BETT 2010 See http://opensourceschools.org.uk for more details.

1. Saving Money
with Open Source
Open Source Schools
Miles Berry, David Willmot,
Alan Bell, Paul Haigh

2. Miles Berry, Roehampton University
Saving money

3. “Dear Chief Secretary,
I'm afraid there is no money.
Kind regards - and good luck!
Liam”
Liam Byrne

4. O Brave New World
• Becta
• Harnessing Technology Grant
• BSF

5. “When we decided to do a
microprocessor on our own, I made two
great decisions - I gave them two things
which National, Intel and Motorola had
never given their design teams: the first
was no money; the second was no
people. The only way they could do it was
to keep it really simple.”
Hermann Hausser

6. “Gentlemen, we have no money,
therefore we must think.”
Ernest Rutherford

7. Open source politics

8. Ofsted
“Compare performance with others to see where
improvements could be made.”
The vast majority of schools have invested heavily in computer
networks, running expensive commercial operating systems
and standard ‘office’ suites of software. In these schools, the
annual licensing costs for each networked computer are eating
up a significant proportion of the ICT budget, restricting further
expansion… Open source operating systems and software are
now a reliable and cost-effective solution, enabling the few
schools that choose this route to achieve excellent value for
money. A few schools have used open source software for
establishing a virtual learning environment, enabling them to
obtain several years’ worth of development with no licensing
costs.

9. Ofsted
‘‘Challenge why and how a service is being provided.”
All the schools in the sample had chosen to purchase a
package of ‘office’ software that is standard in the business
world. On the one hand, this has the benefit of introducing
students to software they are likely to encounter in the future;
on the other, it may actually be hindering the development of
their skills. … In the small number of schools that had
deliberately chosen to provide a mixture of operating systems,
students met a greater variety of software and were better
equipped to cope with rapidly changing technologies.

10. Becta

11. Free to run the program
CC by-nc Socceraholic

12. Free for all
CC by-nc-sa Sarah Parrott

13. Sustainability
cc-by-nc-sa thomas.merton

14. Interoperability
cc-by-sa bdesham

15. Straightforward Support
cc by-nc Destinys Agent

16. Empowered techies
cc-by-nc-sa Grant Mitchell

17. Free to improve
the program
CC by-nc Maggie T

18. Fit for purpose
cc-by-nc bre pettis

19. Helping one another
cc-by-nc Cambodia Trust

20. Avoid lock-in
cc-by-nc-nd xserve

21. LAMP
cc-by-nc smudge9000

22. Freedom and Control
CC by-nc-sa fatboyke (luc)

23. David Willmot, Blackfen School for Girls
Inkscape

28. Using Inkscape

39. Paul Haigh, Notre Dame High School
Joomla!
Moodle
& More

40. What kind of a school is Notre Dame?
• Outstanding Catholic comprehensive school 1400
11-18 year olds
• Comprehensive intake 5% FSM 20% on SEN register
(9% SA 7% SA+)
• As we draw children from all over the city don’t have
the ‘post code skew’ (positive or negative) of other
city schools but are truly comprehensive
• Technology College since 1995
• Ex-grant maintained
• Hub of the Hallam CLC (City Learning Centre)
• Also have Leading Edge status and Second
Specialism (Humanities)
• National Support School
• Entrepreneurial, innovative and risk taking

41. What do we use?
• Joomla based web site as a portal- log in integrated with
MicroSoft Windows Active Directory usernames/ passwords
• Includes features like flipping book e-magazine
• Exchange Server/ Outlook email for all staff and students
• Integration with IP telephony giving features like web
access to voice mail
• Management Information System: Serco Facility CMIS
• VLE Moodle (with a link to MIS) and Mahara e-portfolios
• Gleamtech web access to ‘my documents’ and all shared
directories such as curriculum resources, staff admin folders
with key word search tool (without need for tagging)
.

54. Alan Bell, The Open Learning Centre
Ubuntu and Edubuntu

55. Freedom all the way down

56. “Our aim is to put together a system
that contains all the best free software
available in education and make it
easy to install and maintain”

57. What is Edubuntu?

A collection of great applications

A firm foundation on which they are based

A community of educators

58. The Applications
(just a few of them)

65. The Foundations
Edubuntu is built on Ubuntu which provides:

Package management

Automatic updates

Networking

Integration with Active Directory

Terminal Services

Access to thousands of general purpose
applications

68. Community

Global community of educators working with
and working on Edubuntu

Communication via mailing lists and weekly
real time meetings on IRC

Developer summit every six months

69. Web Live

Free trial on the web

http://edubuntu.org/vmmanager

Virtual cloud based desktop

Lasts for two hours

70. Where can we take it?

Edubuntu is a global project

It is open to contributions

We can adapt it to the UK environment

Translate to English converting -ize to -ise

National Curriculum

71. Thin Clients

72. Portable Kit

74. Open Source Schools
cc-by-nc-sa MrUsh

75. To find out more…
opensourceschools.org.uk
@mberry, @dwillmot20, @paulhaigh, @alanbelltolc
admin@opensourceschools.org.uk
School Leaders Conference, 12th April
Techie Unconference, Summer