The Argument For F/OSS In Schools

pfaffman sends us word of a two-part article in LinuxInsider that lays out to an audience of non-tech educators a cogent argument for using F/OSS in schools. The piece was written by a University of Tennessee professor for the education journal TechTrends. It makes the case that proprietary software is inconvenient and that when schools choose to use proprietary products they spend their constituents' money. The article won't contain a whole lot of surprises for Linux initiates (save perhaps some software recommendations for educational use), but it's interesting to see these ideas presented so clearly to a wider, and influential, audience."

Comments

He missed one point.

[khasim]

If the students are using F/OSS throughout the K-12 years, some of the students will go on to college to study programming.

What better projects for them than enhancing / bug-fixes for the software they've been using for so long?

In essence, the educational system ends up teaching students to write software for the educational system. So it just keeps evolving and improving.

Re:He missed one point.

[tknd]

The problem with having the students work on the actual software projects is that often they may not have enough experience to correctly perform the change. I certainly wouldn't trust pretty much all first and second year CS students with changes and I'd feel more at ease with 3rd and 4th year students. A good portion of the first year students end up dropping out and a good portion of the remaining students still can't write good code. That doesn't mean they're bad students, in fact they might even be very good computer scientists. But there's a big difference in understanding and having experience in the basic principles of software engineering.

For example, my school required all students to take project courses (one where you work on a project the entire quarter rather than sit through lecture) and one course I took was software engineering. We were required to make a team of four students (our choice, at the beginning of the quarter) and we were given a "customer" who was either a graduate student or a representative from a company. In the class we were tasked with constructing a complete proposal and presentation for our specific project, capturing requirements, designing the solution, implementing it, and testing and documenting it. It was not and easy class (there were times where we were in the lab for more than 24 hours) and often teams failed. The teams that did succeed, did not necessarily put together something that met the customer's initial expectations. Often, requirements were scoped down, the final product was not completely finished, and so on. There were even bad customers who poorly communicated with the team (if at all). My assumption is that most of these customers understood that the work done by the students was likely to not meet their expectations, but they're still getting free labor with few hours invested.

The students, however, benefited immensely from this experience--it gave everyone in the class a real perspective of what was beyond the lecture room. But as I said, often what the students produced was of considerably lower quality. I'm not sure that's good for all open source projects as it's quite likely that the quality of work many students will put out can introduce more defects than they solve. I do think it is good for companies and grad students trying to get some free/cheap research done on the side, and I do think that it is a good experience for the students.

Re:He missed one point.

[BigDogCH]

"Teach someone how to use Word and they will be able to use Word. Teach them how to use a word processor, and they will be able to use any word processor."

I agree, so this is why I entered education and tried to spread this concept. It failed miserably. I found few teacher or admins that would believe this. Of course, these were the same people that save files, and haven't a clue where the file is saved. They call IT when their number pad isn't working (numlock), and need their password reset every monday. Lets not forget how they remove a toolbar every time they try to do something more complex than change fonts, and cannot get it back. These are the teachers and admins at every school I have worked at (4), so I gave up. Good luck to anyone else who wants to continue the fight. I might jump back in the fight in a few years.

Dentists agree...

[dws90]

Floss at school would be tremendously useful. Kids everywhere are told to "Brush after every meal", but if they eat at school, how do they get the necessary tools? Since we can't expect the kids to bring a toothbrush every day, providing floss will go a long way to better, brighter teeth!

True.... but not important

[jmorris42]

> Yeah but when you get into the real world you have to use microsoft products anyway.

As addressed in the article, had you bothered to RTFA, it doesn't matter. If you teach word processing instead of Word that is. And you had better be doing that because the version of Word you are teaching on (likely to be a version or two behind already) will almost certainly be obsolete by the times the kiddies enter the labor force. Software changes, see the Ribbon if you don't believe me. "Gotta teach what everyone else uses" is just a crutch to avoid change. By that logic everyone would still be using Word Perfect, Lotus 1-2-3 and dBase.

No, the problem I hit is 'must have' software that has to have Windows. From the crappy Reader Rabbit level stuff in the lower grades to Accelerated Reader in the later ones to state mandated testing software that only works in IE on Windows, etc.

