Tuesday 5 April 2011 in London
What it is
This conference has been designed by school leaders and others in the Open Source Schools‘ community to showcase to school leadership teams the best of educational free and open source software whether used alone or blended with proprietary software.
Why you should come
Using open source software in your school will allow you to:
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save money
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use technology in a way that is aligned to your vision of teaching and learning
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have greater flexibility in the way ICT is used.
Deploying open source is something many schools do in house, and support is available from the community, from many local authorities, partner schools and from local SMEs. Many schools prefer open source because of the rapid way the tools develop, adopting new technologies without schools having to pay for an upgrade. Others like the way the tools can be tailored to specific needs or integrated with other systems in school, such as linking an open source VLE with a proprietary MIS.
The conference will provide:
- an overview of the state of the art in open technology for education
- an opportunity to share experiences with other school leaders who are forming their Open Source ICT strategy
- advice and guidance from leading figures drawn from industry, education and government
- facts which dispel myths about open source software
- examples of how to make real financial savings
- cast-iron case studies from schools using open source to make whole school improvements.
Registration details can be found at http://openingopportunities.eventbrite.com/
Programme
10:00 Miles Berry: the moral case for open source
10:30 Brian Lockwood: the economic case for open source
11:00 Tony Parkin: asking awkward questions
11:30 Coffee
11:50 Paul Haigh: the financial case for open source
12:20 Leon Cych: open source construction tools
12:50 David Willmot: providing tools to equip students – open source apps for Windows.
13:20 Lunch
14:00 Paul Hynes: a national perspective
14:30 Ian Usher: an LA perspective
15:00 John McLear: a developer’s perspective
15:30 Mark Taylor: a commercial perspective
16:00 Closing panel
Ian Usher
Ian Usher is currently the E-Learning Co-ordinator for Buckinghamshire County Council’s Children & Young People’s Service. He has led the County’s use of Moodle and supports schools in the creative use and development of online learning using a variety of tools.
Paul Hynes
Paul Hynes is Head of New Technologies at SSAT. His current work as part of the ‘Future Schools’ group includes work around learning technologies (including blogs, wikis, learning platforms, digital video, podcasting, webquests, computer games, augmented reality and student-owned devices), learning platforms, the use of learning spaces and student digital leaders.
Cheaper and better – a marriage made in heaven
Miles Berry
Miles Berry is senior lecturer in ICT Education at Roehampton University, where he lectures on undergraduate and postgraduate teacher training programmes. His principle research interest is the role of online communities in teachers’ professional formation and development. Prior to this, he spent 18 years working in four schools, most recently as a primary head teacher, leading the implementation of open source software including Ubuntu, Moodle, Elgg and Drupal.
Paul Haigh
Paul Haigh is Assistant Head for Innovation at Notre Dame High School, Sheffield, an ICT consultant and writer of The New Technologies Handbook For Schools. Notre Dame is an outstanding school with award winning ICT (Becta Excellence Award 2009). Paul is a speaker in demand on the conference circuit regularly speaking at events that include BETT, SSAT and Optimus Conferences as well as the political lobby circuit in Westminster. He is passionate about the potential for ICT in revolutionising schools and speaks with humour and the direct honesty you’d expect of a Yorkshireman.
Brian Lockwood
Brian Lockwood, is Director of IT at Egglescliffe School, winner of Becta’s regional and national Whole School ICT Excellence Award in 2010, and a member of the Open Source Schools steering group.
Mark Taylor
Mark Taylor is the CEO of Sirius Corporation plc, the UK’s first Office of Government Commerce and Becta accredited Open Source company.
From individual classrooms, to regional infrastructure projects, to the National Digital Resource Bank, Sirius is involved day-to-day with Open Source in Education at all levels.
Venue
We’ve secured a conference room at the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators on London’s Bloomsbury Square.
12 Bloomsbury Square is ideally situated in ‘legal London’ close to all major transport links and a 400-space underground car park, staffed 24 hours a day. The closest underground stations are Holborn (Central and Piccadilly lines), and Tottenham Court Road (Central and Northern lines).