Digital Media Design Technology scholar 2778 Meadow Brooke Dr. Brownsville, Texas 78526 April 16, 2010 To: Mr. Garnet Gaither, Department Chair Digital Media Design Technology TSTC Harlingen 1902 North Loop 499 Harlingen, TX 78550 Subject: Selling Adobe Student Edition Software to DMDT students This report encloses a series of information dealing with the Digital Media Design Technology issue of not selling Adobe Student Edition software to the students attending in this program. It will pertain on some of the issues affecting with students because the software is not always accessible to them. This report covers on how much the software costs in a regular price of the Adobe software. It will also make note to see if the faculty’s decision in not selling the program is affecting the students. Some of the factors affecting students are the time they spend lab class, the time the lab closes, also how students deal with the disadvantage of have the some labs full or not having enough time to work on their projects. Recommendations have been made that can help this kind of issue the as it has being said to sell a cheaper edition that contains only the applications used in the classrooms. Over all this report is not to be found as a way of criticism, but a way to have some of the disadvantages that students have and changing them into ways that they could elevate their knowledge of education dealing with this program. I hope that with my recommendations with could work something out since it is only for a good cause of education. Please let me know if you have any questions or if you need further information. I may be reach at (956) 544-2256, a.caraveo@yahoo.com Andrea Caraveo  

 

 

 

 

 

Report on:

Selling Adobe Student Edition Software

Prepared by Andrea A. Caraveo

Digital Media Design Technology Scholar

Report Distributed April 16, 2010

Prepared for

Mr. Garnet Gaither

Department Chair of the Digital Media Design Technology

ABSTRACT

The report contains explicit information and data about the DMDT program not selling Adobe student edition software to students attending this program. The purpose of this report is to assure the decision the faculty made in this program was an advantage for the students attending this program. This is very important because making right decision about this issue will make the students knowledge greater causing their education level to increase. Reports show the high cost of buying the software directly from the company than buying a student edition from a college at a cheaper price. There are some issues that deal with the class labs. The lab hours are very few and the time of closing is at 5pm, making it impossible to work on a project if the student has any outside activities such as work that unable the student to stay and use the labs. This make is hard for students since the spare time they have left is away from the TSTC campus and many of the students live in other cities. A recommendation is given to the faculty and chair department in selling a student edition that would allow students access the software in their personal computers saving time and money in going all the way to the campus.

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Table of Contents  

ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................. iii

 

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ...........................................................................................................1

 

INTRODUCTION..........................................................................................................................2

 

Analysis of Student Activities .............................................................................................4

 

Analysis of Student’s Time Use ..........................................................................................5

 

Lab S-130 .............................................................................................................................6

 

  Analysis form the Student Body and Faculty ......................................................................7

Faculty......................................................................................................................7

Studnt .......................................................................................................................7

CONCULSION AND RECOMENDATIONS .............................................................................8

WORK CITED ...............................................................................................................................9

   

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The report contains explicit information and data about why staff members in the DMDT program should sell Adobe Students Edition software to students attending this program. The purpose of this report is to assure that the decision the faculty in this program made was an advantage for the students attending this program. This is very important because making right decision about this issue will make the students knowledge greater causing their education level to increase.

Trying to buy each of the software needed in the course year would be very expensive and it would take time for the software to arrive for students, but selling the student edition from college would make it cheaper and faster for students to buy it and install it.

There are labs in the building that have the software installed in their classroom computers; the problem is that not all the classrooms have the same applications in their hard drive. This makes the rooms get full when having a major project that takes a lot of time making students loose time that could have been use to get ahead in their work. The labs in that building close at 5pm so that the students that need more time can stay, the problem is that not many can stay to work on their projects. Many students have to go to work leaving only their nights at home their only spare time.

It is hard for students that live far away from the TSTC campus because they have to drive all the way to the campus which in most of the cases is in another city. A recommendation is given to the faculty and chair department in selling a student edition that would allow students access the software in their personal computers saving time and money in going all the way to the campus.

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INTRODUCTION

The report contains explicit information and data about why staff members in the DMDT program should sell Adobe Students Edition software to students attending this program. The purpose of this report is to make sure the program is making a good decision in not selling the software and what would the advantages be in doing so. I will also show some recommendations on how to improve this situation that will help students in the DMDT program upper their education level.

