Techsurvivors
Archives => 2003 => Topic started by: Paddy on March 22, 2003, 07:26:00 PM
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As some of you know, North Andover is in the process of building a new High School, due to open in February 2004. And, up until a couple of weeks ago, it was slated to be all PC. I'd mounted a quiet campaign with our Superintendent (who I know well, from working closely with him on various projects) - giving him stacks of reading material on total cost of ownership, other school systems that use Macs extensively - everything I could dig up to bolster my case. He even started to read about OS X on his own and I could sense that he wasn't quite as convinced of the PC option. However, the decision wasn't up to him - the building committee, the HS principal, our district business manager (who was very convinced that PC's were the way to go) and the computer consultants who were part of the project team all had some say in the matter. Our superintendent had suggested that I talk to the building committee, but with everything else I do in the district, I had neither the time nor the energy for a battle I didn't think I could win.
Then, a couple of weeks ago, our local Apple rep called. Wanted to come and do a presentation on why they should reconsider. Not sure what he said to our business manager, but he must have been pretty persuasive. They called a meeting, then our HS principal, network manager and HS secretary went off to Shrewsbury, MA to see their new HS which is a mixed OS X and Windows environment and they came back impressed.
The real clincher though, was the dark cloud...our school operating budget for next year has been slashed by $2.2M (off $31M) - and along with staff, one of the major casualties is professional development. And guess what the professional development next year at the HS was supposed to be? Yup. Training on Windows PC's. No training. No PC's.
Yippee! I exaggerate a little there - there will be some PC's in the language and science labs because of certain software that they want to use which is PC-only, but for the most part, everything else will be shiny new Macs running OS X!!!
Our superintendent said to me (ribbing me a bit) "see, I do listen to you sometimes". I'd like to think I at least helped to open the door a crack - got them thinking a bit - but without Lars from Apple's last minute bid for a hearing, OS X's proven abilities in Shrewsbury and yes, our budget woes for FY04, I doubt I would have gotten anywhere. However, I'll take victory over the dark side any way I find it!!
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What a wonderful story. I think I now know who is destined to be the next VP / Education at Apple.
Waydago Paddy! You da man! (Sorta)
Harv
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GREAT WORK! And be sure to give our best to both the Apple Rep and the school at Shrewsbury! Maybe the Rep can use your school as an example next time!
Jim C.
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Warms the cockles of me heart!
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Great story! Wish it had worked for me. A few years ago, during the thick of the Microsoft-Dept. of Justice wars (oops, sorry! didn't mean to use that word!), I wrote to the DOJ asking them why they were bothering to sue MS and trying to smash them into little pieces, while every computer in the Federal government, military and civilian, runs Windoze??!! Why, I asked, didn't they just start using Macs?? And I went on to list some of the reasons why Macs are more perfect-in-every-way than anything out of Bill Gates alleged mind. Well, they didn't answer. That's the guvmint. Well, I'll stop there!
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Congratulations Paddy.
And kudos to the Apple Rep.
Hope they're all out there doing a similar job.
You should share your story. Might encourage others.
http://www.mathdittos2.com/ednews/
http://macvspc.info/
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Great Paddy! Bet you're feeling a lot more upbeat about life in general now... By the way (purely out of personal interest ) did the Isle of Man story (all the island's schools using networked Macs) help at all?
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HighMac, I forgot to tell you at the time, but I'm not sure that the link worked (a bit fuzzy on that - it was a while ago and I was extremely busy at the time). I gave our superintendent lots of the stuff from John Droz's site and some things about Maine and NC.
However, just did a bit of a search on Google and found this:
http://macfannet.mycom.co.jp/special/man/s...ofman_1eng.html
http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/0104/1...powerbook.shtml
ONE engineer for 2000 Macs (in 40 locations)??? Yikes. I don't think I'll go running out to publicize that bit just now, or they might think it was ok to cut our two techs down to one! Macs are great, but our techs are kept very busy, though they have several hundred PC's to look after too.
I'll probably send an email off to John Droz sometime soon - I did correspond with him about 18 months ago. I will try to get a few more details before I do, since the only person I've talked to so far is the HS secretary (who went on the trip to Shrewsbury). Her son is my son's best friend, so I found out about this on Friday evening.
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Bit of a follow up.
Update on Antioch School District's Mac vs. Windows Platform Debate
http://new.lowendmac.com/lab/03/0403.html