1. Welcome Back Joe Collentine, PACAC Chair

Provost’s Academic Computing Advisory Committee Minutes for September 9, 2010

September 9, 2010 PACAC Agenda

1. Welcome back – Joe Collentine, PACAC Chair 2. Welcome to PACAC – Karen Pugliesi 3. Status on LMS – Don Carter 4. ITS Update – John Campbell & Fred Estrella 5. Next meeting – October 8

Meeting Minutes Attending: John Campbell, Don Carter, Lesley Cephas, Joe Collentine, Bernd Conrad, John Eastwood, Fred Estrella, Evie Garcia, Pattie Gibson, Angie Golden, Kerry Henrickson, Ray Huang, Jill Koelling, Casey Machula, Georgia Michalicek, James Palmer, ElizaBeth Pifer, Chih Tu, and guests: Jayme Davis, Linda Neff, and Karen Pugliesi.

Welcome back Joe Collentine, PACAC Chair, asked members to introduce themselves. He then highlighted priorities for the committee in a PowerPoint presentation titled, PACAC 2010-2011, which can be found on the PACAC web site at http://www.nau.edu/provost/pacac, under Information.

The Learning Management System (LMS) decision will be the PACAC priority for this semester. There is no choice but to replace Blackboard Vista because it will no longer be supported by Blackboard. In his presentation, Joe outlined some issues for consideration and asked questions that may come up during or after the decision process.

Joe also spoke about eBooks, what the preferred mode of communication is and whether or not it’s generational, and said he recognized the importance of the Northern Arizona University Guidelines for Planning and Designing Learning Spaces document that PACAC recommended to the Provost in 2008 while attending meetings with Capital Assets during the summer. He said it is difficult to think beyond the wall when building classrooms, and while newer technologies have been added on, everything in the document is still relevant. He also suggested members read an Educause article titled, Are You Ready for Mobile Learning?

Welcome to PACAC Karen Pugliesi said she agreed with Joe; the top priority for PACAC has got to be the selection of the new LMS. She said the preferences of faculty and students are not particularly directive, and said this could be an opportunity to advance what we do in the way of online instruction, blended instruction, and technology enhanced instruction.

Karen reminded members the university is very focused on increasing student success. In the mix, technology is invoked quite often; the mailboxes of administrators are full with messages about software and vendor products. She told members, whatever guidance and leadership PACAC can provide in this area is worthy of their attention. She said enormous changes are afoot in expectations and processes in PACAC Minutes for September 9, 2010 – Page 1 Provost’s Academic Computing Advisory Committee Minutes for September 9, 2010 accreditation; NAU will be expected to provide the data needed for evidence of student learning on an annual basis. There will be a need to take assessment practices to a new level across the university. She heard that the LMS product had utilities for assessment and hoped PACAC would look at that potential when making their decision.

Karen then asked the committee to help the university look ahead when beginning their work next spring. She asked them to consider what kinds of technologies have real viability that will be valuable in enhancing what faculty are trying to do with students, such as research activities. She asked the members to think about sustainability and to consider what opportunities they might have in their organizational units to conserve finite resources. And finally, she asked what guidance should be given to students about what to bring with them when they attend NAU.

Karen then reminded the committee of another substantial effort PACAC made a few years ago on technology literacy. She said, at the time, faculty decided to drop the goal from the liberal studies program. However, the Liberal Studies Committee has geared up for a review and there may be an opportunity for PACAC to participate and advise the faculty group that will be spearheading that issue.

Status on LMS Don Carter explained that Blackboard is getting rid of the Vista learning management system (LMS) NAU currently uses, and a decision needs to be made now on which LMS to use beginning next fall. He said it will take one year to move all of the courses on Vista over to the new LMS. The two options being looked at are Blackboard Learn (Bb Learn) and Moodle (an open source product.) Pilot courses are being taught in both products during summer and fall semesters.

Don said the e-Learning Center has been doing research on both products. A survey of faculty teaching summer courses has mixed returns, with a slight leaning toward Bb Learn. Much of the survey data is qualitative. The fall group will get surveys, too. He would also like to have panel discussions with some of the faculty who worked in the pilots, including the fall pilots.