Time is Money

Trying to buy each of the software needed in the course year would be very expensive and it would take time for the software to arrive for students, but selling the student edition from college would make it cheaper and faster for students to buy it and install it. Looking at some of the websites in the internet I saw that each application had a price:

Adobe Application Software Price US Adobe Soundbooth CS5 $79.00 Adobe Illustrator CS5 $199.99 Adobe After Effects CS5 $349.00 Adobe Flash CS5 $179.00 Adobe Photoshop CS5 $199.00 Adobe InDesign CS5 $199.00 Adobe Premiere CS5 $349.00

This information from Adobe.com shows the price of each of the apps. As you can see from this table trying to buy an application of the software is really expensive and I listed all the ones that we use in every class.

Away

Also it is hard for students that live far away from the TSTC campus because they have to drive all the way to the campus which in most of the cases is in another city and that takes time a lot of time away that could be use to work in a project.

Crowed Labs

When classes are not in use they become labs for students to work on their projects. Not all the classes have the same software applications installed on their hard drives. Many students take advantage of the time and use the computers when the rooms are available. The problem is that when a lab like the one on room S-130 gets full there is no other class available that has the same software. For example After Effects or Encore are the applications that only the computers in that lab S-130 has and many students need it for their projects. Even if it was available the lab closes at 5 in the afternoon not making enough time to finish a project. Other students do not

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have time to stay because they have to go to work, making evenings the only spare time available. By having the Adobe software on a personal computer would make it more accessible for students to work on their projects in their spare times.

The Tests

I also provided primary/secondary research that was done to show graphs that give credibility to this issue. An interview was created and filled for a student in the DMDT program. It had couple of questions like:

• What do you think about the labs? Are they accessible? • How much free time after college do you have left in the rest of the day? • How many classes dealing with your DMDT program do you have? How many projects

do you get per class? Do they more time? • Would you think it would make a difference in your projects if you had the software you

use in class installed in your personal laptop?

All the answers where submitted and created into a charts which show the percentage of students who have free time and have a need for the software application which can’t be use because series of situations occur.

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Analysis of student activities

 

          

Drive back  to their hometown

44%

Go to Work35%

Stay at labs12%

Get out from class at 5pm9%

What students do after class 

 

  These chart on top shows the percentage of students who either can’t or can stay after their classes are done to use the computer labs. Basically 5 out of 10 students have to drive back to their cities, 3 have to go to work, 1 stays in the lab and one can use it because they still are having a class session.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Analysis of student’s time use

Home Work Stay in Lab

Free time 7 4 9

Busy 5 8 3

012345678910

Hou

rs

Students Time Availability 

This column chart shows the hours a student has busy in after 12 pm and how many hours they have free being away from the campus. Students who go to home either because they have to babysit, pick up their kids from school, or need to do house chores use only about 5 hours to do this things and they have a spare time of about 7 hours. By having the software in a personal computer they could of make good use of this time and could have gotten ahead in their projects. Also for the people who work and have approximately 4 hours left even in 1 hour they could move on in their projects. People who stay in the labs can get ahead and they benefit of that by having good grades.

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Lab S-130

The lab S-130 is one of the three labs that the DMDT department has for the program. The other two classes have the same applications as the computers of this classroom, but with the exception of Adobe After Effects (AE), and Adobe Encore. This class room S-130 has 5 five classes every week, 3 Mondays, Wednesday and Fridays and 2 Tuesday and Thursday. Each session has about 24 students that attend which occupy the 24 computers that are available in that class. This makes approximately 120 students who use the class room/ lab daily. The problem is when 24 students are using the computer in the lab and the other 96 students want to use the computers there is no other classroom that has that same applications. For the students that is just a waste of time which would have been use in doing their projects.

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Analysis of from Student and Faculty

In order to know what other students and faculty did aside of just giving what I saw in this process. I sat and talk to some of my classmates and my instructors to see what where their opinions about the decision TSTC had made.