Even worse the schools here love to spend money on crap. Why would anyone spend for PC Anywhere when VNC is free and works? But they do. And yea, they get the licenses really cheap but new Netware servers everywhere? Yup. Supposedly it is some dependency on a mandated package somewhere.

Still no reason not to try infecting as many schools as we can with Free stuff that runs on Windows. Eventaully we might get a few of em adopted.

Re:True.... but not important

[bobdickgus]

Yeah much better to teach spreadsheets rather than excel(whatever version), better to understand concepts rather than specific implementations. Once you understand the ideas behind it all you can easily learn a different programs interface.

Re:True.... but not important

[Dunbal]

better to understand concepts rather than specific implementations.

      From what I remember of grade school this is something applied to all subjects, not just computer science. The teachers who actually try and get students to think about the stuff they're learning rather than memorize by rote is sadly very disappointing. Teaching a step by step "click here then there then do this then do that" fits the mold much better when you want to breed worker drones.

Re:True.... but not important

[FJGreer]

No, the problem I hit is 'must have' software that has to have Windows
As a happy employee of a broke private school most of the 'must have' edu-apps I've tried (Mavis Beacon, Accel. Reader, some crufty legacy apps) work just fine in WINE, so thats a several grand site license for Windows that wasn't spent. And you wouldn't believe how easy it is to train teachers to use linux boxes:

1. Turn on computer
2. Double click on the application you need (named after their Windows equivs (OOwriter is labeled word, firefox is labeled IE, etc)
3. Done

The ones that even noticed a difference all complimented me on how much more quickly the computers ran. Re-training is easy when there is little to no knowledge to 'unlearn.'

Now the few teething problems got noticed, but since I had them all dloading updates automagickally with cron, it was easy to propagate fixes.

Now if your school has a cargo-cult mentality to teaching computers, I can see how you would have a problem.

Re:True.... but not important

[Digicrat]

Teaching the concepts of a spreadsheet or word processing program in general is much more important. However, practically speaking, schools will teach for the specific product (MS or otherwise) that they have, and a non-trivial portion of the users will then get lost when exposed to an alternate, but entirely equivalent, application. It is sad the number of people I can identify that will get lost if you rearrange the icons, let alone the slight differences of, as a basic example "Bookmarks" versus "favorites."

For schools computer curriculum to be truly educational, they should at least attempt to teach the general concepts, with examples (even if just in screen shots) on how common features are designed to work logically, even if the mnemonics or icons of the commands might vary between implementations. There is a big difference between saying "to undo your last action, press Edit (see screenshot) and then 'undo' [more screenshots]" and "the option to undo your last action is a type of editing command, and therefore can be found on the menu titled 'Edit'." This is obvious to /.'ers, but this is a leap of logic that many average users do not necessarily make.

As the old saying goes, "show a person where to click and they've done one task, teach a person why to click there and they might not ask you next time a similar task is required."

The real truth of software costs in schools

[zerofoo]

Proprietary software at educational pricing is, in most cases, dirt cheap.

Almost every single software company I know provides software to schools at a significant discount.

Our small little school gets windows for $60/copy. We also buy office for $60/copy. Bigger schools get an even bigger discount than that.

Our largest costs are humans and hardware; neither of which have a free/open source equivalent. If you look at the entire budget for a school or a school district, software costs are a tiny blip on the radar. Those costs pale in comparison to payroll, benefits, insurance, utilities, facilities.....etc.

The point is that software should be selected based on ONE criteria: suitability of purpose. The best software that does the job for the lowest total cost should be selected. Sometimes free software is the way to go, sometimes it's not.

We are already struggling with religion creeping into schools, we don't need software religions creeping into schools.

-ted

Worst possible argument

[El Cubano]

It makes the case that proprietary software is inconvenient and that when schools choose to use proprietary products they spend their constituents' money.

There are so many reasons to prefer F/OSS (and yes, lack of up front licensing costs is really nice). However, this is the worst "benefit" to pitch. In reality, the software will very likely require the same amount of support as other software (which many times Adobe or MS will give gratis or close to gratis). In any case, sysadmins and tech support people cost more than software (unless your software is built by Lockheed to NASA safety specs or you are using custom production and manufacturing control software).

Some better arguments include: freedom to roll out additional seats without tracking licenses; freedom support something yourself if that is better for your organization than upgrading (upgrades often being forced by proprietary vendors); the money spent stays in the local economy instead of going off to some software company's home state/county/whatever; heck, even altruism.

