Step Zero - Thu, Aug 27, 2020

Are you a nail? I am a hammer.

PSA - I have had an extremely long week and am exhausted as fuck. Probably just going to steal some ideas from my research and spew some garbage. Let me know if it’s too bad. Or just skip it, I don’t want you to suffer through this.

As mentioned in one of my earlier blogs, I have been working on a report to better understand the Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) ecosystem in India. I am particularly looking at the state of FOSS and Education (obviously) in the country. For the last few weeks this is all I have thinking, breathing and living. It’s fascinating when you are researching a topic, how quickly you go from I know so much to I know nothing at all, constantly like a pendulum. While I have also strongly argued the need for FOSS coming in big to the education scene (mentioned in another blog), especially after the pandemic. There is evidence constantly coming up telling me how tricky the entire thing is going to be.

One disclaimer off the top, I have an extremely biased personal position on the entire scenario. To put it briefly, Open Education Resources (OERs) and FOSS and integral to any reform and sustainable development in the space, without either it’s just not happening. The grand idea at the end of everything is enabling FOSS literacy at an early age so that other aspects like adoption and contribution come in more organically.

Here comes the tricky part. Who will this solution benefit and how it will benefit them. Even if you suggest the perfect solution, there should be someone available and capable of adopting it. According to some estimates, computer literacy amongst children in India is just 10% (1). Most educational settings still hold the archaic views of computers not being important in education. Event if institutes adopt programmes promoting the use of technology, the educators are not equipped to use technology as a teaching medium. So the solution of FOSS literacy becomes a moot point. It’s the equivalent of wanting to screw a nut, with the hammer.

There is an urgent need for building and sustaining these capacities in educational institutes and enable them with the necessary resources, then we can talk about the what resources are the best one to use. I know this is not something new that I have discovered. These ideas have been argued an discussed forever, I am just enjoying it playing out in front of me. Back to the drawing board, I guess. And I am glad to be able to write about my thoughts, gives me immense clarity on where I want to move next. Thank you for reading these, I will see you on the next one.

TATA!

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