Open Source classes

[david at thekramers.net (David Kramer)]

On Friday 07 May 2004 4:51 pm, Brendan wrote:
> I have started my own business and we're going to start offering
> classes/seminars (we are not accredited for tech courses) on Open Source
> products/services. Does anyone have any idea how much these things cost and
> how rare this is? I went out and looked around, and most of them were 2
> grand, and only briefly touched upon Apache/Linux, etc. etc. Does anyone
> know why this is? It seems like there is interest, but no one is offering
> the courses.

Well, they were, and they were closed down, for doing business just as you 
propose.  They were called Certiviable, and they were based in Waltham.  I 
had some bad dealings with them.  This January I was contacted by the 
Department of Education about them.  It seems you need certain licenses to 
teach, even if you're not offering certification.

> I'm recruiting teachers first, and there is already a pile of resumes
> showing up in my mailbox, so does anyone think there will be a problem with
> students? I am aiming for small class sizes (under 10 in my office), and I
> am charging way less than half what others are. What am I missing? What
> isn't there anyone out there like me, doing the same thing? Where do I
> advertise (keeping costs low and the students local to Boston) to get the
> people in the seats? I need to cover my costs, and make some dough to
> continue offering this kind of thing. Rent and bandwidth (heavy, guaranteed
> bandwidth) is a fortune in Somerville.

I know someone else who tried this.  They made several mistakes:
- They did it in Western Mass so land was cheap, but nobody wanted to go out 
there.
- They bought a bunch of fast computers and expensive office furniture right 
up front, instead of leasing or buying refurb, and starting smaller.
- They did not embrace what they taught.  They sent out advertisements to me 
several times after I unsubscribed several times, and they sent emails with 
MSWord attachments.  I sent them constructive criticism on these topics and 
they blew me off.
- They didn't hire teachers that both knew the subject and could teach it.


> Anyone have any ideas? I was going to have my first classes be "PHP",
> "Moving to Linux", "SQL" and "OpenOffice". These seem like winners, but I'm
> wondering what else people would be interested in learning/hearing about?
> We're really after getting the word out about Open Source, instead of
> trying to milk it. I'm an old hand at FOSS and rubbed the LAMP many times.

How about configuring Linux?  Or how to choose a distribution?


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DDDD   David Kramer         david at thekramers.net       http://thekramers.net
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DKK D  Caffeine is raw fuel which has not yet been purified into software.
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