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Re: [LUG] Ubuntu training for newbies

 

Grant Sewell wrote:
On Sun, 25 Apr 2010 19:11:25 +0100
John Hansen wrote:

On 25/04/2010 19:04, james kilty wrote:
On Sat, 2010-04-24 at 12:47 +0100, Paul Sutton wrote:

It would be nice to have an indication on demand for this sort of
thing, as it seems training or lack there of is a big barrier to
the take up of Linux of any flavour.
I contacted my local adult ed centre a couple of years ago about
running a course. They said they'd have to contact the IT
department and I heard no more. I presume the IT department would
not like to have their Windows machines contaminated with a Linux.
So, an educational opportunity was disallowed by the IT
professionals rather than on educational merit. There is a human
rights issue here if I wanted to pursue it.

James

James,
I suppose the IT guys were not themselves confident in the use of
Linux so were not prepared
to run a Linux course.

John W

Yes, I'd *like* to think that as well.  Many years ago I contacted my
then-local Adult Ed people about *ME* running a Linux course and I got
exactly the same treatment as James.  Then over the course of 5 years
whilst under the employ of a local FE College there were many attempts
- frequently met with enthusiasm but then everything got swept under
 the carpet.
You have to remember that Linux and FLOSS scares the hell out of the educational establishment. Currently people earn a lot of money re-inventing the wheel - almost every teacher/tutor makes their own course and sells material etc. Now consider the floss approach - all material free online, a good 75% of the market can easily self train at home and self test. You then just need to pay for 'qualifications' - ie exams etc.
Old habits die hard
I still find it amusing that school teachers complain about the amount of work they have to do preparing lessons. Why dont they ( and bloody ofsted) pool their work?
Tom te tom te tom

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