Skip to main content

VLEs and other student systems

This time of year is always busy for Development Services.  By the end of July, we have to install any new systems needed for the start of the new semester in September.  This gives us a month of "normal running" which we can use to fix any unexpected problems, before the students start using the systems in earnest.  Our aim is to give the students the best service possible - ideally they should barely even notice all the IT that is making their life easier.

Each year brings its own particular focus for us.  Two years ago, the emphasis was on student administration systems, adding extra functionality alongside the new student record system.  Last year, we were busy integrating IT following the merger of the University and the Edinburgh College of Art.  This year, the focus is on the systems that students actually use directly.

Chief among these is the upgrade of the main Virtual Learning Environment.  We have run WebCT for several years.  Now we are replacing WebCT with Learn, the latest system from Blackboard (who acquired WebCT back in 2006).  This should give a welcome refresh to the experience of using the VLE and we are getting positive vibes back from many of the academic staff who have started to use it.  Distance Learning courses have the option of using our new Moodle VLE as well.

The university is also launching a major revamp of its student support.  We are currently developing some basic IT support for the first year of this new system.  Next year, we will work on a major project to significantly enhance the technical underpinnings of this new initiative.

The university portal, MyEd, is also being upgraded.  Like the VLE, the version we are currently running is a little long in the tooth and the new version should be a significant improvement.  Later in the year will we replace the student e-mail and e-diary system with Microsoft's Office 365, which will also give students the ability to use web versions of Word, Excel and Powerpoint, with storage space for their documents.

More is in the pipeline for next year.  The next phase of the Shared Academic Timetabling project will give each student their own personal timetable, direct to their e-diary.  This may sound straightforward; the hard part is actually setting up the timetabling system itself.

All these new tools should give a much better service to students.  Hopefully, after the initial period of getting used to the new systems, they will be able to ignore the IT and just use it to help their studies.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Webinar: Powering your business with Cloud Computing

On October 14th, I will be hosting a Grid Computing Now! web seminar on the topic of Cloud Computing. We have lined up two very interesting speakers who are using Cloud now to make businesses work. Ross Cooney had a good technological solution to sell but couldn't make it economic until Cloud Computing allowed him to pay for his computation only when he needed it. He will discuss the instant benefits and long term impact of cloud computing to the development, competitiveness and scalability of your application. Alan Williamson created the BlueDragon Java CFML runtime engine that powers MySpace.com. He advises several businesses and will give an overview of the different types of services available and how to avoid being locked-in to a single supplier. You can register for this event here .
Post a Comment
Read more

Business Model Canvas

A Business Model Canvas is a tool for mapping the core functions and capabilities of an organisation.  Compared to the Core Diagrams that I described in an earlier post , the business model canvas attempts to present more aspects of the business, starting with the value proposition – a statement of what the organisation offers to its users (in the business world, to its customers).  It shows the activities and resources, as Core Diagrams do, but also shows user relationships & channels, and also benefits and costs.  I’m not aware of any universities that have used this tool but you can find examples from elsewhere on the web. We are considering business model canvases as a tool for mapping the strategic capabilities of units at the University of Edinburgh.  Phil Taylor, our EA contractor, sketched an outline of what a business model canvas might begin to look like for HR: This is only intended to be suggestive: the real canvas would need to result from in-de...
2 comments
Read more

Changing Principles

In EA, architecture principles set a framework for making architectural decisions.  They help to establish a common understanding across different groups of stakeholders, and provide guidance for portfolios and projects.  Michael Durso of the LSE gave a good introduction to the idea in a webinar last week for the UCISA EA community. Many organisations take the TOGAF architecture principles as a starting point.  These are based on the four architectural domains of TOGAF: business, information/data, applications, technology/infrastructure.  These principles tend to describe what should be done, e.g. re-use applications, buy in software rather than build it, keep data secure.  See for example the principles adopted at Plymouth University and the University of Birmingham . Recently though, I encountered a different way of looking at principles.  The user experience design community tend to focus more on how we should do things.  E.g. we should...
1 comment
Read more