Re: [libreoffice-marketing] LibO in Academia

Here is an interesting thread that was posted recently. It would be nice 
to hear of your comments.

=================

Quoting Anthony Papillion <papillion@gmail.com>:

>
> My local school district is looking at doing a fairly large upgrade from
> MS Office 2007 to MS Office 2010 (no real reason, just the Microsoft rep
> said it's time) and I'm really wanting to sell LibreOffice HARD as an
> affordable alternative.
>
> Has anyone approached education (specifically in the USA) and how did
> you do it? What are the initial forays that you used and what were the
> results?
>
> Thanks,
> Anthony
>
> - --
> Anthony Papillion
> Advanced Data Concepts
> Remote Technical Support and Software Development
>
> Office: (918) 919-4624
> Mobile: (918) 320-9968
=================

Hi Anthony,

Here would be some possible approaches I would take, just based upon my 
experiences in education.

1.  Try to find out if there are any teachers within the school district 
who are either a) already using open source software in the classroom 
or b) have an interest in open source software such as LibreOffice.  If 
you are a parent yourself within the school district, asking your 
child's teachers for names of those who teach computer studies and then 
contacting them would be a good place to start.

2. If you find a teachers who is interesting in giving LibreOffice a 
try, first let them do so on their workstation.  Let them be convinced 
that LibreOffice is a great tool for educating their students.

3. Let the teacher ask the IT staff (perhaps with your assistance if 
they desire) if they would be willing to install LibreOffice on a select 
number of workstations, to evaluate its potential.   Giving more 
rational explanations for the desire to evaluate LibreOffice could help 
put IT staff in a less defensive posture and may warm up to the idea, 
depending on the person.  Reasons you could give include the software's 
generous licensing terms, the ability for low-income students to have a 
copy of the software for their not-so-modern computer at home to improve 
their studies, the possibility to squeeze a few more years of life out 
of the school's aging workstations, etc.  Be sure to emphasize you wish 
to evaluate it, not immediately trying to make a district-wide move to 
the software in the immediate future.

The adoption of open source software, in my observations, has worked 
best when there is a genuine, organic interest from the teachers, 
administrators, students and/or IT staff.  Schools often have a number 
of mandates they have to comply with.  Figuring out a way to explain how 
open source software can help in meeting those mandates, and do it 
better than proprietary software, can go a long way toward helping in 
its adoption.  It won't be something that happens immediately.  Then 
again, like a lot of things in life, taking a slow, steady approach and 
building a solid foundation (ie people truly interested and convinced of 
open source software's potential in education) I think will win out in 
the end.

Best regards,
Gabriel

--
Gabriel Gurley
Educator and Author
Website: http://www.gabrielgurley.com/

=================


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