Faculty

I talk to an instructor of the DMDT department who also gives classes in the room S-130 and he told me that the reason TSTC did not sell students editions to student was because they had to buy first licenses from the company in order to sell a cheaper edition to the students. He gave me an estimate of about two thousand five hundred million dollars to buy the licenses. The reason TSTC did not buy was because

• TSTC knows that not all the students in the TSTC campus are going to buy the software because only the DMDT department is the one who makes use of these applications.

• They believe out of this department only a very small part of students would buy the student edition.

For those reason TSTC didn’t buy the licenses, but did bought the software for those classes in the DMDT building.

Students

I also talked to some of the students about how would they feel about not being able to buy a student edition for their personal computers, I had several different answers. One person said that that would be a good idea since they could do their work on home when they can’t come to class. Then some other people said they didn’t have to worry because they downloaded the software for free from a website. That is when I ask them all that if they could sell the software would they buy it, and most of them say they would because they would feel better buy the cheap software than being caught using the software and being reported for using pirate software.

If the Adobe Company would make an agreement with TSTC directors and sell a student edition software the company wouldn’t be losing money because the students would be buy the software and not downloading it for free.

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CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS

After reviewing all of the information, data and the analysis made from evaluating the program’s decision of not selling the software, it has come to my attention that it was not a best solution because it affects the student’s lack of incrementing their knowledge and skills.

A recommendation given is that TSTC department chair talks to the TSTC directors and make a decision of going to talk to the company Adobe to settle an agreement. This agreement would allow only students in the DMDT department to be eligible to buy the Adobe Student Edition software in order to use it in the class room.

I am aware that in order to fall into an agreement with such company the college will have to buy a license that allows them to sell the software to students. The cost can be elevated but I believe that students will take advantage of this benefit since either in the beginning of the semester or the next one they are going to start to notice that the software is needed to finish projects of such length of time.

TSTC should let the company know that the software is only for the DMDT department, maybe that way the company could make a cheaper offer for the TSTC College. This department is the only one who uses the this software in the whole campus to work on their projects, if for some reason the company thinks that they don’t want to get into an agreement because of few people who would buy the program, then it could be open into the whole campus including staff members of the TSTC college.

Another reason the TSTC staff could let the Adobe company know is that many students that need the software download it from websites that give them all the full programs for free, this makes the company loss immense amount of money, when they could be earning more by selling a cheaper edition. Students will feel better because they will know that they are able to work on their personal computers inside the building without any instructor reporting him/her for downloading any pirate software.

Many of the students that attend to college get financial aid money and the DMDT classes do not need students do not need to buy book for that department, so having that amount of money makes the student the benefit of buying the software.

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WORK CITED

Adobe Applications of software prices:

Adobe Premiere CS5

https://store1.adobe.com/cfusion/store/index.cfm?&store=OLS-EDU#loc=en_us&category=/Applications/PremierePro&view=ols_prod&store=OLS-EDU

Adobe InDesign CS5

https://store1.adobe.com/cfusion/store/index.cfm?&store=OLS-EDU#loc=en_us&category=/Applications/InDesign&view=ols_prod&store=OLS-EDU

Adobe Soundbooth CS5

https://store1.adobe.com/cfusion/store/index.cfm?&store=OLS-EDU#view=ols_prod&category=/Applications/Soundbooth&loc=en_us&store=OLS-EDU

Adobe Flash CS5

https://store1.adobe.com/cfusion/store/index.cfm?&store=OLS-EDU#store=OLS-EDU&loc=en_us&category=/Applications/FlashPSTE&view=ols_prod

Adobe Photoshop CS5

https://store1.adobe.com/cfusion/store/index.cfm?&store=OLS-EDU#store=OLS-EDU&categoryOid=4529549&loc=en_us&view=ols_prod&category=/Applications/PhotoshopExtendedSTE

Adobe After Effects CS5

https://store1.adobe.com/cfusion/store/index.cfm?&store=OLS-EDU#store=OLS-EDU&loc=en_us&view=ols_prod&categoryOid=4529536 Adobe Illustrator CS5

https://store1.adobe.com/cfusion/store/index.cfm?&store=OLS-EDU#view=ols_prod&store=OLS-EDU&loc=en_us&categoryOid=4529546

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