Note to Readers: This is the
first in a series of posts drawn from a discussion with administrators that
participated in the Beta program for Blackboard Learn, Release 9, and who have already launched pilot programs for the new
platform at their campuses. In this series of posts, we will hear their
impressions, reactions and ideas about Blackboard’s new teaching and learning
platform. Roundtable participants include: Donna Wicks Systems Administrator for Blackboard, Kettering University, Flint, Michigan Santo Nucifora Manager of Systems Development and Innovation, Seneca College, Toronto, Ontario Learning Management System Administrator, Georgia Gwinnett College, Lawrenceville, Georgia Vice President for Enterprise Information Systems, Georgia Gwinnett College, Lawrenceville, Georgia RELEASE 9: FIRST IMPRESSIONS
David Robinson
Dr. Lonnie Harvel
Blackboard: Tell us about your first impressions of Blackboard Learn Release 9.
Donna: I first saw Release 9 at BbWorld last year during (Blackboard CEO) Michael Chasen’s demo along with some members of our faculty who attended. The big thing for me was it just looks fresh; it looks more modern, more up-to-date. I can control more of the look as a system administrator so we can integrate that more tightly with our Web site aesthetic. Immediately after that presentation, my colleagues were so excited, and they couldn't wait to get involved. The faculty, just from what they had seen, thought, “Wow, this is going to be so much easier to build a course!”
Blackboard: And you have since launched a pilot for Release 9 at Kettering?
Donna: We started a pilot on January 12. We went live with five courses and the plan is to go live with all courses at the beginning of April, when we start our new term for the spring. Every one of the instructors who have been included in this pilot have logged in and immediately said “Oh, this is so much easier.” To them it feels like a more natural workflow from previous versions. They’re seeing the course the way they wanted to see it for so many years.
David: I was at BbWorld as well, and was excited by Michael Chasen’s presentation. My first impression was “this is cool. We’re certainly heading in the right direction.” The consistency of the user interface elements all over the place makes things a whole lot easier, and the drag-and-drop functionality allows users to not have to move through as many pages as we used to. When I told our CIO, who had been talking to Blackboard about these things anyway, that the Beta version of Blackboard Learn Release 9 was coming soon and that we might be able to implement in co-production for the spring, he also became excited. While the co-production really was the selling point for me, the ability to do things with these modules is what excited our CIO.
Blackboard: What’s the status of the pilot project at Georgia Gwinnett?
David: We completed the Beta test and are doing a pilot of co-production, with a half a dozen faculty members teaching their courses in Vista 8.0 through the co-production possibilities of Release 9. We have about 380 students active on the server right now. Part of our reasoning for wanting to try this is the service-oriented aspect of Release 9 and the fact that we can still teach our courses in a more familiar interface in Vista 8.0. So we’re looking at the possibility of Release 9 being a portal for us and potentially taking advantage of the new Community Engagement and Learning Content capabilities. The idea of being able to deliver content through Release 9 and use Release 9 content in other contexts is a big part of our mission.
Blackboard: Santo, what was your first impression of Release 9, and what’s the status of the pilot project at Seneca?
Santo: I wasn’t at BbWorld, so the first time that I saw Release 9 was in the Project NG video on Blackboard’s Web site. When I first saw the video, I was actually quite scared. It was exciting for me personally because I had seen the drag and drop, and I was glad that Blackboard was moving towards the DHTML/Web 2.0 type of look, but I was a little worried about how faculty would accept it. The user interface is totally new, which takes some getting used to, but is definitely for the better.
Our pilot started at the beginning of January, and classes started on January 12th. Our goal is to get a faculty member from each of our 20 schools on the pilot. So far there are 11 faculty members and 15 courses on the pilot right now, and I think it’s actually running better than we had anticipated. Roughly 500 students have been using it for two or three weeks now, and we haven't heard anything from anybody, which is usually a good sign. We’ll look to go campus-wide with all courses at the end of April.
As we’ve gone through this process, we were able to provide several previews without actually having the software yet, so we were able to showcase some of the features on the Beta server for our faculty. We held a two-day Blackboard day showcase for each of our main campuses to demonstrate various tools and the user interface for our faculty. As I explain how to get to things in Release 9 I find myself telling our faculty “whatever you know about Blackboard, forget it, because this is just different.”
Donna: That’s a great way to promote it to faculty – “think you know Blackboard? Forget about it.” I think that’s great. I’d love to steal that if it’s OK with you Santo.
Santo: By all means.
Next in the Administrator’s Roundtable series: MOVING TO THE RELEASE 9 PLATFORM