The point is that even F/OSS requires that "they spend their constituents' money."

Open source & commercial publishers

[WPIDalamar]

I believe there is a place for open source and commercial software in schools. I better since I work for a commercial Educational software publisher.

I'd love to have our stuff run on Open Source platforms, but we currently only release for Windows/OSX. We don't produce for OS platforms for the simple reason that nobody asks for it. Ever. I talk to our sales guys from time to time. I ask them if people ask for Linux versions. The answer is always no.

So Educators, administrators, curriculum people, make sure to ask your software vendors for versions that run on open platforms. You'll probably get a "no". But keep asking. It's not that they can't, they just don't know you want it.

school discounts do have a "price"

[wizardforce]

Proprietary software at educational pricing is, in most cases, dirt cheap. Almost every single software company I know provides software to schools at a significant discount.

from TFA:

Training teachers and students to use a piece of software makes that software more valuable. Vendors know this. Business sense, not altruism, is what drives deep discounts on software for education. I once spoke to a vendor of an online grade book who, upon learning that I train teachers, was very interested in my using it in my classes. "What does it cost?" I asked. "It will cost you nothing. You can use it for free for as long as you like." "And once I addict my students to your software," I asked pointedly, afraid that I was being rude, "what will it cost them?" The vendor became excited. "That's exactly what we were talking about in our last sales Free White Paper - What Retailers Should Know about M-Commerce meeting!"

In Short Because it is the norm in most schools, businesses and homes, many of the costs of proprietary software are difficult to see. There are now alternatives to the most commonly used applications in schools. When these open source alternatives are nearly equal to -- or better than -- their proprietary competitors, the significant advantages of F/OSS make them the better choice.

the scools can get FOSS for free and MS software for cheap but later when students want to/need to use the software their school uses they end up paying for MS. at least with FOSS they wont need to spend their already limited student cash on MS software. Lastly, this isnt just limited to K-12, in college, office software is very important to have, for homework, projects, research etc. so any cost savings is greatly appreciated.

It's hard to break through non free propaganda.

[twitter]

The following is a typical frustration for free software advocates:

Recently I gave a conference presentation about the benefits of F/OSS for educators -- how all teachers and students could use these tools and that they were free and would remain so. I distributed copies of TheOpenCD and talked about the F/OSS programs that it includes. Near the end of the hour-long presentation, a participant raised her hand and asked, "So I can use this software for free?" Even after an hour, F/OSS still did not quite make sense to her.

Every other source of information teachers have is full of non free propaganda. Don't copy that floppy (flash warning) is an annoying classic. The basic tenants were laid out by Bill Gates in his famous 1976 whine which says, "if you don't pay me, your computer won't work". Broadcasters and publishers justify their existence with a similar but more realistic story that reinforces the software lie. The lie is reinforced with confusing language, bogus arguments and, ultimately, name calling. The tactics are covered in detail here. Microsoft spends a billion dollars a month on marketing and each piece of that marketing conveys their propaganda.

It's very effective and can only be eliminated by free software use. The idea that software can be shared and improved is so completely foreign to them, so much that you can perform almost any demonstration with free software and they still won't understand, as evidenced above. It's only after they use free software, like Mozilla, that they can see that it is not only good enough, it's what they want and that's what free software is all about. At that point, the rest of the lies start falling down and they get very angry.

Re:It's hard to break through non free propaganda.

[Dunbal]

Broadcasters and publishers justify their existence with a similar but more realistic story that reinforces the software lie.

      Of course they do. They are middlemen trying to protect their (obsolete) position. What does a publisher add to a product, besides mark-up? 20 years ago they could claim "distribution", but now, they add NOTHING. Anything that can be translated to an electronic format can be sent anywhere in the world. And they can't even claim bandwidth costs - bittorrent has proven that the masses will help with the distribution if there's demand for the content.

      Publishers - of books, software and music (which are extremely well suited for "electronification") are now parasites.I'd much rather pay the creator $1 a copy and get the electronic version than pay the publisher $5 for a DRM infested piece of crap that likely as not won't work with some of my equipment. I bet the creator ain't getting a 20% cut anyway. More like 5 - 10% if lucky.

