> I think this is a major different between higher education and further > education colleges. My college is a deprived area of south east London > and has all new, shiny equipment. I'm guessing they got grants etc for > it all and the suppliers have photos for marketing purposes. > > Also the qualifications people do there require windows - even the CCNA > I'm doing requires access to windows and I get tested on MSDOS commands > etc. > > Computer science students in higher education are a different group with > a different set of abilities and needs - many of our full time students > are doing 2 year courses to prepare them to enter University. We don't > do any programming here afaik. > > Caroline
The College I work at is quite near Carolines (Essex). We have started embracing open source as much as we can because the money isn't there to fund all this proprietary software. I am deploying Linux as far as I can and I am succeeding with servers and kiosks, but I have a boundry that stops before the end user. This is due to politics mainly and is a shame. The argument is that the students should learn what is out there in industry, which is a valid point, but the value of open source is just as important. A problem is that a lot of people don't want to learn something new, as they either have a lot invested in the Microsoft based systems like training and knowledge for example, or they just feel that what they are doing works for them so why bother changing. I am not an academic, but I think a possible reason for the shiny new computers is due to a few factors. The birth rate has been decreasing over the years, so there are starting to be fewer people that are around to enrole. The student fees have been increased, so students want what they pay for or are put off studying for this reason. A lot of academia is short of money, and some are in serious financial difficulties and without an attraction to study at the College or university, the end for that organsiation could be in sight not too far away. With regards to the locking down of the PCs: That's my job :) and it is getting harder to block the stuff students can do (even if they only surf the net with IE, that causes so many problems!). Linux would actually be an easier platform to support for a lot of users. Matthew -- ubuntu-uk mailing list ubuntu-uk@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-uk
