Dealing with IT Budget Cuts

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Permalink Reply by Evaggelos on January 28, 2009 at 11:53am

Hey Rich,
You can start by looking into such software as Open Office. This way you can provide quality software with 0 money. Dealing with purchases you could do a little creative. Let's say you have only $1,000 to purchase two new computers. You can be a little creative with the money too. If you have a separate budget for software you can apply $120 from the software money for each computer because the computer is mad of software and hardware. Additionally, you can take $150 from your Contractual code, I hope you have such an option, for the maintenance. This way you can stretch you dollars almost by 1.5X for every computer purchase.

I hope this helps.

Evan Panagiotopoulos

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Permalink Reply by Rich Kaestner on January 28, 2009 at 12:40pm

Thanks, Evan. I'll make sure that Open Source is addressed, but will likely look at it from a TCO perspective. Open Office has a lot of appeal as it has developed into a full-function offering requiring minimal user or support staff training.

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Permalink Reply by TI Teachers on February 19, 2009 at 7:47am

Rich,
One of our contributors at the TI Teachers Lounge, Bryson Perry, wrote an entry on facing budgetary issues to obtain classroom technology. Like Evan, he believes using Open Source is a great money-saving alternative. He also offers a couple other basic approchaes for obtaining technology, such as practical advice for presenting technology to administrators and parents.You can check out his suggestions here: http://timath.com/blog/?p=390

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Permalink Reply by Mike Hourahine on February 19, 2009 at 8:14am

One thing you could take a look at is replacing infrastructure for storage and email to something Software-as-a-Service based. Both Google (in Google Apps for Education) and Microsoft (in their Live@EDU offering) offer storage, collaboration and email that are ad-free, will run under your own domain name and are 100% FREE for educational institutes. You can connect an entire school district without spending a dime.

Admittedly, you need to consider the issues around turning these things over to a 3rd party carefully. However, the cost savings in both server infrastructure and staff may be redirected into some more valuable in the classroom.

If it's a temporary set back in budget, perhaps the best thing to do would be to focus on how to further leverage existing technology to show value to those making the budget decisions. Can any school honestly say they are 100% utilizing the capabilities of their existing technology? Perhaps re-focusing some existing IT staff on teacher education and training in technology will help a) get more value out of what you have, and b) show others that technology is worth investing in.

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Permalink Reply by Jeff Byrd on February 19, 2009 at 4:53pm

Rich, my company which is Journey Ed, works with a lot of schools and we can help save your district money on educational technology purchases and administrative processes.

In today’s difficult economy, schools of all sizes are pressured and struggling to reduce costs. So how do you do this while maintaining a high quality of education for your students? JourneyEd allows you to focus on education and your responsibilities by taking the headache and much of the cost out of your administrative and purchasing processes all while saving you money.

JourneyEd is 100% focused on education because that is what we are passionate about. Our solutions and the products we represent are developed not only for faculty, but also the students. Our vertical market focus gives us insight that is aligned with your needs. Your organization will benefit from our passion and determination to develop and provide these flexible and scalable solutions.

Please consider just a few minutes of your time for a discussion to see how Journey Ed helps districts like yours. You can reach me at jbyrd@journeyed.com

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