The planned £4.5bn schools IT revamp today faces a barrage of criticism.
The government's Building Schools for the Future (BSF) initiative has provoked a fierce reaction from IT managers who believe they will be dictated to by local education partnerships comprising local authorities and private sector suppliers.
These partnerships mean they will be steered away from open source software and concede control of procurement.
Computing has been inundated with comments from IT managers and technicians worried that the scheme will threaten the quality of IT support in schools and their own career development.
Others fear the scheme will leave students unable to exploit the latest web and social networking-based applications.
Schools are being prevented from enjoying a revolution in software provision, and self-sufficiency is being halted by the promotion of dependency, said Ian Lynch, spokesman for the Open Schools Alliance.
“Innovation starts with teachers and pupils, but under BSF the school’s IT strategy is taken out of its hands,” he said.
“The massive rise in Web 2.0 and social networking tells us that applications are moving to the web and tools are provided free and supported by advertising, not licensing and subscription.
“The further you remove control from users, the more likely you are to entrench the status quo, which many firms that would win BSF-style contracts have an interest in maintaining.”
Young people do not have enough input into the IT they use, which will do nothing for their skills, said Steve Molyneux, an independent IT and e-learning expert.
“The way young people use the web almost conflicts with the functionality of virtual learning environments, which were developed in the mid-1990s,” he said.
Partnerships under the BSF initiative are already being formed across the UK, however, the latest being Newham Council’s £53m deal with IT supplier RM.
See below for examples of school IT managers' angry comments on how BSF is affecting their ability to deliver IT.
BSF could threaten the career development of school IT managers, while shutting out smaller suppliers 17 Apr 2008
Computing looks at what Building Schools for the Future hopes to achieve 17 Apr 2008
Education sector scheme includes £15bn-worth of technology investment 09 Aug 2007
The £53m IT contract with supplier RM will cover 19,000 pupils in the borough as part of its Building Schools for the Future scheme 14 Apr 2008
Robert Chapman reveals the advantages for the IT professional of working in education 28 Feb 2008Industry groups claim design and construction of new schools fails to take IT use into account 31 Jul 2008The £53m IT contract with supplier RM will cover 19,000 pupils in the borough as part of its Building Schools for the Future scheme 14 Apr 2008
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