As anticipated, the Learning Management Systems, aka Course Management Systems market will be seeing a lot of activity. Here's a "Proposed Integration of the Moodel Learning System and uPortal: AN Opportunity for Open Standards," Justin E. Tilton, instructional media and magic, inc.
Monthly Archives: January 2006
Collaborative web-based software - Goodby Excel?
No, I don't expect that Excel will be going away anytime soon, but this is the reason the folks in Redmond are nervous. I just came across JotSpot Tracker, a web-based excel like applicaton that brings web collaboration to the next level. Give it a look. http://tracker.jot.com/?utm_source=jot_home
I'm not that crazy about their business model which limits the free version to just to sheets and five users, but I am fairly confident that this won't be the last attempt at an web-based spreadsheet.
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The challenge.
I recently have been challenged by a couple of my colleagues to identify several "where's-the-beef" blogs and to identify one non-technical faculty member on campus who is an example of how blogging can impact instruction, research or some other aspect of the community in a positive way. This is not unique and many campuses have already passed through this phase of cautious skepticism when adopting this technology and as will all higher education institutions eventually. I have enough experience to recall that the same types of discussions occurred surrounding word processing at this institution. I personally believe that while blogging is not the be-all-end-all, it is certainly an example of the evolving nature of Internet technology and social interaction and will be around for the foreseeable future. Therefore, challenge accepted.
Suggestions welcomed for examplar academic blogs.
BI in Higher Education
I found the article on Data-Driven Descision-Making>> Who's on Your BI Shortlist?" to be an interesting read. It highlighted a couple points that I couldn't agree with more:
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The biggest risk is multiple departments deploying multiple BI platforms without any central oversight. This scenario is eerily familiar to CIOs who wrestled with network software installations in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
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Even if a BI project is limited to a departmental deployment, it’s critical to keep the university CIO in the loop. Without CIO recognition and involvement, other university departments may embark on BI projects of their own—without leveraging the knowledge and skill set gained from the initial BI project.
It is very important that Higher Education institutions leverage and coordinate the skills necessary to deploy effective BI tools.