Microsoft adds support to Unesco IT education plan
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Microsoft has added its support to the efforts of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco) to apply IT to education initiatives in developing countries.
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As part of a European antitrust settlement, Microsoft will supply protocol documentation to developers of the open-source software.
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TechWeb - Most of its work within the group will focus on making its middleware more compatible with Microsoft's.
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Microsoft chairman Bill Gates inaugurated a technical support center in Bucharest on Thursday, saying he was confident that Romania's recent accession to the European Union would boost foreign investment and the country's IT industry.
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By Mensah M. Dean, Philadelphia Daily News  Sep. 7--When Philadelphia public school students begin classes today, a small number will enter new facilities, including those selected to attend the Microsoft Corp.-aided School of the Future.
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Microsoft chairman Bill Gates will sign a cooperation agreement with United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation on Wednesday to improve access to computers, the Internet and IT training in ...
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Microsoft is giving away development and design software to university and high school students around the world through a program aimed at fostering technology innovation worldwide.Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates&#160;is expected to unveil the DreamSpark program Tuesday at Stanford University on the first stop of a U.S. and Canadian college tour. The program is now available to more than 35 million college students in Belgium, China, Finland, France, Germany, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the U.K. and the U.S.Software available to students through DreamSpark includes Microsoft&#39;s development environment, Visual Studio 2005 Professional Edition, and its Web and graphic design toolset, the Expression Studio. Microsoft also is making available XNA Game Studio 2.0, SQL Server Developer Edition, Windows Server Standard Edition and other software and resources through the program.In the next six months Microsoft expects to extend the program to college students in Australia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Japan, Lithuania, Latvia, Slovakia and other countries. And in the third quarter, the software will be available to high school students as well, Microsoft said.DreamSpark is part of a company-wide effort to work with local governments, communities, and academic institutions worldwide to give potential technology workers a head start in the competitive job market to foster technology innovation and improve citizens&#39; quality of life, especially in developing countries.Microsoft also is trying to compete worldwide with open-source technologies such as Linux that are freely available to anyone and thus popular with student computer enthusiasts who may not be able to afford to purchase Microsoft products.One major benefactor of DreamSpark is Aisec, an international exchange student program. Its 28,000 students will get software such as Microsoft&#39;s Office productivity suite, said Michelle Galant, vice president of communications.Aisec, which has 1,100 offices in 100 countries, will also use the company&#39;s Exchange e-mail server, Gallant said. &quot;It enables us to run offices and enables us to run our exchange program,&quot; she said.More information about DreamSpark can be found on Microsoft&#39;s MSDN developer site.
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For a number of years, Microsoft has allowed government entities in most of the world access to the source code for Windows; as of today, Microsoft is expanding this so-called Shared Source Initiative to include Office.
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Responding to requests, Microsoft will sponsor open-source project to build translators between older office formats and Open XML.
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Microsoft Corp. chairman Bill Gates, left, shakes hands with UNESCO secretary-general Koichiro Matsuura prior to their press conference at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2004, after signing
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Microsoft will spend $235.5 million in schools in developing countries over the next five years, part of a plan to increase the number of people trained on its software.
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(InfoWorld) - Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates outlined on Wednesday a vision of education in which students worldwide use high-speed Internet connections and curriculums that draw on online resources such as Wikipedia to become more globally competitive. "We are now on the verge of something where technology will make a difference," Gates said in an address before the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh, Scotland. Advances in hardware, software, and connectivity and are enabling a "user-centric" focus for technology, letting people access information over vast distances inexpensively, Gates said. The address by Gates concluded the two-day Government Leaders Forum, an annual Microsoft-sponsored conference attended by government leaders throughout Europe. The delegates addressed education issues and how Europe can become more competitive through the use of IT. Gordon Brown, the U.K.'s chancellor of the exchequer who oversees financial matters, warned in a speech before Gates' address that the number of jobs that require no skills in the country will drop from 3.4 million today to only 600,000 by 2020. Those who donât have access to education programs and acquire IT skills are "at risk of being unemployed over the next decade." "We cannot afford to ignore the potential of any child," Brown said. Microsoft is backing several educational programs aimed at integrating technologies into classrooms that some young people may already be encountering outside of school. Teachers may have trouble keeping up with students who are already using devices such as the Xbox Live gaming system at their homes, Gates said. "When they [students] come back into the classroom and there's a chalkboard there, that teacher has a hard time living up to the level of drama and richness," he said. Gates announced that Microsoft will expand the company's Innovative Schools initiative, which looks at ways to better integrate technology and learning, to an additional 12 countries: Ireland, the U.K., France, Germany, Finland, Sweden, Qatar, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Chile and Hong Kong. Microsoft has undertaken a variety of projects as part of the program. In Philadelphia, the company joined the city's school district and built a 750-student high school -- called a School of the Future -- that focuses on how technology can improve student performance. It opened in September 2006. The company provided technical guidance, which included the building of a secure Web portal for parents and students for access to assignments, class schedules and grades. In the U.K., Microsoft backs the Building Schools for the Future program, a Â£40 billion ($78 billion) government program to revamp secondary education. The company assists local authorities on ways to integrate technology into education. In Taipei, students at Zhong Lun High School have improved their acceptance rate from 36 percent to 50 percent since it became a School of the Future two years ago, Microsoft said. The company also helped with a distance education facility for teachers, where they can design and publish e-learning material. At the start of his address, Gates spoke of Andrew Carnegie, the Scottish-American steel magnate who later used his wealth to fund libraries and educational institutions. Next year, Gates will step down as Microsoft's chairman to focus on the philanthropy through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which focuses on global health and development issues. Gates recalled one of Carnegie's statements: "He who dies rich, dies disgraced." "Iâm working on avoiding that, but it's a high responsibility," Gates said to laughs.
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Manikonda Jagir (Ranga Reddy, AP): Microsoft India Campus, the new facility coming up at Manikonda Jagir near Hyderabad as an extension to Microsoft Corporation&#39;s commitment of $400-million of investment in India, would focus on developing high-end
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A Microsoft 'school of the future' has been opened in Philadelphia, where traditional materials will be replaced by wireless laptops and parents can track their child's progress on the internet.
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Microsoft said Thursday that it is enjoying success with its campaign to increase IT security for customers of its products worldwide.
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COPENHAGEN - Microsoft Corp. wrapped up its IT Forum in Copenhagen this week by singing the praises of new management tools that are part of a long-term vision for reducing IT complexity. But behind its more vocal announcements there emerged another significant tune, one that suggested that the software maker will have to be more willing to play with platforms from other companies in order to deliver its new strategy.
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PRAGUE -- Following the European Commission's call Wednesday for increased technology research, Microsoft launched an initiative to invest in scientific research centers in Europe.