I stopped by my father’s house the other day, and a couple of neighbors came to the front door. They were volunteering for the area schools, going door-to-door, and getting out the word on the school levy vote coming up.

Of course, they were hoping Dad would vote for the levy.

I asked a few questions to get some basic information so I could relay it to Dad a little bit later.

The school levy is on the ballot again because the district needs additional money due to increases in operating costs.

As it was explained to me, many programs were about to be cut or have already been cut.  The neighbors specifically mentioned that many computer classes at the high school have been cut, as well.

This is one area of study that schools should not be forced to cut ever!   That is, if the school district would simply switch to Linux.

Linux is FREE!  All the software is free!  Once you obtain Linux, you own it!  A school system could download one copy of Linux and deploy it across the entire school system!  The schools could hand a copy of Linux to each and every student to install on their home PC or notebook computer.

Switching to Linux means no more licensing fees to Microsoft or Apple, no more anti-virus subscriptions, no more paying for software upgrades, no more spyware, no more Trojans, no more pirated software, etc.

The school system will be able to cut their software costs considerably.  In return, they could make a modest donation to the particular Linux distribution of their choice in order to keep the project moving forward.  But it would be nowhere near the hundreds and thousands of dollars that the schools, and parents, pay out each year to those other operating systems.

As one Linux friend put it (Parnote on the PCLinuxOS Forums), “You can d/l one copy of ANY Linux distro (preferably PCLinuxOS) and install it on ALL the computers in the school, if you choose. Hopefully, any school district that did that would pony up and contribute at least 10% of what it would have cost to install Windows, all the anti-virus software, all the MS Office software, and other assorted programs…”

That would be fair and the savings would still be considerable!

And it makes sense.  Linux is everywhere!  Google runs nothing but Linux on its servers.  Android phones are Linux.  And all  kinds of electronics gadgets run specialized/customized versions of Linux.

Want to see more reasons for schools to switch to Linux?  Check out this blog post.

And check out this school district that switched to Linux.

Here’s a school district in California making the grade with Linux.

And lastly, here’s an article from Wired magazine that speaks directly to the point I’m making when it states, “Tux the penguin may become the preferred mascot of America’s financially strained public education system –- for Linux represents a way to avoid paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for software.”

So, if schools would only run Linux, it would be one less thing school boards, teachers, and parents would need to argue over when belt tightening times arrive.