One issue that I don't think we probably talk about enough when it comes to using technology for educational purposes is what the effect is of asking students to use particular software packages, especially commercial software packages? When we choose textbooks, I suppose that we don't worry about the "brand" behind them so much as we worry about the content of the books themselves. I hope this is the case when we decide on what software to use.
I'm not, however, sure that this is the case insofar as many of our decisions are made for us by the institutions in which we are working. For example, the fact that we are conducting our workshops in the Arc lab means that we do not effectively have the option of using, for example, Firefox as our web browser or OpenOffice as our office suite.
Is there an ethics to asking (or not asking) students to use PowerPoint? Are we willing to avoid commercial software altogether and rely on less ubiquitous and (sometimes) less-supported open-source software?
This doesn't even get to a lot of the other logistical issues that might arise when we think about this question: for example, what do we do with students who use different platforms for which compatible software is not always available (Windows vs. Mac OS vs. Linux)?
I won't keep going on about this, but I'd love to hear others' thoughts on the issue.
One of the most frustrating encounters I have with technology occurs when people use different applications–Mac files uploaded to Telesis are unreadable unless saved in a text-rich format, for example. So at some point, no matter how often I remind them, I have to hound students to resave their document in an accessable format. Or I have students who complain about the variety of course management software–blackboard vs. Telesis, etc–that they have to learn. Hard/software developers seem reluctant to make their applications more friendly to each other. Certainly it seems like the best applications may not become the most popular. I don’t want to cheer for a monopoly, but there is some amount of usefulness in having something become so widespread.
This doens’t quite address your ethics question, except to imply that sometimes familiarity and logistical ease outweight concerns for variety and competition even in my own life.
That’s a good point, Courtney–part of us probably longs for the ease of a universal application shared among all computer users (and if Microsoft has their way, we’ll end up with it).
There are ways to work around compatibility issues, of course, and it has gotten better. For example, most of the MS Office documents are cross-platform now, so a Mac Word document should open with minimal problems on a Windows PC with Office. The problem for me is endorsing, or worse, requiring a certain application for students if it may mean an extra cost to them (either in terms of money, time, or principles).
Let’s say, for example, that you require students to present a PowerPoint presentation for your class. One group consists of students who all have the full version of MS Office on their personal computers in their dorm rooms–they can work at their leisure with a piece of software that they own the license too. Another group has a student who doesn’t have a pc, one who has a Mac without Office, one who has a pc that runs Linux, etc. Has my requirement introduced an unnecessary difficulty for them to navigate?
My solution thus far has been to make sure that I can present an open-source alternative to whatever commercial software package I might mention. So if I were to require a PowerPoint presentation, I would show my students OpenOffice as an alternative that would allow them to do the same thing without a monetary cost and with minimal other costs to them.
It doesn’t solve everything, but I really think that more of an effort should be made in the academic community in general to get behind open-source software initiatives. But I’ll get off my soapbox now.
I think the PDF format has turned out to be somewhat of a solution to this. Most word processing applications can now convert their files into PDF format. Although the pdf format was started (I think) by adobe, there are some open source pdf viewers (like xpdf on Linux); not to mention the fact that acrobat reader is free.
–Greg
That’s a good point, Greg. As long as there are applications out there than can mediate between the different platforms and software environments (and for free), we can avoid some of these problems. It gets a little trickier, I think, when we ask students specifically to make a PowerPoint presentation, however, or to use some other specific piece of software. So far, the only solution I’ve found is to try to offer students a viable, free, compatible alternative to the program (which requires a little investigation on my part, but it’s usually possible).
–Ryan
This is definitely going to be an issue for me next year as I’m trying to teach students how to produce scientific illustrations using Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator. I’m going to try to teach as much as I can about these applications through directing them to online movie tutorials to at least get them familiar with the software, and thus freeing up as much time as possible for them to actually use the software during class time. I don’t know how fair it is going to be to require students to work on projects with this software outside of class, since some may have the programs but most won’t. Also, I haven’t figured out what to do about different versions of the software. I know CS2 best, but some students might have earlier versions, and I think the software available in here is an earlier version as well.
I don’t know how well-known this is, but there is an open source alternative to photoshop called the gimp. (See http://www.gimp.org) It is supposed to be comparable in functionality to photoshop, although it is somewhat difficult to learn. I just thought I would mention this just as something to consider (perhaps for the future since learning an entire new program such as this would take a long time). Not only is the gimp free, but (to agree with something that was mentioned earlier) I think open source software is more inline with the academic spirit.
A more practical suggestion would be to stick with photoshop and the version that the computer labs have, since that seems to be the fairest (and easiest) solution.
–Greg
Thanks for the suggestion, Greg. Which leads me to a side question. Why must these online sources have such silly names? Gimp? What kind of argument is that for something that actually works? I wish that these sources would sound a bit more professional. Which is why I like wordpress.
–Courtney
I think the silly names come from silly computer scientists who are writing programs for free (and hence don’t have to have a professional sounding name). Gimp is an acronym for GNU image manipulation program, and GNU is an acronym for GNU’s not unix (it’s a recursive acronym; again more silliness) which basically refers to free programs under a certain special open source license. You can read about GNU at http://www.gnu.org.
–Greg