[TOS] Infrastructure Team: Can haz?

[Matthew Jadud]

Hi all,

On Wed, Jan 12, 2011 at 13:29, Heidi Ellis <heidijcellis at gmail.com> wrote:
> constraint is time. Computing profs already have to keep up with the latest
> technology changes. Involving students in OSS is a change in teaching

I had a detailed response to some of the earlier posts, but let it
sit. (I didn't like having college and university faculty compared to
children who need to learn to make their bed---it was a bad analogy.)
Like educators at all levels, faculty work long hours because they are
passionate about their students, and the ones who will go the extra
mile to introduce their students to FOSS need more barriers knocked
down, not morality tales.

I'm completely with Heidi on this, and I want to take it a step
further. The majority of students graduating today are not in
computing. I'm going to claim that a lot (most?) of management
positions are held by people who graduated with degrees in History,
Literature, Business, Philosophy, Psych, Econ... you get the picture.
If you want POSSE to have an impact---that is, if you want faculty
beyond computing departments bringing their students into the
ecosystem---then you need to lower the barriers until an overworked
member of the faculty at a small community college teaching technical
writing can easily (1) learn the tools and (2) help their students to
work with those tools in open communities. (Or, not. See my last
comment.)

More questions and discussion about the needs of the users (the
faculty---who are they, who do we want to support?) and how best to
meet those needs is a good idea. While I understand the spirit of
Chris's point of view, I don't think it gets at the reality of the
vast majority of POSSE participants to date, or the broader community
of educators that we hope (need?) to engage. To that end, more
user-centered discussion and questions to people like Mel (who has
helped run just about every POSSE to date) would be a Very Good Thing.

Cheers,
Matt