You missed the point

[cecil_turtle]

From the header of the first article, had you bothered to read it:

Free software gives everyone the freedom to run, study, change and redistribute software. It is these freedoms, not the price, that is important about free software. Free software advocates make the distinction between free, as in speech, as opposed to free, as in beer. Though many people would gladly accept a free beer, it is not one of the fundamental principles of democracy.

The article doesn't even make the argument about cost to the schools. It does make another point about the cost of F/OSS vs. proprietary software however (one I hadn't considered):

I once spoke to a vendor of an online grade book who, upon learning that I train teachers, was very interested in my using it in my classes.

"What does it cost?" I asked.
"It will cost you nothing. You can use it for free for as long as you like."
"And once I addict my students to your software," I asked pointedly, afraid that I was being rude, "what will it cost them?"
The vendor became excited. "That's exactly what we were talking about in our last sales Free White Paper - What Retailers Should Know about M-Commerce meeting!"

When technology leaders train teachers and students to use proprietary software, it obligates those teachers and students to buy or steal that software or to have wasted their time on the training.

It made another 8 or 10 points that were not at all cost related. So overall, it was a good article. You should read it sometime.

Very weak arguments

[fitten]

I read both links... here is my take on what was published:

Myth: You get what you pay for.

Author does not assume the cost of IT/training actually costs time or money and implies that neither are necessary. Most schools don't have IT staff or the money to hire IT staff (particularly qualified staff in something other than Windows... Unix/Linux administrators typically are hired at higher salaries. One option is that the school may get volunteers from either the higher level grades or from parents/supporters, though.

Myth: F/OSS software is created by amateurs and must be inferior.

This passage sounds very whingy. It then uses examples of one similar group (amateur astronomists) but then uses musician/art and then a genius (obviously an exception, not the rule). Instead of touting the strengths such as professional programmers who contribute in their spare time, college students who work on projects because they are eager, etc.

Myth: With F/OSS I cannot get support.

The only option the author gives is to go talk to someone else in your building who, if they have a different version than you, can upgrade your software to the latest version without cost. What about drivers? What about any number of other issues like bugs? What about turning to forums, actually buying support, newgroups, mailing lists, etc?

Myth: Moving to F/OSS will require retraining and relearning.

So... you've nailed down Office.... what about the host of other applications that people use? Like Photoshop, etc.? What about switching from IIS to Apache? MSSQL/MSDE to MySQL? Exchange to whatever (plain email?) Windows point-n-clicky to something different (point-n-clicky with some side helpings of editing text configuration files)? Drive mapping to NFS?

Myth: Students need to learn the standard applications.

Again, you nail word processors and spreadsheets... what about everything else?

Educators Pay for Software - Twice

Author mentions that the first round is given to the school like the first taste of a drug... Then they buy it for home use... where is the second buy?

Training Teachers on Tools They Do Not Have

Finally a reasonable paragraph.

On the Allure of Free Proprietary Tools

FUD. Companies that tend to offer free trial offers don't back out on that in anything other than extreme circumstances (being bought by another company that changes licensing agreements) and even then, it is very rare. This section is pure FUD.

Productivity Applications, Internet Applications, Content-Specific Applications, Server-Based Applications

Finally... some concrete and founded sections but mostly it's just listing alternative software.

MSFT pays for FOSS in all Calif public schools

[christian.einfeldt]

For those who do not already know it, Microsoft has settled its anti-trust case in California, resulting in a settlement fund that allows every school district in California to get a set dollar allotment per student per school district. This website has all the deets:

http://www.edtechk12vp.com

So if you have been wanting more FOSS in your school district, but haven't had the budget, step right up!

Let me summerize both of these articles

[Actually, I do RTFA]

First, the executive summary: In spite of starting by explaining the difference between free as in speech and free as in beer, let me outline why educators should use F/OSS: It's free for the teachers, the students, the insititution, the graduates, and will remain so in the future. Oh, and it's almost as good. Then here's a laundry list of applications that you may want to use that I started tunning out during.

