Mr. Tobis- I applaud your goal to start a list to promote Python projects for education. But I wonder, wouldn't any such projects have their own dedicated mailing lists? I fear slightly that two lists would dilute the attendance, and risk falling below a critical mass of people. As Kirby says, though, by all means give it a go, and we'll see what happens. Perhaps a different venue will start something new and vibrant. -Winston On Apr 27, 2006, at 12:54 PM, kirby urner wrote:
There was general agreement among the attendees at the education BOF meeting at PyCon that a new list was necessary, so although my own presence is recent, my assertion was not unsupported. There has also been some discussion of dissatisfaction with the breadth of discussion here expressed since I have been following the list, notably including some strongly worded advice from Guido van Rossum recently.
Guido was upset that we were straying into education philosophy, understandable given the just-ended Shuttleworth Summit, where such philosophical questions came up repeatedly. I am in full agreement that education philosophy *should* be on the table, but *not* here on edu-sig, where we'll just bog down in endless citations of an alien literature (i.e. by writers who know nothing of Python or our work together).
As to a BOF wanting to start a new list, I don't see a problem, although it seems unnecessary to cast it as a fork or breakaway from edu-sig. Just propose a new group with a mission statement or focus, other than what's already covered here, why not?
It happens that in response to this general agreement at PyCon, I set up such a list on Google Groups, with myself and Vern Ceder as owners and potential moderators, and there has been some traffic moving there.
Sounds good to me. Good luck with that. I'm staying with edu-sig myself and haven't time for two Python in education groups.
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