Unlike some of the people that have posted here, I never had the chance to learn any type of programming in high school. My school just got new Pentium machines at the beginning of 1998-1999 school year. As with any home PC, most of these came pre-setup with Windows, Office, and Navigator. The only specialized software that any high school might even have the remotest need for would be some type of CAD program (my school has AutoCAD R14), maybe computer graphics (mine has Mac and Windows versions of Photoshop 4.0), accounting software (my school doesn't have this as there is a township career center which has it), and lower level math/english/science/ course programs. These few pieces of software are very expensive for single end-user licenses. Imagine the need for 20-40 licenses to fill a classroom at $1000 a pop for AutoCAD or $500 a pop for Photoshop and it adds up. Schools can't afford to buy new software every year. My school just upgraded to AutoCAD R14 this year after being on R12 for the previous 3 years. The thing that is really killing the software companies is pre-installed software that they sell to PC vendors for wholesale pricing, who in turn sell these pre-setup machines to schools, who don't need to buy any software now. If they want more money, they shouldn't sell software to PC vendors!
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Unlike some of the people that have posted here, I never had the chance to learn any type of programming in high school. My school just got new Pentium machines at the beginning of 1998-1999 school year. As with any home PC, most of these came pre-setup with Windows, Office, and Navigator. The only specialized software that any high school might even have the remotest need for would be some type of CAD program (my school has AutoCAD R14), maybe computer graphics (mine has Mac and Windows versions of Photoshop 4.0), accounting software (my school doesn't have this as there is a township career center which has it), and lower level math/english/science/ course programs. These few pieces of software are very expensive for single end-user licenses. Imagine the need for 20-40 licenses to fill a classroom at $1000 a pop for AutoCAD or $500 a pop for Photoshop and it adds up. Schools can't afford to buy new software every year. My school just upgraded to AutoCAD R14 this year after being on R12 for the previous 3 years. The thing that is really killing the software companies is pre-installed software that they sell to PC vendors for wholesale pricing, who in turn sell these pre-setup machines to schools, who don't need to buy any software now. If they want more money, they shouldn't sell software to PC vendors!