[seul-edu] web presentation that worked

["Prevett, Larry" <Prevettl@cochise.cc.az.us>]

Just recently, the honors students that did a Linux
clustering project last spring were asked by the
president and vice-president of the college to give 
a presentation to the Cochise College Board of Directors. 
This was a very unique event since students do not usually
speak at the Governing Board meetings. The presentation
was very well received and Linux and Open Source Software
were mentioned several times. The points emphasized were
that Linux, and other versions of Unix that run on PCs,
were 1) a tremendous success at universities and research
centers because they allow mainframe and super-computer
applications to be migrated to PCs. 2) They are freely
available. (They really liked the 'free' part.)

I posted the link to this web presentation before, but
that was before they gave the presentation, so here
it is again.

http://math.cochise.cc.az.us/math/cluster

Even though it is ugly, it's an example of
a short but convincing presentation that really 'worked'.
We've really gotten a lot of mileage out this clustering
project and I would highly recommend that high schools
pursue some kind of project like this. It is a little
hard work but the pay off is worth it. If you've got
some time over the holidays, check it out. Believe
me, if we could do it here, any high school could also.

The presentation lasted about 15 minutes, Mike Milazzo
(Robert Benton couldn't make it) just covered the
text in bold and answered questions. We printed the
front page so they could return to the link if they
wanted to read the 'fine print'.

L. Prevett
Mathematics Instructor
Cochise College, Sierra Vista, AZ, US
prevettl@cochise.cc.az.us