Follow Up--MCPS Going Dark

On Saturday we received a postcard from the President of the Montgomery County, MD, Board of Education, Ms. Patricia O'Neill, stating that our inquiry regarding documentation for the decision to end MCPS dual platform environment for a Wintel environment has been forwarded to MCPS CIO John O. Porter for response. We had also written to Mr. Porter directly but have not received a response.

In our letters to Mr. Porter and the Board of Education we asked for the documentation that was used to support Mr. Porter's statement that "Supporting two platforms is a costly option for MCPS." especially given that most of the K-6 and middle schools already mostly use Macs and have trained personnel (IT, administrative and teaching staffs). We also asked for documentation supporting going Wintel versus Mac when all studies of total cost of ownership of which we are aware have clearly favored Macs, although none of those studies were conducted in the past 6 months. Here is IDC's study. Finally, we asked for documentation showing how factors related to educational effectiveness were weighed in the Wintel decision and if they were favored over IT staff convenience or even cost.

This issue which we initially raised last May 24-25 and updated last weekend (December 2) made The Gazette, the local Montgomery County newspaper Friday. We look forward to reviewing the data and logic behind Mr. Porter's decision. If any readers, especially Montgomery County residents, receive such documentation, please forward a copy by email or snail mail (Macs Only!, P.O. Box 215, Vienna, VA 22183).