I have just returned from the GITEX Expo in Dubai. It is massive expo featuring major and minor IT players. Everyone from Oracle to the Taiwanese Trade Commission is there. I normally got over a two day period to have enough time to talk to everyone and see new solutions. Although most of the displays focused on corporate IT, I did see 20-30 vendors demonstrating classroom technology.
What was appalling to me was that everyone was trying to create some type of cheaper or varied solution for projecting and image and then interacting with it on a wall or board. Similar to SMART Technologies. Just a few meters from most of these vendors were companies such as WACOM and GENIUS which have very cool wireless accessories to make any classroom flexible. Simple additions that free the teacher/presenter from the confines of a board, and allow them to work around the room. In every case, the teacher/presenter spends most of their time with their back to their audience.
Not only is the audience looking at the back of someone's head while they are literally speaking toward the wall, the teacher/presenter is going through menus and trying to do and redo things on the board with a bunch of tools and "toys". The audience probably can describe the hairline of the teacher/presenter better than the content of the presentation.
If we look at best practice strategies for HUMAN COMMUNICATION and PUBLIC SPEAKING, we find that successful speakers and good instructors:
* Make eye contact
* Change their tone and inflection and project their voices clearly
* Use hand motions and other non-verbal cues
* Use presentation media as a guide not a distraction
* When applicable allow the audience to participate in the creation or manipulation of media
* Connect on an emotional level to help ingrain the message into the minds of the audience
I could go on and on. Basically making the focus of the classroom or presentation the back of someone's head is a mistake. We are losing the discipline of good public speaking, by demanding technology that separates us from our audiences. It really needs to stop before we forget how to stand-up and create a presentation, when all we have is an idea.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Friday, October 1, 2010
How to Support Open Source with your IT Budget
Many schools use open source unofficially. They download programs like VLC and then clone them across all their installations. They run servers with Apache to provide numerous services to their communities. Yet normally they cannot donate or contribute any money to these open source projects because of the way supplier registration works.
I would be nice if every year the IT budget could have a line item called 'Open Source'. Then the IT director would be allowed to take various amounts of money and donate them to the projects that the school depends. However, this probably would not work. Most accountants do not understand the concept of open source, and even if they did they would never officially support a payment that did not require an invoice.
I think the solution is simple. IT directors need to employ a multi-faceted strategy to ensure that every year open source projects get additional financial support.
1. Raise awareness with parent and student groups who raise money. Let them know what benefits they are getting from open source, and explain how cost would increase for the community if these projects do not keep growing.
2. Lead fund raising efforts for IT projects that use open source software. The project can be the benefit to the community and the money can be donated to the open source project. There are so many projects that can support various groups within the community, but are difficult to budget for or get approved.
3. Create reports that bottom-liners such as accountants can understand. Build these reports year after year to show how much money is saved by using open source software. Make sure these reports include projections of savings if the software is continuously used and projections of budgetary increases if the open source software were not used any longer.
If open source software can find awareness among users, eventually bottom-liners will have to start paying attention to the numbers and make the needed changes in policy to allow schools to directly and publicly support software that is empowering their communities.
I would be nice if every year the IT budget could have a line item called 'Open Source'. Then the IT director would be allowed to take various amounts of money and donate them to the projects that the school depends. However, this probably would not work. Most accountants do not understand the concept of open source, and even if they did they would never officially support a payment that did not require an invoice.
I think the solution is simple. IT directors need to employ a multi-faceted strategy to ensure that every year open source projects get additional financial support.
1. Raise awareness with parent and student groups who raise money. Let them know what benefits they are getting from open source, and explain how cost would increase for the community if these projects do not keep growing.
2. Lead fund raising efforts for IT projects that use open source software. The project can be the benefit to the community and the money can be donated to the open source project. There are so many projects that can support various groups within the community, but are difficult to budget for or get approved.
3. Create reports that bottom-liners such as accountants can understand. Build these reports year after year to show how much money is saved by using open source software. Make sure these reports include projections of savings if the software is continuously used and projections of budgetary increases if the open source software were not used any longer.
If open source software can find awareness among users, eventually bottom-liners will have to start paying attention to the numbers and make the needed changes in policy to allow schools to directly and publicly support software that is empowering their communities.
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