The more detailed summery using his bullet-points:

• The Power of the Source: Free as in speech is good
• Property Rights Turned Upside Down: Copyleft is good
• On the Annoyances of Proprietary Software: Buying licenses is annoying, and people asking if they can pirate off your legit copies is annoying.
• Understanding Open Source Software: Filler
• Myth: You get what you pay for: With F/OSS you can buy your documention and tech support piecemeal.
• Myth: F/OSS software is created by amateurs and must be inferior: Both parts of this arguement are wrong.This marks the last non-poor argument
• Myth: With F/OSS I cannot get support: The best support is friends/teachers. Hey, we might have different versions, let me rehash the licensing point.
• Myth: Moving to F/OSS will require retraining and relearning: All software UI is practically the same. Look for him contradicting himself soon.
• Myth: Students need to learn the standard applications: All the applications you learn now will be out of date when you use them. I'm sure all the artists who spent forever learning Photoshop will love to hear that. Oh, what, it has so much monopoly power that professional computer artists have to learn it to work? Nevermind.
• Page 2
• Educators Pay for Software - Twice: Complains about licensing costs again. Contradicts his retraining point by insisting that you are teaching students to use only a proprietary solution and getting them locked in or making them throw all their years of training away. But that was the page before, who expects that much consistancy?
• raining Teachers on Tools They Do Not Have: Has he mentioned that teachers can use this software free of cost?
• On the Allure of Free Proprietary Tools: Sometimes, companies that offer free versions of their program no longer do so. With F/OSS you never have to worry about the dreaded licensing costs
• Productivity Applications: OpenOffice is almost as good, all it needs is a grammar checker. It's not as bad as it used to be!...

He then goes on listing applications and their uses, organized fairly well, but I got tired of paraphrasing.

Isn't the F/OSS community capable of having a better spokesman? Or at least reasons that refer back to letting students tinker with applications so they can see how the code/math/grammar checker works? And that teachers can customize the code to tailor fit the school's needs? And... actually, now is when I stop preaching to the choir.

That's not true.

[twitter]

In reality, the software will very likely require the same amount of support as other software (which many times Adobe or MS will give gratis or close to gratis). In any case, sysadmins and tech support people cost more than software

What ever gave you that idea? Non free software cost more in every way. The hardware is always more expensive and you have to replace it more often. It always takes more time to keep up, so you get less for the money spent on staff. Staff that's not busy with the patch time of the month, rolling out "upgrades" and fighting virus infections have time to work on tools the school actually wants. Finally, licensing costs are an issue no matter how "good" a deal you get. All of the issues you mention, easy roll out, fewer "upgrades", and local spending are cost and convenience issues in free software's favor. It's hard to imagine free software will ever be as expensive and inconvenient as non free software and experience is making the case clear.

M$ marketing from the mouth of the beast.

[twitter]

Where are you pulling you $1 billion a month figure from?

From Microsoft. They spent 2,191,000,000 in three months according to the quarterly report filed September 30, 2006. More recent reports have more and that's what I remember, nearly a billion dollars a month in sales and marketing. Spending more on marketing than anything else! That's insane unless you are selling carbonated sugar water.

All M$ reports are kind of slushy. The sited report has a strange 1.6 billion for "cost of revenue" and a further 1.8 billion in "research", much of which we can assume lands in "get the facts" reports. It sure did not put new features into Vista.

Re:Couldn't get Ubuntu 7.04 to work so well...

[symbolset]

Isn't it nice that your GNU/Linux support team doesn't just wait for your emails, but rather services your call tickets on every random blog on the internet where you happen to leave them?

The real truth of costs in schools

[symbolset]

Proprietary software at educational pricing is, in most cases, dirt cheap

Hell, the first few hits are free! When you're hurtin' for more, come back and we'll take care of you real good.

Try and think ahead. You're supposed to be responsible for teaching small humans to do that. Set a good example.

Re:Let me summarize both of these articles

[pfaffman]

(And yes, I am the author of the article.)

Isn't the F/OSS community capable of having a better spokesman?

I think there are several examples of better F/OSS advocates, and even a few who do educational research.

Or at least reasons that refer back to letting students tinker with applications so they can see how the code/math/grammar checker works? And that teachers can customize the code to tailor fit the school's needs? And... actually, now is when I stop preaching to the choir.

No. That's exactly wrong, and exactly why most people in schools if they can even understand that it's legal to copy F/OSS, they're sure that there's some other catch, like if they want it to work they'll have to become computer programmers. As someone else pointed out, it's unrealistic to think that many high school students are going to tweak a grammar checker. (Most of them don't have a very good understanding of grammar in the first place, hence the need for a grammar checker.) It's patently absurd to suggest that teachers will. Have you met any teachers?