Members of the IT staff actually scoffed at you for bringing up Linux? Maybe you should consider transferring schools...

The notation for the multiple choice answers should be notated in set theory ex: x = { 4,5,6,7 } ... imho

If your cluster is going to be closed circuit (no internet access) I would recommend RHEL5 as finding and installing RPMs is generally easier when your not able to use the default Distro package utility. If you cluster will have access to the internet (you'll be able to use the Distro package app) I'd recommend Ubuntu10.04 as the Distro repository is up to date and constantly growing.

Has anyone else considered that perhaps this is not really a correlation between apple imagery and religion, but perhaps just an indiction that the studies the UK neuroscientists have been working on aren't yielding any significant results.