US/ND-1: Re: A teachers perspective initially

Re: A teachers perspective initially

Rex Buddenberg (budden@nps.navy.mil)
Wed, 28 Aug 96 08:21:39 -0700


> Jan Bolluyt wrote:
> > 
> > When do "students" stop their "studenthood".  At what point do we deny
> > subsidized access.  College? Junior College? Early graduates? Adult
> > education?  GED students? "life-long" learners?
> > 
> > Jan
> 
> Excellent point.  If we subsidize educational instutions, does this mean
> only those within the bricks and mortar buildings, or does it apply to
> students doing homework, or home schooling, or teachers from home?  An

Broaden the perspective a bit.  The economic issue isn't 
edu vs everything else, but rather non-commercial use vs
commercial use (an issue that the Internet as a whole thrashed
about 4 years ago).  Consider 'subidized service' for a
wider audience and crank this economy:
	- include the fire department, police department,
hospitals, and ambulance folks as part of the non-commercial
base.  Note that they are funded out of the same tax base
so the economies of scale ought to be attractive.
	- consider the role of schools when a disaster
strikes.  Consider what the role of the schools might
be if the Northridge quake had struck at 10AM instead of
0430.  
	There are several one-time costs (like a network
operations infrastructure) that you're willy-nilly stuck
with regardless of the size of the network.  So making the
network bigger lets you pro-rate those costs over a wider base.

Rex Buddenberg