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0e1f616
(Get the code!)
Education & Government?
I've noticed that the way people are currently "educated" regarding computers leads to a very narrow-sighted, almost 99% Windows-only way of thinking.
This applies to schools, universities and adult evening-courses.
In an Austrian school in "Krems", they've adapted an existing live-distro to perfectly fit the needs of an average school environment:
http://
(sorry, German only)
Interestingly, the pupils are not the ones complaining - it's the teachers. And mostly those of other schools. From my experience, I'd say they are afraid. Most teachers nowadays are not good with computers and they will literally hang you if you modify *anything* on a system they're used to work with. They never understood the applications, they've learned things the "muscle-
Why are they so afraid? Because they don't have anyone helping them, and often the math or physics teacher is the admin - and thus stressed by a double-workload.
So what will happen?
Kids that could grow up open minded only see Windows around them (and a few Apples). As soon as they start working, they will use the tools they've been taught. They will install the same applications at home (usually illegal copies), suggest them to friends, support them, etc...
Getting FOSS into schools would provide a better IT future, because kids could actually learn something. Currently, they're only taught to become end-users.
...and that would also bring more developers to FOSS, because clever pupils have a lot of spare time. : )
Now there are several approaches for improving this situation. The ones that could immediately be tried out are some bottom-up ideas:
- Convert your old school?
Most of use *are* geeks. This usually means we were also good at school, and thus we often have a good connection to our old teachers (at least they pretend to be friendly). What about talking to them, asking them why they're not using FOSS - and where we could help them.
- Talk to parents.
If you have kids yourself, you can talk from parent to parent and make them see what harm the current educational system will cause their children, by denying them access to valuable technology know how. etc...
There are several more ways, but I don't want to flood you with a wall-o-text. : )
^Rooker
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The 2nd thing are governmental institutions. I'll wait for replies on my first post before elaborating that.