Seems our freedom of information laws don't apply to Microsoft and the estimated £55M schools spend on its software.

http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquire...uk-schools

Bolton Technical Innovation Centre was again the venue for the Free, Libre Open Source Software In Education this year. Skegness Grammar gave a talk on their Thin Client Linux system which has saved them tens of thousands of pounds compared to a Microsoft equivalent system. A brilliant example of trained people using OSS to provide excellent IT and save money too. The main message from the conference was that all the money paid on expensive licenses could be used to fund OSS development in the UK, creating jobs and skilled local people. BECTA estimate switching to OSS could save over £60 million in secondary and £200 million in primary schools. Imagine the difference being able to legally copy software for free would make on pupils, staff and parents.

Course management and visual learning environments are used by many schools and colleges. It allows teachers to set and mark online assignments, provide help and support all from one package. All activity is logged and provides an audit trail to show how much work and support was given. Students can't complain about lack of support or timescales to complete work! Moodle is the open source version used by many UK schools and colleges. If you want advice or help call us on 0845 201 2298.

http://business.newsforge.com/business/05/12/19/1859258.shtml?tid=37

http://www.schoolforge.org.uk/index.php/Open_University_chooses_Moodle

This is a list of Case Studies from SchoolForgeUK site

http://www.schoolforge.org.uk/index.php/Case_Studies

Video introduction Click here

nvu - Web page creator (HTML editor) http://www.nvu.com

Scribus - Desk Top Publisher. Create brochures, booklets and books. http://www.scribus.org.uk

OpenOffice.org - Writer, Draw, Base, Calc, Impress, Math. Complete office suite compatible with Microsoft Office - Word,Excel,Powerpoint. http://www.openoffice.org

Firefox - web browser http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox

Thunderbird - Email client http://www.mozilla.org/products/thunderbird

Lightning - Calendar plugin for Thunderbird and Firefox

Pidgin - Yahoo and Microsoft messenger compatible IRC

Gimp - Image editor

Moodle - Course management system aimed at Schools.

Gedit - basic text editor

Apache - web server

Squid - web proxy

Censornet - Web content filter

Kpdf - PDF viewer

Xfig - drawing application

Audacity - music and sound recorder, editor, mixer

Skype - telephony over internet (closed source but available on Linux)

Zoneminder - CCTV application http://www.zoneminder.com

Kolorpaint - image editor and resizer

rdesktop - terminal server client

Dia diagrams - basic version of OpenOffice Draw

Asterisk - Free PBX - use both VoIP and Analogue phones http://www.asterisk.org

SchoolforgeUK Software List http://www.schoolforge.org.uk/index.php/Free_and_Open_Source_Software_Directory

If you are planning to purchase new computer equipment and would like to reduce the license fees and ICT technician time you could use Open Source technologies. Parrs Wood High School in Manchester saves over £13,000 a year each on licenses fees. They have also reduced technician time by up to 75%. The recent BECTA report on 15 schools confirmed a 20% saving for secondary schools. The systems installed allows schools to re-use PCs that cannot run Windows XP. Technician time is greatly reduced as the system is centralised and very stable. The system also runs Moodle, the Course and Content Management Software that is rapidly being deployed in schools worldwide.

Discover Linux can provide this technology and yearly support at a price based on the actual yearly savings, starting at £2000 a year for support and software updates. Please contact us if you'd like a free survey and cost reduction quotation.

References and examples where Open Source is used:
BECTA report 13th May, 2005
Parrs Wood High School
Moodle
Specialist School Trust
Moodle at Yeovil College
Specialist School Trust
Moodle talk at FLOSSIE 2005 (Drew Buddie)

Venue for FLOSS conference 2005 and 2006 the centre is a purpose built centre for conferences and learning.

The centre has an IBM Linux Terminal Server running SuSE and diskless PCs running off it.

http://www.uktic.org

Powys are leaders in the adoption of Open Source Software in Schools. The have installed a Linux server in every school and are now in the process of upgrading them to add more features and security.

http://www.telecentres.com/opensource/index.html Update - Now won an award too!