Opening Up to Open Source

The prime reason behind putting the word " Opening" in the title is that the educational institutions (schools, colleges, universities, etc.) haven't really opened up their minds to the philosophy of open source. Except for few examples which are not success stories yet, the situation is abysmal. Inspite of the ocean of resources that Open Source is, still the institutions have an indifferent attitude to it. One major reason i see is the comfort zone that the institutions have been put in by the "closed source". The users or the decision makers are not keen to move out of their 'comfort zone" and try out (forget about impelmenting) different things or resources. The potential and capabilities of Open Source is quite underestimated currently by the institutions. The institutions are willing to compromise on the aspects like money, customisation, etc. but won't stand up and take the first step towards embracing Open Source that could help them get rid of their routine headaches pertaining to either lack of quality content or lack of content control with the teacher. Of course, this is just one reasong for institutions not opening up to Open Source. There are other apprehensions as well which i will post in few days. Its high time that the education system wakes up to the fact that Open Source is like a ladder to the plethora of resources useful for an educational setup. Open Source should be perceived like a Pandora's box which has plenty to offer for everbody and unless we see and select what suits us we will never be able to realise the power of "Open Source".