LSB History - Part 3
Technology Culture
The LSB has employed a series of systems administrators and developers with a strong knowledge of and belief in open source technologies. A strong sense of advocacy for open source technology in education developed slowly over this time. The LSB believes that the “free” nature of these communities is congruent with the education community. For better or worse, proprietary systems have been viewed by the technical staff as inflexible and therefore often inappropriate as a tool for innovation in teaching and learning. The belief was that open source teaching and learning projects could be tailored to meet the specific college’s pedagogy and assessment style. Between 2000 and 2003 several transparent and honest discussions between enthusiastic software developers and teachers yielded many products that were used to transform and educate teachers in surrounding districts. Most of these success stories involved open source software projects as key components.
As the PI’s of LSB grants witnessed the development of software that supported alternative teaching methodologies they were able to impact their programs that may have been difficult with development effort, they became supporters and champions of open source.
TechMentor Support
A TechMentor program was developed in order to train and support the faculty and students in the School of Education. The staff of the TechMentor program is composed of students that register for a 3-credit class to learn how to use technology in the classroom. The TechMentor program primarily served the Teacher Preparation program in the college. This happened at the same time that FACSS implemented a program called Big Chalk with the goal of training faculty to use Blackboard and technology in instruction.