It's serious crunch time in regards to education budgets. Budgets are staying flat or shrinking as costs go up. So, how do we cut costs to get the most bang for our buck?


Here are some tips:


1. DIY Whiteboards - a regular whiteboard can cost hundreds of dollars. If you go to a home improvement store, you can buy the same material for a few bucks and glue it over an existing chalk board or wall. 


And forget those expensive "Interactive Whiteboards" that are not interactive and are a huge waste of money since most teachers only use them as a projection screen. Save the $2500 and use it on other things that will get all of the students active. 


2. Professional Development - don't hire expensive "Professional Trainers" that probably haven't been in a classroom in years. There are a lot of great presenters and trainers out there though too. But, if you are hurting for money, you need to cut these out (or at least decrease the number). Use the resources you have around you. There are plenty of people in your building or district that would make great PD presenters for you, and will be much less expensive than bringing in an outside trainer. Also, you can help other teachers create their own personal learning network for instant and always-on professional development. Related: Professional Development on a Shoestring Budget, Professional Development 2.0. 


3. Netbooks instead of laptops or (sorry guys) Apple products - Netbooks are very inexpensive and you can use lots of free software on them. In fact, if they come running Linux, they are going to come with lots of software for you. I'm also waiting to see how much the Google Chrome OS notebook computers will be because Chrome OS will be great for schools. You can get two netbooks for the cost of an inexpensive laptop or iPad and you can get 3-5 for a Apple laptop. You can also get 9 netbooks for the cost of one Interactive White Board. Related: ACER One Netbook Review, and Update.


4. Free Software and Services - why pay for software when there is so much out there that is free (and in many cases, better than the paid version). Google has a million apps and services that are free and then you have things like OpenOffice, GIMP (graphics editing), and more that are really good and free. Related: Alternatives to Paid Software, Free Alternatives to Paid Software and Services, Free Apps - Find Free Software


5. Go Paperless! If you have the computers, you can go paperless. You can also decrease the amount of paper used if you use computer based note taking, don't print emails, and use email instead of printed memos.  Related: Tools to Go Paperless.


6. Free Textbooks - instead of spending $60 - $140 for textbooks that are heavy, static and get outdated quickly, look for free alternatives. Create your own "textbook" using a class website and posting materials there. Use free e-texts that are available. Use a variety of free resources instead of textbooks. Related: Resources to Replace Textbooks, Digital Textbooks, Free Textbooks (downloadable and online).


7. Find some grants and donations - grants are a great way to get supplies and equipment for the classroom. Talk to local businesses and colleges and ask for donations of older equipment, computers,  furniture, and such. You can also ask local businesses for money donations. There are thousands of grants out there for teachers, but the applications can be time consuming. Donor's Choose is easy and a great way to get supplies for your classroom. Related: Sources of Funding for Teachers 


8. In-house IT Help - use knowledgeable teachers and students to help others with tech problems so that the IT department can focus on the big issues. 


9. Free calculators - if students will be working on computers a lot, like in a 1-1 program, why spend money on calculators? There are free calculators available online, and for download, so save your money. Related: Free online calculators, Microsoft Math - free math help and graphing calculator software. 


10. Free Conferences - why pay for an educational conference when there are so many free alternatives? I do like many conferences that you have to pay to attend (like CECA, TechForum, FETC and ISTE) but if you don't have the money, you can still attend some great conferences for free. 


Some free alternatives:
Edcamp - held all over the country


EduCon - held yearly in Philadelphia

Teachmeet - held all over the world

NT Camp - held in multiple locations


Discovery Education Spring Virtual Conference 
(Discovery runs a lot of free online conferences and in person Day of Discoveries - check out the DEN Blog Network to find out about more of them)

Virtual Tech Forum 

Campus Technology Virtual Conference

Virtual FETC Conference

Related Articles and Resources

Why do schools still pay so much for software? Free alternatives to paid software and services

Top 10 Free Google Resources

Top 10 Free Web 2.0 Resources for Students

Top 10 Free Resources from Discovery Education

Free Stuff - summary of free things I use to save money at school

The Value of Educational Technology

Free Stuff for Educators

The blog your are currently reading.


Free Technology for Teachers - another great place to find free resources for your classroom.

There are a lot of ways to save money at school. What do you use to save money at school? What resources do you use to find free things?

READ MORE - Tips for saving money and finding free resources for school

Lightworks is a professional video editing software that has just gone public beta. The software is open source and has won Academy Awards and Emmy's. 

an Academy and Emmy award winning professional-grade editor with over 20 years of history in the film and broadcast industry. Having cut hundreds of films such as Pulp Fiction, The Departed, Centurion and Shutter Island, it includes a full feature set of editorial tools -- from advanced trimming and media management, to stereoscopic support and realtime effects including multiple secondary colour correctors. Lightworks has an advanced effects pipeline, utilizing the power of your GPU. And with support for up to 2K workflows with realtime effects, it is the most advanced editing application available.

Lightworks is full featured, has a support page, and a growing community of users. 


This is great for teachers for working with video for their classrooms and also great for students who are creating videos as assignments.

READ MORE - Lightworks - professional video editing software available for free

In this day and age of shrinking school budgets, I still don't understand why schools pay so much for software and services. I use all free services and software for my own use and with my classes and students. I think that schools should look at these free alternatives and seriously consider them. The old arguments of support and IT infrastructure no longer hold since many of these services have their own support and are hosted off site.

Here are some of my suggestions for alternatives to paid services:

1. Operating System - Windows vs. free. Windows licences are expensive. But Windows is entrenched and many IT departments, as well as users, are comfortable using them. However, there are great alternatives. Linux is the first alternative. Linux exits in many different forms and distributions, but the one I have used and find easy to use, is Ubuntu. It is easy to install, use, support and has free software that matches all of the Windows software. There are other alternatives coming soon also. Google Chrome OS and HP webOS are coming to netbooks, laptops and tablets and will be nice alternatives.

