly with engineers to get a fix for proprietary software and I had a custom build/patch sent to me. But this is rare. To a company like MS, you're an ant.
Compagnies like the safaty of having someone to blame if stuff goes to hell.
This is a tired, stupid argument. Having someone to blame does absolutely nothing but appease the egos of incompetent management and staff. In the end, the stuff has gone to hell. ANd no amount of blame can change that.
I'm a big advocate of OSS and all but applying random patches is just careless and stupid.
Of course applying "random" patches is careless and stupid. But we're not talking about "random" patches. We're talking about specific patches that will solve a specific existing problem. One great thing about OSS is that often (if you have the skill) you don't even need to wait for ANYONE to supply a patch. I can't tell you how many times I have actually gone into the code myself and fixed a problem or added a minor feature. You just can't do this with most proprietary software. If something goes to hell, I'll gladly take the blame. If something goes wrong, I'd much rather it be my fault. That way I am much more able to make it right again.
-matthew
"THERE IS NO JUSTICE, THERE IS ONLY ME." -Death
I've been tossing the idea around about selling some open source project ideas to my old high school. When it comes to the labor of installation and maintainence that usually comes with open source projects, I see this as the very REASON I would use this in class. Fixing all those little tedious bugs associated with any open source project are a great way to learn how operating systems work.
Open source too much labor for education? FUD.
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