Why do schools hire retards.

Abraxaz1

Abraxaz1

Abraxaz1

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OK a bit of back story,
I help a friend who runs a private IT consultant company that specialise in large scale network installs i.e. school style network's.
Well he got awarded the local schools system refurbishment, which contained full new cabling and pc plus pc in each lecture room ready for ready for future power interactive boards.
Well reading the specification we were told that was required for the pc in the research rooms, and IT lecture rooms. We recommended a small form factor or even a Intel atom based pc, with a dual core , 2 gb of ram, 120gb hard drive (students work is stored on a separate server). Running either a opensuse or Ubuntu to keep the price down and also the lower strain on a system compared to vista.
So we submit this idea to the “IT” leader at this school and she comes out with the same generic crap, so she's comes back with a specification she's decided on with her own “background “knowledge” and research....
She wants each pc to be quad core, 4 gb of ram (so the school will have to invest in 64bit operating pcs) 3800 series graphics cards and 1 tb hard drive for a system which has limited use and access to the hard drive (all students work is save on the file server not on the pc's hard drive). And require each a full system of anti virus. I can understand this specification for the teachers pc that will be running the interactive screens.
So now the systems are nearly 3 times the cost and all they are going to be doing is run a web browser, office application's and printing of a students work. Not exactly a need for a quad core 4gb system.
I'm starting to understand why the schools around here are constantly struggling with staying within their budgets.
Sorry for the rant, but probably due to this women so called intelligent idea, the school will have to cut back in a certain area.
 
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they probably wont get to upgrade their computers for another 10 years and she probably knows this.
she is in my view making the right choice....she is atleast future proofing them as much as she can.

btw since when did women say 'higher spec' and men say 'No lower lower' :p
 
What a waste. Play the Green card. The power consumption of those beasts will be many times that of an Atom based machine. I bet the graphics card alone will pull the same watts. The local authority should be pushing to reduce power consumption in schools so get eco on their hides!
 
I would meet her in the middle and go AMD energy effiecient dual core with 780G board.

ok graphics, better processor than atom. but then not OTT like her quad suggestion.
 
why are you bothered about how much they spend? you have suggested what you think is needed so you should have no guilty conscience, give the lady what she wants, she is paying ;)
 
The way the public sector work is they have to spend every penny, if they don't they get next years budget cut. Its a backward system where its there interest to be wasteful. Nobody looks at the big picture.
 
Im about to start work in a school is this what i should expect? :(
I'll change the world (or the school system at least). Open Source all the way! More money then to spend on the kids!
 
eXor said:
Go over her head.
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do this. its people like her who ruin schools and there reputations :(


no doubt there will be cutbacks in other sections of the school

similar had happened at the school my mum runs before she was there. they didnt have enough simple things they needed like large paper sheets, coloured pens etc but they had some fancy computers no one needed. i suppose it happens everywhere
 
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mleanz1 said:
Im about to start work in a school is this what i should expect? :(
I'll change the world (or the school system at least). Open Source all the way! More money then to spend on the kids!
Click to expand...

You might find there are already service level agreements in place with other parties which specify the use of Microsoft software. Also, a popular information management system for schools is currently Windows only. It will really depend on your setup, but I definitely wouldn't go in armed with your Linux CDs before you've at least spent a couple of months in the job.

It's a great idea to go all open source, but unfortunately you might find the barriers too much to overcome. Also, even if you overcame the technical challengs and converted your userbase, you might be leaving the school in a right mess if you leave and they can't find a Linux administrator to replace you.

Good luck with it though. :)
 
Speaking as an "IT tech" in a school, linux + teacher = support nightmare, by all means have a linux back end, but its best keeping the teacher facing IT equipment as close to what they would be using at home as possible.

While the spec this "IT Leader" has come up with isn't bad, it could do with being a little closer to what you were thinking, so present her with a tweaked spec that is in the middle ground of both.
 
Abraxaz1 said:
OK a bit of back story,
I help a friend who runs a private IT consultant company that specialise in large scale network installs i.e. school style network's.
Well he got awarded the local schools system refurbishment, which contained full new cabling and pc plus pc in each lecture room ready for ready for future power interactive boards.
Well reading the specification we were told that was required for the pc in the research rooms, and IT lecture rooms. We recommended a small form factor or even a Intel atom based pc, with a dual core , 2 gb of ram, 120gb hard drive (students work is stored on a separate server). Running either a opensuse or Ubuntu to keep the price down and also the lower strain on a system compared to vista.
So we submit this idea to the “IT” leader at this school and she comes out with the same generic crap, so she's comes back with a specification she's decided on with her own “background “knowledge” and research....
She wants each pc to be quad core, 4 gb of ram (so the school will have to invest in 64bit operating pcs) 3800 series graphics cards and 1 tb hard drive for a system which has limited use and access to the hard drive (all students work is save on the file server not on the pc's hard drive). And require each a full system of anti virus. I can understand this specification for the teachers pc that will be running the interactive screens.
So now the systems are nearly 3 times the cost and all they are going to be doing is run a web browser, office application's and printing of a students work. Not exactly a need for a quad core 4gb system.
I'm starting to understand why the schools around here are constantly struggling with staying within their budgets.
Sorry for the rant, but probably due to this women so called intelligent idea, the school will have to cut back in a certain area.
Click to expand...

I hope you are going to do more than just sit back and moan about it on an internet forum.
 
If it's a secondary/higher school then it might be justified because some of the students may be using CAD programs for graphics and whatnot (at least I did in product design, was the only part of the subject I was any good at!) - and in media studies we did some video encoding which would also suffer at the hands of an Atom.
 
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