[nzlug] OSS in Nz schools

[Simon Bridge]

On Thu, 2007-02-08 at 08:02 +1300, Vik Olliver wrote:
> On Thu, 2007-02-08 at 01:43 +1300, Nevyn wrote:
> > Does anyone here actually work in the education sector? (and more
> > specifically a school?). The first question, disregarding the OS
> > question entirely for the time being, is what are the requirements? An
> > Office Suite is a no brainer. It's the other stuff that'll either make
> > or break a project of this type.
> > 
> My brother-in-law teaches IT in Matamata. If you need input from him,
> I'll put you in contact.

I've been a secondary teacher...

Most schools I've been involved with have liked to have computers so
they can say they have them. They like to be able to point out how
advanced they are in a way that their patrons can understand.

Teachers use office type applications, occasionally power-point.
However, there is usually some school oriented software around for
working out timetables and to aid planning lessons.

There will also be some demonstration software for students where
computers actually make it to a classroom.

I found that schools with the greatest on-paper commitment to IT
actually use it the least on a day-to-day basis. Networks and so forth
are usually staggeringly unreliable (then add students) and so gets
factored out by folk who actually have to do the teaching. However, they
don't think of this as "unreliable". They think of this as "normal". But
if you try to tell them that this is not normal and that things can be
better, nobody wants to know.