[seul-edu] Third draft of letter of invitation

[Doug Loss <drloss@suscom.net>]

Here's a third draft of the letter of invitation.  I think it's
getting to where it needs to be.  After a bit more tweaking, it
should be ready to send off to all the projects we can find.  So
critique it, and at the same time assemble a list of people you
think we ought to send it to.  If possible, don't just give a
project name but an actual email address for that project.  BTW, I
took the Schoolforge mission statement from Felipe's webpage
mockup.  Is it current, or should there be some revision to reflect
the latest wording?

Hello.  My name is Doug Loss, and I'm writing you on behalf of
Schoolforge, a new organization dedicated to putting Linux and free
software systems into schools and
other academic institutions. We at SEUL/edu have noticed your
efforts to further the use of Linux, free software in general, and
other free resources in education.  By "free" we mean of course open
for everyone to inspect and modify to suit his or her needs as well
as available at little or no cost.  We are members of groups with
similar goals.  Up until now our projects have suffered from low
visibility, and this lack of visibility often meant that our hard
work was a waste, repeating the efforts of others, and failing to
build on their successes or to learn from their failures.

When Red Hat made a counter-proposal
<http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/011120/202744_1.html> to Microsoft's offer
of settling a private, class-action antitrust lawsuit by giving US$1
billion to US schools (mostly as Windows software), we were
galvanized to try to take advantage of the sudden publicity this
gave the use of free software in education.

We have planned a coalition of groups working to increase the use of
free software and resources in education.  You'll find a description
of this coalition, called Schoolforge, below.  We currently have
numerous members, including Open Source Schools, K12Linux, SEUL/edu,
and RedHat.  We'd like to invite you to join the
coalition and help us advance our shared goals of providing free
resources to our schools.  To join Schoolforge, just reply to this
message with the name of your group and the contact person.  We'll
add you to the list.  If you'd like to take part in the discussions
and work of forming Schoolforge, go to <http://www.seul.org/edu/>
and join the mailing list.  That's where all the organizational work
is taking place.  We hope to welcome you on board!

The goals of Schoolforge

Members of the Schoolforge Coalition have the common goal of
advocating the use of free and open source tools and curricula in
education and assisting in their successful use and maintenance.  We
aim to make our individual efforts more effective and efficient by
collaborating and focusing on them, because we are convinced that
free and open source solutions are right for education.  The road to
free and open source technology and curricula is the road to
effective and sustainable school program development.

--
Doug Loss                 All I want is a warm bed
Data Network Coordinator  and a kind word and
Bloomsburg University     unlimited power.
dloss@bloomu.edu                Ashleigh Brilliant