The SchoolTool project isn't making too much of a wake at the moment, but I suspect that before too long, there will be a bit more buzz around it.

SchoolTool is (or will be) a fully open source, free education administration system. Think SAP for schools. It's written in Python, with an interesting and flexible architecture.

The project is being funded by The Shuttleworth Foundation, as founded by Mark Shuttleworth. Yes, that Mark Shuttleworth.

Mark was at last year's Python UK conference. He was already planning this project at that time, and he was looking for people to work with. He basically wanted someone with strong Python skills, and lots of XP experience. Since I don't really fit the former category, and I don't even remotely fit the latter, I wasn't the man that he was looking for. Which was a bit of a shame. But I though I knew a man who was - Steve Alexander, whom I'd met at a previous Python UK conference.

Bizarrely enough, I bumped into Steve on a crowded train to Reading just a couple of weeks later, and I mentioned Mark's project to him. Steve was (and is) working in Lithuania, so it seemed to me unlikely that Steve would be able to join the project. I was under the impression that Mark wanted the it all be based in London. But, with Steve's permission, I passed his contact details on to Mark anyway.

Clearly I was wrong, since Steve is now on the SchoolTool team. Cool! I suppose that these days, there's little reason why a project needs to be based on any one place, after all.

So, anyway, if you want to contribute to a truly worthy open source project, SchoolTool could be your man. I wish it luck.