Executive+Summary+(DRAFT)

=Executive Summary of Work Group Activity=

//as of March 31st, 2010//
= **DRAFT** = Formed in October of 2009, the Learning Management Systems (LMS) team was charged with assessing the AJCU schools use and interest in learning management systems, hosting opportunities, tools used, and long range plans for LMS at each of the schools. The group made up of volunteers, met on a regular basis (every two weeks) to discuss multiple topics, identify research opportunities, and learn about products, schools experiences, and plans. Initial meetings included the sharing of backgrounds and interests of the team participants and their schools. Additionally, the work group put together a Wiki to use as its repository for documents, discussions, and other collaborative efforts.

One of the first steps for the team was to identify the goals for the team knowing that an already set time line included a summary report to the AJCU-CITM at the annual meeting in April 2010, which was being hosted by Fordham University, was going to be required. Details of the group goals can be found here. The team established four primary goals including:

1. Identifying the “current” state of the LMS at AJCU schools 2. Identifying Open Source Alternatives 3. Reviewing Blackboard\Angel (Commercial) System Resource Opportunities 4. Evaluating Hosting Options (Local, Hosted, Cloud)

As part of the first goal to understand the current landscape, the team developed an LMS survey and issued it to the AJCU schools in December. Sixty-one percent (61%) of all schools participated in the survey and results of the survey can be found here. Survey results were many and it was noted by the team that most all schools were already on Blackboard or were going to it because of vendor mergers and acquisitions.

Additionally, it was noted that schools had a “real” interest in open source alternatives, especially Moodle, which was starting to get a “ground swell” of support in the community.

In looking at open source alternatives, the team benefited from a special presentation from Mary Morrisard-Larkin from the College of Holy Cross. Mary and others at Holy Cross have implemented Moodle as their primary LMS. Mary shared her schools experiences with the implementation and support. The migration from Blackboard to Moodle took nearly three years to complete at Holy Cross with careful planning and faculty support. Ginny Wallace and John Bansavich from the University of San Francisco also shared their experiences with Moodle at USF. Given that many AJCU institutions can benefit from a sample Moodle site. This area of sharing can lower the cost for member institutions to evaluate Moodle as a possible alternative to Blackboard. We recommend the association put together a Moodle center for members to evaluate the potential benefits. More details about open source alternatives can be found here.

The team also spent many meetings identifying processes and procedures at their respective schools, which other schools may benefit from. It had been noted that there is likely an opportunity to share some Blackboard documentation, planning documents, and other resources since most of the schools were already on or getting ready to migrate to Blackboard. Of great value to the team was the sharing of Blackboard experiences from schools that were part of a migration from something like WebCT to Blackboard or those that were moving from Angel to Blackboard. It was clear that there has been some anxiousness in the rapid pace of Blackboard mergers and acquisitions and not fully understanding what features and functions of existing LMS systems such as WebCT and Angel would be carried forward as the mergers completed.

The team also reviewed and discussed other potential collaboration opportunities such as licensing, support, and professional services. It was noted that further investigation with additional school membership should be considered. Given the many areas for potential benefit for AJCU institutions from working together surrounding commercial vendors/LMS applications, we recommend that the group evaluate these on the basis of highest impact to select an area or set of areas to begin work developing collaborations. Once these have been decided, then we would look for volunteers for each effort from each campus that would be impacted to initiate the cooperative endeavors. The details of the potential collaboration opportunities can be found here.

The fourth area that the team focused on was looking at hosting options. The team shared experiences with hosting and the survey results showed that some schools were taking advantage of 3rd party hosting opportunities. It was also noted that as schools were having interests in open source alternatives, hosting options was going to be a key variable in the decision making process. The team shared hosting evaluation questions, worksheets and tools, which can be found here. Additionally, cloud computing as a hosting option had been discussed.

Over the course of the last six months the work team shared much information, benefited greatly from hearing what other schools are doing, and identified some niche opportunities for future LMS planning.