[p2p-research] Free Technology Academy and Free Software Foundation Partner to Expand Access to Master's Program in Free Software and Free Standards

[Franco Iacomella]

Permanent links:
  - http://www.fsf.org/news/free-technology-academy
  - http://ftacademy.org/announce/fsf


AMSTERDAM, The Netherlands -- Tuesday, October 26, 2010 -- The Free
Technology Academy (FTA) and the Free Software Foundation (FSF)
announced today their partnership in the FTA's Associate Partner
Network. The Network aims to expand the availability of professional
educational courses and materials covering the concepts and applications
of free software and free standards.

The FTA consists of an advanced virtual campus with course modules which
can be followed entirely on-line. The learning materials are all
published under a free license and can be accessed by anyone, but
learners enrolled in the FTA will be guided by professional teaching
staff from one of the three participating universities. The FTA aims to
enable IT professionals, students, teachers and decision makers to
undertake accredited professional education modules in free software
studies.

One of the FTA objectives is to establish a strong relationship with the
free software community and to turn the FTA course materials into an
essential reference. The FTA seeks to educate and promote the adoption
of free technologies without losing sight of the free software
community's core purpose of freedom and social transformation.

Wouter Tebbens, president of the Free Knowledge Institute and director
of the FTA, explains: "We are building this master's programme on free
software with the support from relevant organisations and community
members. And in this sense it is an honour for us to have the support of
Richard Stallman and the FSF. We hope to be of use to the community and
we invite the community to participate in our courses and review our
materials."

Richard Stallman, leader of the free software movement and president of
the Free Software Foundation, said, "The FTA course materials teach
people to use GNU/Linux; more than that, it teaches them to recognize
why this is important."

Details of the Partnership:

      * The FSF will provide special video guest lectures in FTA courses.
      * The FSF will encourage volunteers to collaborate in the
maintenance of existing materials and the production of new courses.
      * The FTA will provide the FSF Associate Membership
(http://www.fsf.org/associate/) with 30 discount vouchers for FTA
courses each trimester.

Enrollment for 2011 courses is now open, and students can register at
http://ftacademy.org/courses/programme/2011.


== About the Free Technology Academy ==

A Consortium formed by the Open University of Catalonia (Spain), the
Open University of the Netherlands and the University of Agder (Norway)
and led by the Free Knowledge Institute (FKI), the FTA has started up -
with support from the EC's Lifelong Learning Programme - an
international educational programme on Free Software. The courses are
taught completely online in a virtual campus based on the Campus Project
interoperability framework.

Following the Free Software and Open Educational Resources movements,
all learning materials are freely available through the Internet. The
use of Free Software (also referred to as Open Source software or Libre
Software) is rapidly expanding in governmental and private
organisations. However, still only a limited number of ICT
professionals, teachers and decision makers have sufficient knowledge
and expertise in these new fields. The Free Technology Academy aims to
address this gap by providing high level courses that fit into larger
Master Programmes at the participating universities.

      * More information: http://www.ftacademy.org
      * Contact information: contact[AT]ftacademy.org
      * About standards: http://ftacademy.org/standards
      * About FTA Associate Network:
http://ftacademy.org/about/associate-network
      * FTA Study Programme 2011:
http://ftacademy.org/courses/programme/2011
      * FTA Community Portal: http://campus.ftacademy.org/community/


== About the Free Software Foundation ==

The Free Software Foundation, founded in 1985, is dedicated to promoting
computer users' right to use, study, copy, modify, and redistribute
computer programs. The FSF promotes the development and use of free (as
in freedom) software -- particularly the GNU operating system and its
GNU/Linux variants -- and free documentation for free software. The FSF
also helps to spread awareness of the ethical and political issues of
freedom in the use of software, and its Web sites, located at fsf.org
and gnu.org, are an important source of information about GNU/Linux.

      * More information: http://www.fsf.org
      * Contact information: info[AT]fsf.org
      * FSF's Membership: http://www.fsf.org/associate/
      * Donations: http://donate.fsf.org