F/LOSS in Education System in Nepal [Conclusion]

Due to the licensing of Free/Libre and Open Source Software (F/LOSS), every user of F/LOSS can enjoy the freedoms and rights that it has to offer. Information and communication technology (ICT) recently has been recognised to play an important role for organisations to be able to meet its business objectives. Even the educational institute have realised the potential it has to offer but due to the high implementation cost and maintenance of the ICT infrastructure, educational institute mainly in the developing countries have been deprived of its use. The study indicates that with the availability of F/LOSS as an alternative, most of the education sector in developing countries have been able to enjoy the benefit ICT has to offer.

In the context of Nepal, when the Ministry of education realised the potential of educational sector benefiting for the ICT, they initiated programs to integrate it in the education sector. One Laptop per Child (OLPC) model is the best example to consider in context of Nepal. So far 18 schools in different regions of Nepal has benefited from this project. FOSS Nepal in the other hand has been volunteering in the deployment of OLPC projects and advocating the use of F/LOSS. The community has been organising workshop and training program about F/LOSS and GNU/Linux system. In the country where more than 80% of the population reside in rural areas and are deprived from ICT due to poverty and language barrier, F/LOSS has given them the opportunity and has been assisting in closing the digital divide.

The study indicates GNU/Linux system and F/LOSS to be preferred by the education sector mostly because of its philosophy rather than the functionality and perceived use of the software. The educator professionals and students are largely motivated to use F/LOSS and the use of F/LOSS has helped education sector of Nepal to enjoy the benefit provided by the ICT. The users have experienced F/LOSS to make the teaching and learning process to be more interesting and interactive and the collected data has proved that F/LOSS has encouraged innovation in the students. This was confirmed by the data collected from the educational professional too. Moreover it still indicates that software piracy is still a major problem within this group. The study has suggested teachers and students favouring use of F/LOSS for teaching and learning purpose. There had been identified many F/LOSS available for the educational purpose still the data suggest that some percentage of both the educational professional and students have been using proprietary software (most of which are identified pirated) because of unavailability of alternative F/LOSS.

The literature and research shows that Free/Libre and Open Source Software (F/LOSS) is not only important but crucial for Nepal and it has had positive impact on the education sector. However the current load shedding of 4 - 12 hours in a year is identified as an important obstacle for use of ICT in education sector in Nepal.

Lack of skills or experience and personal resistance could be another major obstacle for the use of F/LOSS (Gallego et al., 2007). The migration from proprietary software to F/LOSS could be a challenge in the context of education sector in Nepal. There is an opportunity for further study about migrating from proprietary software to F/LOSS that can be used to reduce fear, uncertainty and doubt in context of education sector in Nepal.

This research suggests the need to examine the development model of F/LOSS and the development of essential features required for the education sector in Nepal. There is also opportunity for the future researcher to develop a framework to understand the impact that F/LOSS has on the performance of the education sector in Nepal.