Introduction

A growing percentage of schools are using Open Source Software and there already plenty of case studies – see www.schoolforge.org.uk/index.php/Case_Studies. Its only 15 to 20 years ago that schools moved off Acorns onto Microsoft based systems as this was the software that pupils would find in the work place and what the school wanted to use for its administrative systems. For the moment all the big schools IT systems suppliers are committed to supplying Microsoft based systems. Because most proprietary software suppliers give big discounts on licences to schools and pupils there is less incentive for you to consider using alternative free OSS. And the software credits systems doesn't work if you want to get support for free software so you have to spend your credits on proprietary software you may not want or need.

Thus you miss out on the other advantages of OSS:

• it is often more reliable, secure and functionally relevant than its proprietary equivalents (because its developed and tested by its community), and sometimes it's the market leader.

• It usually runs on lower specification hardware which costs less (or nothing if recycled) and thus has a lower environmental impact.

• So it costs you less to maintain, less on hardware and less on electricity.

For evidence of this see Open source software in schools: Information sheet and school case studies www.schoolforge.org.uk/index.php/Case_Studies

Latest:

There are over 60 UK schools case studies on the SchoolForge UK site at http://www.schoolforge.org.uk/index.php/Case_Studies .  If you are a UK school please submit you OSS case study to them.  There are over 70 schools case studies on the SchoolForge USA site at http://www.schoolforge.net/case .  If you don’t appear on either of these sites or would like extra publicity please let us have your case study of a link to it so we can publicise it here.

If you are a pupil you should consider switching to OSS if you

• can't afford a new laptop – now Vista has arrived much higher specification and more expensive PCs are required than before. Its quite hard to buy a PC with Linux pre-installed from the major retailers but is you have an old laptop you could contact your local Linux User group www.lug.org.uk where members will be pleased to advise you and install a suitable version of Linux. .....................

• You want a better web browser that on Windows or Linux – download Firefox from www.mozilla.org

• You want to create .pdf documents – OpenOffice www.openoffice.org generates these for free as well as saving in Microsoft (e.g. .doc) and ISO standard formats.

• You need special software for part of your course. There is nearly always a free OSS equivalent if you can find it and because you can access the source code you will be able to modify it to suit your needs. To find it ask your friends or tutors and go to www.sourceforge.org which may be a little daunting – for a guide written by academics for academics see www.oss-watch.ac.uk/resources/sfintro.xml . Also take a look at Edubuntu, www.edubuntu.org the schools version of Ubuntu which has a lot of free education application on the CD

If you are the IT manager in a school you ought to consider running Linux servers and thin client systems (probably windows based) so

• You can achieve more reliable systems that cost less: you spend less on software, less on hardware and less on maintenance.

• The systems will have less environmental impact because you can recycle old PCs and install networks of thin client systems which use less energy.

You can provide all the main office applications for your academic and administrative staff using Open Source versions and they run on Windows or Linux – email, browsing, word processing, spread sheets, presentation and data base and they can all produce files in international standard formats or in Microsoft Formats(which you will still need for external communications). And in addition they can produce PDF format documents for free.

There may be a few applications that you use that only run on Windows but you will usually find there is an open source equivalent for things like website development, accounting, desktop publishing, artwork, content management, document management and Virtual Learning Environment. In fact Moodle www.moodle.org is now the most popular VLE in the UK and many parts of the world..

If you are unfamiliar with OSS technologies and would like some help go to www.schoolforge.org.uk/index.php/Support which will give you several options from reading materials, user groups and consultancies.

The problem, as always with change, is deciding when to extend your use of Open Source because it will take some effort and will cause some disruption and user resistance. The answer is to do it when you are making changes for other reasons. So you should consider switching some or all of your systems to Open Source Software if

• you are rebuilding your website

• you are rebuilding your network to client server

• you are about to throw away some old PCs

• you are out to tender for new systems – ask for quotes to include OSS components – they should be cheaper as your supplier will be getting them for free.

