A Former Teacher’s Musings on Open Source and Web Technologies

I’ve been in tech communications my entire career, but at one point, right in the middle, I taught English in Bay Area public schools for a few years. I received my own education while teaching — in social justice, curriculum writing, teamwork, and even parenting, but one of the things I remember most, always uttered jokingly by a master teacher, was the line, “Rip off and disseminate.” That’s right: Teachers are among the original open sourcers. Indeed, free software, much of which has evolved to become open source software, was originally created out of collaborations between academic researchers and, in some cases, companies.

During the years that I taught, everyone — experienced teachers, administrators, advisors — encouraged me to borrow and share curriculum materials and methods. We teachers did this old school: photocopies, websites, Google docs — no fancy online platforms for people who are on their feet performing six class periods a day, and on lunch duty and helping students one-on-one the rest of the time. I gave curriculum and materials to others to use and tried to improve upon the things other teachers shared with me.

The best teaching involves delivering important information in an engaging, compelling way, so whether kids were standing in a line hurtling Shakespearean insults at each other and laughing hysterically, acting out a scene from a play or novel, or teaching each other grammar lessons as creatively as they could, my colleagues and I put the kids front and center and acted as facilitators as much as possible.

There’s so much talk these days about education reform and educational technology. I can tell you from experience that paying for materials and funding professional development training is the best way to drive improvement in educational outcomes. For example, what if every community had a program like the Krause Center for Innovation’s MERIT program for teachers, which provides technology training to educators, plus a stipend to cover their costs as they create new, tech-based curriculum, and a cool tech device? I attended the program one summer, and it was transformative for my curriculum, my teaching, and my confidence.

I loved teaching, and I loved my students and their families. I still remember almost all of them by name and still see many of them. But at heart, even though I think I was a good teacher, I’m kind of an introvert, professionally. I’m happiest with a cup of tea, at my computer, typing away. So when my husband and I moved to the East Coast for his academic job, I returned to communications.

Two cross-country moves later, I’m still writing for most of my workday, now for an open source software company, Ionic. I’m engaged in our local public schools, and I think a lot about teachers as open sourcers and how technology can pair with education in ways that are truly helpful. I’ve come to believe that curated content provided by nonprofit organizations online and open source technology are the best resources for education — in other words, I think the two best things the tech world can offer teachers, students, and parents are web-based and open source.

Why? First of all, the web is open to anyone with an internet connection, and the mobile web is available to anyone with a cheap phone and access to broadband. Free online content that’s been vetted by nonprofits like PBS is an excellent educational resource. Open source software (just like curriculum) can be customized, and developers — even students — can contribute to it; plus, it’s free to use.

It’s easy to draw parallels between the open source ethos and that of public education (at least as I’ve experienced it in the U.S.):

• Offer something (education/software) at low cost, to allow everyone to take advantage of the opportunity to participate.
• Work collaboratively.
• Funding, whether public or private, should go toward making things better (to buy teachers materials or send them to classes, or to create a customer support position at an open source company).
• Contribute to improving things, whether by participating in class or contributing to an open source project.
• Be supportive and positive.
• Give back.

I think there are great opportunities for teachers to take advantage of open source and web technologies, and for the companies that support those technologies to also support teachers and students. And I could envision a future in which certain types of curriculum become official open source projects — the process has begun, but it needs to be refined. After all, teachers get it. They’re the ones that started it.