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(Continued from previous page)
ADMINISTRATOR
PERSPECTIVE
Dr. Don Spicer
Associate Vice Chancellor for Information Technology and CIO
University System of Maryland |
FACULTY
PERSPECTIVE
Dr. Marci McClive
Director: whytech Project for Faculty Training Professor of Management, College
of Business
Frostburg State University |
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disciplines have different pedagogical
approaches. Can one Learning Management
System meet the needs of all faculty? |
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is an apparent tension between ease of
use and giving a faculty member control
over the presentation of course materials.
The easiest to use Learning Management
Systems are like a fill-in-the-blanks
template. It is hard to go beyond the
boxes they provide. For the average faculty
member, is there a middle ground? |
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| The
Learning Management Systems industry
is immature. Companies come and go. What
are the implications of choosing an LMS?
Are you better protected by building
your own? |
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Current Perspectives on Learning Management
Systems
Full Responses
What is important to you when it comes to an institutional choice of a LMS?
ADMINISTRATIVE PERSPECTIVE:
- Long term viability of the company: The
LMS market is young and fluid. There has been substantial consolidation
of the marketplace in the last several years. Transitions between
systems are not easy and the institution's intellectual property
is encapsulated within the system.
- Reliability of application: Increasingly an institutional LMS is
a mission critical system. If a component
fails, that course component is not available. Faculty
and students won't tolerate, or use,
tools that interfere with the learning
process rather than assist it.
- Runs on a platform where there
are in-house skills present: These systems are a component
of the enterprise services architecture. They need
to be integrated with other systems,
such as Student Information Systems.
This,
as well as their on-going maintenance,
requires in-house technical skills. There
is only a limited amount of diversity of skill
sets in which an institution can afford
to invest.
- Good technical support: Concurrent
with the youth of the LMS market is its
rapid growth. LMS companies have had difficulty
managing the growth of the market, the
evolution of their product, and customer
services. Institutional staff cannot afford to
find themselves caught between an unresponsive
vendor and demanding faculty and students
for a service that is this mission critical
to the institution.
- Reasonable pricing
and stable pricing model: LMSs were
initially quite inexpensive for stand-alone
systems. As they have evolved to become a component
of a more integrated
services architecture, their license
costs have escalated rapidly. Their
license fees are typically more comparable
with those of other enterprise services
(ERP applications, mail systems, etc.).
Institutions have struggled to manage rapid escalation
of costs, especially in the current lean
budget years.
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