• you are planning a move to Vista – it requires more memory and power so more expensive PC and more impact on the environment. Its also different so you will have to retrain your techies and your users. And BECTA have said there is nothing it it for Schools.

• you have run out of IT budget

• you want to avoid lock-in – that is finding there is a high cost to switching supplier and software products in the future.

If you are the head teacher or on the School Finance Committee then have a look at the financial benefits of OSS published by BECTA. BECTA support the education sector to make the best use of technology so that every learner in the UK is able to benefit from its advantages and achieves the best they can. They are at www.becta.org.uk/

They have published three documents on the use of OSS in schools in 2005

Open source software in schools: Information sheet

Open source software in schools: A case study report

Open source software in schools: A study of the spectrum of use and related ICT infrastructure costs

which showed schools making significant savings by partial adoption of OSS.

In January 2007 they published an assessment of Vista and made the following recommendation “The new features of Vista add value but do not justify early deployment in the educational ICT estate. Educational institutions are strongly advised to consider the findings of Becta’s final report on Vista before considering any wide-scale deployment”. Their consultants estimated costs of some £4,000 for a typical primary school to deploy Office 2007 effectively across its ICT estate. For a typical secondary school the costs of deploying Office 2007 would be around £26,000. Taking the school system in England as a whole, it is estimated that to deploy Office 2007 would cost in the region of £167 million. Download electronic version of
Microsoft Vista and Office 2007: Interim report with recommendations on adoption and deployment, 332KB

Other organisations helping you adopt Open Source as part of the school curriculum as well as in the school administrative systems.

SchoolForgeUK, www.schoolforge.org.uk is probably the most important site for UK schools to visit. They refer to FLOSS, Free and Libre OSS emphasising that it is free and liberates. In addition to the benefits of savings in TCO they highlight the elimination of dependence on software vendors (avoidance of lock-in) and the pedagogical or educational benefits- that is individuals of all ages and abilities can engage in FLOSS projects according to their own strengths and interests – from providing or testing code or content – something that cannot be done with proprietary software and copyrighted content.

INGOTS, International Grades in Open Technologies, www.theingots.org are designed for primary and secondary school children and adults. With the rapid rise in the importance of open systems and open source technologies, a new UK government accredited family of certificates has been designed to prepare ICT users to cope with these changes as well as to certify their basic ICT capability on currently popular systems. The INGOTs were designed by Ian Lynch who has a Masters degree in Education Management and 30 years experience in education including work as a Registered Inspector of Schools with OFSTED and as an assessor of the National Professional Qualification for Headteachers. INGOTs are vocationally related qualifications endorsed by the Sector Skills Council for IT and Telecommunications and accredited by the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority. They promote citizenship and preparedness for change as well as basic skills in software operation. There are INGOT certificates suitable for children and adults with special educational needs progressing to support for Level 2 which is equivalent to A*-C grades at GCSE/basic school graduation. Certificates at Level 3 (University entrance level) are planned for 2008. INGOTs are international with trained assessors in over 10 countries.

ECDL stands for "European Computer Driving Licence". It is an internationally recognised qualification that enables people to certify their competence in essential computer skills & knowledge. In the past, the ECDL was mainly based on Microsoft products. In 2007 ECDL has become a ' vendor independent certification '. The ECDL Tests can be performed with open source software, such as GNU/Linux, OpenOffice.org, Mozilla, Evolution. Training manuals can be ordered from http://www.becpublishing.com/book/ECDL/TFESO8/ and there is an on-line training room demonstration at http://trainingdemo.openapp.ie/

Ubuntu and Edubuntu

for using see http://www.edubuntu.org/UsingEdubuntu

OSS Watch www.oss-watch.ac.uk promotes awareness and understanding of the legal, social, technical and economic issues that arise when educational institutions engage with free and open source software. It does this by providing unbiased advice and guidance to UK higher and further education. To find out what OSS is being used by Universities go to www.oss-watch.ac.uk/resources/softwareexamples.xml#body.1_div.2

Linux User Group (LUG) Your local LUG can be found at www.lug.org.uk