NYSCATE: Session Canceled

Yesterday I received notice from NYSCATE that the hands-on lab I was giving on November 19th had been canceled due to low enrollment.

This message is regarding your “Introduction to Open Source Applications” session.  Up to this point, we were holding on to your session in hopes that enrollment would trip to our cutoff of 3 participants, however, we will need to cancel the session due to low enrollment.

Yes, you read that correctly. There were not three educators interested in learning about Open Source Applications this year. With the same description last year I ended up with eight educators in my class. I am disappointed and now must think about how to raise interest for the session next year. When I look at the courses that survived they are either iDevice oriented or focused on an ‘outcome’. I obviously will not have the fortune of teaching about things that match the popularity of an Apple advertised computing device so I think next year I must find a desired outcome and align it with FOSS applications and tools.

The conference is very supportive of Open Source tools such as Moodle so I know there is no issue there. I need to find and tell a story relevant to education that involves Ubuntu and Open Source Applications. Sadly that will have to wait until next year.

Hands-on Open Source Lab: Success

The hands-on open source lab I taught at NYSCATE 2010 was a resounding success. The technical staff at the school hosting the labs allowed Ubuntu to be loaded on the computers used. This allowed the attendees to experience Ubuntu and several open source applications.

Two of the attendees are considering switching their labs from Windows to Ubuntu after the lab and one is looking to upgrade their school from older Ubuntu installs to the most current LTS. All attendees were amazed with Blender and the sheer quality and quantity of available applications.

Tomorrow I get to present Free and Open in Education: ISTE 21st Century Skills and NETP 2010. I expect to have pack the 120 person capacity room. I will post and update on how that goes tomorrow.

NYSCATE: Full day hands-on open source lab

I just got notice that my presentation and hands-on lab submissions for NYSCATE have been approved. I plan on exposing the attending educators to a series of open source applications that can be run on Linux, OS X or Windows. I would like to find some curriculum that ties in with the applications as well.

If anyone has suggestions please let me know.

NYSCATE social media

NYSCATE is using the following tags for social media:

#nyscate

#nyscate2009

They are also using wikispaces for presenters to add information for their presentations. You can check my wikispaces presentation page out and give me feedback.

NYSCATE 2009

I will be giving a presentation, Educational Technology and Equity in Today’s Schools, at the 44th annual NYSCATE conference on the morning of Tuesday November 24th. The headline presenters are Sir Ken Robinson, Chris Lehmann, Elliot Soloway, Cathie Norris, David Jakes and Peter Reynolds. The conference has over 1000 pre-registrations this year and will provide an exciting opportunity to advocate for the adoption of FOSS software in K-12 education. Unfortunately the cost of a vendor booth was simply too high for the New York State LoCo team to afford this year, but perhaps getting a booth on the exhibit floor will be possible next year. I will post a report on the presentation and some pictures from the event later in the week.

Educational Technology and Equity in Today’s Schools

I am scheduled to give a presentation for NYSCATE next month and I am starting to piece together the pieces and bits. Tonight I worked on my slide background. I always try to do a different custom background for my presentations. This is the product of about an hour of work.

Getting feedback on the this presentation background would be much appreciated. Thanks.