Real Open Source Applications for Education?

openeducation writes "I have been researching open source solutions for K-12 education pretty heavily for the past year and have been disappointed to find no real alternatives to the large administrative applications like student information systems, data warehouse, ERP, etc. But recently, I ran across Open Solutions for Education. This group appears to be making a serious effort at creating a stack of open source applications that are alternatives to the large and costly commercial packages. Centre, an open source student information system that has been around for a while, is part of the solution stack. They have a data warehouse and are proposing an open source SIF alternative and an assessment solution. While the proof is in the pudding, these guys have working demos and they look pretty good for a first run. K-12 education is in dire financial straits and solutions like these could help with lower TCO. Plus, education is a collaborative industry already, which makes it a good fit for open source."

Comments

The proof is not in the pudding

[Logic and Reason]

The saying is "the proof of the pudding is in the eating." The OP's (commonly mistaken) version makes no sense.

Re:Necessary?

[LynnwoodRooster]

The reality is that they are not. At all. What's needed is to get back to the basics; I know I'll get berated for this, but somehow the world's scientists and engineers up through the early 90s were educated enough without computers, IS, and such in their primary education. This here Intarweb came from guys who learned on slide-rules and pencil-and-paper... Boeing designed some pretty fine planes before the first engineers who touched a computer prior to college came into the market. And so on...

But this is /. and the reality is that any tech that is pushed considered a GOOD thing. Unless of course it's shown to be a failure, then everyone jumps to the other side saying yeah, it's not needed. Witness the laptops-for-students issue. 3 years ago, it was "of COURSE we should do it!" Now that the facts were reported about how unsuccessful it's been, it's "of COURSE we shouldn't do it!"

Sometimes people just like to blame technology - or the lack thereof - for social ills. When in fact it's society. It's being afraid to let ANYONE fail, so as a result we hold back everyone so no one succeeds.

I've said this before, but it bears repeating, and is a fundamental, direct-to-the-point issue from a teacher I had in high school (Dr. Elwell at O'Dea HS in Seattle): "I don't care if you learn or not; it's up to you to make that decision. Someone has to flip the burgers at McDonald's"

Technology isn't the cure, or the problem. It's a smokescreen. The problem is fear of any failure. Not everyone will be President, or a CEO, or a basketball star. Some will fail miserably, multiple times. Some will succeed beyond their wildest dreams. It's called the Right to the Pursuit of Happiness for a reason. The fear of failure of students - and the resulting light of incompetence that would shine on a good chunk of the public education racket today - is why we constantly hear about the need to upgrade technology, or need more money.

As a result, much of the education racket tries to push everyone towards college to pad the apparent success, to keep funds coming in by keeping the consumers - the parents - blind to the actual issues. And as a result you get colleges having to teach the basics to freshman students who really shouldn't be there.

If by the age of 16 little Johnny or Sally isn't pulling a GPA of 2.5 or better, then perhaps college isn't for them, and they should consider trade schools - mechanics, truck drivers, contractors, drafters, chefs, etc. can make a living wage. Or think about college 4-5 years after HS.

And for the record, I wend to a high school that had a 70 year old building with exposed knob-and-tube electricity, no computer lab until I was a senior (when we received 3 TRS-80s), 3 years of required math and philosophy/art, 4 years of required science, English, History, 2 years of required foreign language and physical education, and electives consisting of courses like drafting, 3rd or 4th year foreign language, typing, advanced math and the like. Basics, rote-memorization, drills over-and-over. With 10 year old textbooks, taught the same way by the Christian Brothers of Ireland for 40 years. And it worked quite well...