Dear Readers,
There is a philosophy popularised as "Open Education" which is based on the way people produce, share, and build on knowledge. The Open Education Consortium states that,
"sharing is probably the most basic characteristic of education: education is sharing knowledge, insights, and information with others, upon which new knowledge, skills, ideas and understanding can be built."
Open education and open-source software converge on the fundamental belief in the power of openness, collaboration, and accessibility. They share a philosophy centered on democratizing knowledge and technology by removing barriers to access, promoting transparency, and fostering community-driven development. In both domains, open or not, individuals should be encouraged to actively participate, contribute, and collaborate, whether in creating educational resources or improving software functionality.
It is no secret that the educational industry is one of the largest adopters of Drupal, while scrounging through Drupal.org, one can find a statistic stating that 71% of the top hundred universities use Drupal. Put forward by Kevin Reynen (University of Colorado), we at The DropTimes headed by Vimal Joseph embarked on a project to validate and substantiate this claim with proper evidence. The analysis resulted in a strong correlation between Drupal and university rankings. Notably, 80% of the top 100 universities utilize Drupal on at least one of their websites.
Find the list of selected universities for the analysis by The DropTimes here and also Vimal Joseph shares the journey behind this conclusion for the readers to understand and contribute relevant information.
In the previous week, I also had the opportunity to publish an interview featuring Boyan Borisov, VP of Digital Solutions Europe at FFW. In an email correspondence, Boyan Borisov shared his journey of becoming a Drupal enthusiast and probed into transitioning through different roles at FFW. The interview also discusses Boyan's involvement with the Drupal Community, the benefits and challenges of transitioning from individual Drupal sites to a unified multi-brand ecosystem using Drupal Multisite, and most importantly his thoughts on the future of Drupal. For a detailed read refer to, "Drupal's Future Excites and Warrants Consideration: Boyan Borisov."
Michael Richardson emerged as the victor in The Event Organizers Working Group Elections. Richardson shared his gratitude for the opportunity with The DropTimes and remarks that "Two Michaels are better than one," reflecting the enthusiasm surrounding this recent development.