2. Email - Microsoft Exchange and Outlook are expensive. Gmail is free. I am a Gmail user so I'll focus on that, even though there are other free email systems out there. Gmail offers easy, free email systems. Gmail has integrated tasks, is accessible anywhere, and integrates nicely with other Google products. Once you have a Gmail account, you also have access to the rest of Google's apps, which I'll talk more about below.

3. Calendar - Microsoft Outlook and Exchange systems have built in calendars, but so do other systems. Google Calendar is free and works well with Gmail and can even by synced to many smartphone calendars.

4. Office Suite - Microsoft Office is expensive to license and use. I use two alternatives: OpenOffice / Libre Office and Google Docs.

OpenOffice and LibreOffice are very similar. LibreOffice was born from the same group that originally created OpenOffice. Both of them look like Office 2003 in terms of menus and icons. They work the same, but can also save and export files in a variety of formats, including MS Office and  PDF. I have used both at home and currently use LibreOffice. I have them set up to automatically load and convert MS Office documents and then save those documents as MS Office file formats so that they work at school where we use MS Office.

I also use Google Docs. This is another free service from Google. Google docs has word processing, presentations, spreadsheets, and drawing apps and everything is done online with no downloads required. The other nice feature is the ability to collaborate with others and work on the same document at the same time.

5. Web Site Hosting - many schools still pay for website hosting (and it's not cheap). Google Sites is a great, free alternative for teachers to use to create classroom and school websites. There is even a template for these types of sites to make it easier to create. Blogger also allows teachers to create free blogs to use with their classes and schools.

6. Graphics Software - I know of many schools that pay a fortune for Photoshop when there are some great, free alternatives out there. GIMP, Aviary, and Picasa are all different graphics editing software and apps that are free. All of them have different features and abilities, so check out each one and see which one best meets your needs.

7. Gradebook Software - Another area that schools spend money on is gradebook software. In some cases this makes sense because the gradebook integrates with their student information system. But, if a school is paying for a stand alone gradebook system, they should look to Engrade instead. Engrade is a web-based, free gradebook that is very powerful, full featured, and easy to use. I used it for many years until our school got a new SIS with an integrated gradebook. Students and parents can even have view access to see their grades at any time.

8. Graphing Calculators - I still see schools and students spending way over $100 for graphing calculators. The reason I hate seeing this is that many of these schools and students have computers and smartphones available and there are free and very inexpensive graphing calculator apps and software out there that they could use instead.

9. PDF Creation - for simple PDFs (and even some more complicated ones) you don't need to spend a lot of money on Acrobat. You can use OpenOffice, LibreOffice, and Google Docs to create your document and then save it as a PDF file. You can also use CutePDF to create PDF files from anything you can print, including web sites. CutePDF installs as a printer so you just select CutePDF instead of a real printer and it converts your print job into a PDF file.

10. Organizing and Notetaking - MS OneNote is great, but it costs money. Evernote is free and does some great things. Organize notes, clip websites, upload photos (and search text in the photo), share notes, and so much more. Access from any computer and any smartphone. Evernote is one of those apps I can't live without.

Google Apps for Education is a great way for schools to get a free, integrated set of tools. Gmail, Google Docs, Calendar, safety and security filtering and systems, Google Sites, Google Groups, Google Talk and much more.


Resources to find free alternatives and free software and apps:

Alternativeto - great site that allows users to plug in the current software they use and find alternative software titles. You can search by price/free also.

Education Technology Guy - lots of free resources here

Free Technology for Teachers - great site with lots of free resources for educators.

Twitter and your PLN - Twitter and Personal Learning Networks are a great way to find out about free resources from other educators.

Tech&Learning Magazine - free educational technology magazine with lots of great resources. Website also has great resources and articles.

THE Journal - another free educational technology magazine with great articles and resources.



What free apps, software, and alternatives do you use and recommend?

READ MORE - Why do schools still pay so much for software? Free alternatives to paid software and services.

Intel AppUp is an online app store for your computer. There are paid and free apps, searchable by topic, available for Windows XP and Windows 7 as well as Moblin.

Intel markets it as an app store for your netbook, but I've found some cool free apps on it, including some for education. I was also happy to see that Angry Birds is now available for Windows. How will I ever get any work done?

There are apps for education, games, reference, sports, books, utilities, and much more. You can also search by paid or free.

This is a good resource for teachers and students looking for free apps for their Windows computers (desktop or notebook.).

READ MORE - Intel AppUp - app store for your computer

FreeApps is a web site that aggregates free software and lets you download it all from one site. You can choose free software ranging from web browsers, to email and communications, to utilities like anti-virus and firewall. Most of the free software they offer is well known, such as Firefox, AVG, Adobe Reader, and the like, but this site makes it easy to find it all in one spot. It also bundles the software into one file for downloading. There is a very large variety of software available. See below for some of them.

Teachers can use this themselves, but it is also a very good resource to let your students know about so that they can easily find some of this great free software that is out there.

READ MORE - Free Apps - easily find free software for your computer

Teaching with Technology is a great resource for teachers. It has a list of different technology resources for educators. The resources are grouped in tables by category. Categories include Tools for: Creating, editing, and sharing; Communicating and networking; Managing time, tasks, and information, and Making it all work.

Many of the resources I've covered here in this blog, but there are a lot of other great resources listed. Everything from documents to presentations to videos to Skype to Twitter to Google Calendar to Remember the Milk to firewalls and anti-virus.

This is definitely a site to check out and bookmark.

READ MORE - Teaching with Technology