Preseting the last announce from the Free Technology Academy:
Featured courses
Deadline Early Bird discount – March 22nd, 2011
On April 18th the next round of courses will start! The FTA offers seven different modules in this term. A 10% Early Bird discount is available until March 22nd, so register now and enrol yourself to one of these modules! Enrol here!
Module highlights of two upcoming courses:
Economic aspects
This module is focused on the study of Free Software in relation with the private sector and the economic implications of its use and development models. You will analyse the software industry from an economic perspective: how it was affected by the raise of free software and what is its potential for the future. You will also study how to use Free Software in the private sector, from a software development perspective but also regarding deployment and migration.
Software architecture
Software architecture is the discipline concerned with model-based description and analysis of software systems with a view to satisfying the (often contradictory) concerns of stakeholders. The software architecture of a system is a high-level description of its components and their interactions.
The central theme of this course is balancing the concerns and requirements of stakeholders, combining these into an architecture proposal by employing known tactics and patterns, producing a description of the architecture that can be communicated and analysed, and evaluating the resulting architecture’s qualities.
Richard Stallman at the FTA
Richard M. Stallman, founder of the Free Software movement, will give a video Guest Lecture and answer your questions in the FTA Campus between 11th and 18th April. In his lecture, Richard Stallman dives into current attacks on the freedoms of software users, such as DRM, software patents and ACTA.
Previous knowledge is required: please make sure that you understand the basic concepts of Free Software. You will find some introductory documents and videos in the classroom where the Guest Lecture will take place.
Learn about Free Software and join the Guest Lecture provided by Richard M. Stallman from April 1st onwards.
The OUNL extends its support to the FTA
Starting Sep. 1, 2011, students in OUNL’s master programme in computer science will be able to include more FTA course modules. A new curriculum is introduced with more opportunities for individual specialisation. A block of up to four FTA modules is explicitly listed among the approved choices. Moreover, the university leadership has pledged its support for the effort to extend the FTA into an accredited international master programme.
Voices after the first year of courses
About eighty learners have followed one or more of the eight courses offered by the FTA during this first year. This is what some of them say about the experience:
“A new way of studying perfectly fitting for people who can’t/won’t go to the University (again). It is amazing to do a master level study on Open-Standards / Open-Source-Software and having classmates from Europe/America/Africa and Asia.” – Harry Thijssen (The Netherlands)
“My FTA tutors have been very knowledgeable and the courses, challenging. I’m not only learning, but also bonding with fellow students who, in their own right, bring a wealth of experience and insight to our studies.” – Peter Rock-Lacroix (Taiwan)
New Associate Partners
The FTA Network is maturing. Two more organisations have joined the FTA Associate Partner network: the Varna Free University in Bulgaria (VFU) and the Dutch chapter of the Internet Society. The VFU is currently translating several course books from the FTA into Bulgarian and will start the courses at their local premises. Furthermore, the university is planning to set up its own master programme in collaboration with FTA partners. ISOC.nl will be able to offer vouchers to its members worth a 20% discount on FTA modules. Think you qualify for a volume discount? For more information please contact us directly! More information on VFU can be found here.