Don said there are three different categories for moving courses. They are: a. Transfer – a simple transfer of all course files b. Translate – copy and paste all HTML from Vista to Bb editor and embed content in Bb c. Transform – really work on the quality of the courses, the quality of engagement and interaction He told PACAC he would like their advice to help determine what to transform and what to just transfer.

He said moving files into Moodle will have to be file-by-file, or copy and paste HTML. There is no migration tool. But files cannot be edited in Moodle either. Linda Neff said Moodle does require you to build the course and the e-Learning Center would have to help. She also spoke about a student survey that was conducted in the pilot courses over the summer saying that once students reviewed the Moodle tutorials created by Georgia Michalicek, over eighty-five percent reported having a positive experience.

Don said the e-Learning Center is offering Use Case Scenarios in both LMS’s for faculty to evaluate the two systems from September 13 – 24. He will collect the survey data. He would also like to have people who taught in both systems get together with the PACAC subcommittee and talk. There are a few other things to look at such as, making sure these are ADA accessible and how well they work for the library PACAC Minutes for September 9, 2010 – Page 2 Provost’s Academic Computing Advisory Committee Minutes for September 9, 2010 and e-reserves. Information Technology Services (ITS) can support either one. Beth Pifer said with preliminary testing, Moodle is a little buggier for ADA compliance than Bb Learn, and Bb Learn was recently given the nod by the National Federation for the Blind.

Fred Estrella said the challenge to PACAC is how to make a decision. He asked, what is the decision making process? PACAC needs to rate the products and then sell the decision. ITS can support either product although they may prefer one over the other. Fred said he thinks students will adapt to whatever product is chosen over time, but added, PACAC should take student input. He sees it as more of a faculty decision, and said the group needs to engage all faculty. The Provost’s decision will be based on the PACAC decision.

Fred said he did not think the transforming of online courses should be part of the decision. Faculty do not have time, and there are not enough staff to do it for them. He emphasized that PACAC needs to make the decision to support one product. There are only one-and-one-half people in John Campbell’s organization devoted to the LMS. Don Carter and Joe Collentine agreed that two different products cannot be supported. Fred said there are many administrative processes that occur and ITS has been able to leverage those when supporting one system.

Joe Collentine said data from the LMS Decision subcommittee and the e-Learning Center could be utilized to make a decision. He suggested that one more public forum be used to engage faculty who were not sitting in the room. Then a decision could be made, and PACAC would make a recommendation to the Provost.

Fred recommended the subcommittee ask what they are going to weight more in the process, and put that in writing. He said, this has to be the key so the decision is logical and can be understood, making it defendable to sell it to the faculty. Angie Golden said she disagreed. She offered that what’s really critical is not telling them how PACAC came to the decision, but how the new LMS is going to be supported. She said it’s important to plan right now, even before a decision is made, to help the faculty make the transition. Fred agreed, saying there does need to be a process for making the decision, not only based on how it is selected, but how it will be supported. He wants to get faculty involved and make it as transparent as possible.

Fred said the LMS is an enterprise-wide system. John Campbell reported there was already a record amount of use recorded in Blackboard Vista this fall that’s twenty percent higher than last year. He asked, what is the best solution for the university to move forward? He shared, the President’s Cabinet is aware of the project and resources are available, including some money. Joe Collentine asked if the support to make a change would be there a year from now, and John answered, yes, there is a sustainability plan.

Don Carter then informed the group of three steps being planned for migration of courses to the new LMS as follows:

1. Move the courses – student workers 2. Verify course structure and files – e-Learning staff 3. Faculty to make sure course is what they expect it to be – offer stipends PACAC Minutes for September 9, 2010 – Page 3 Provost’s Academic Computing Advisory Committee Minutes for September 9, 2010

Action item: Joe Collentine will meet with a couple people from the committee to write a procedure for making a decision. Don Carter offered to provide the methodology used when making the Vista decision. John Campbell volunteered himself and his team lead, Chris Gray, to work with Joe, and Angie Golden also volunteered.

ITS Update – John Campbell and Fred Estrella In the interest of time, John Campbell asked the committee to read his update which is posted on the PACAC web site at http://www.nau.edu/provost/pacac under Information. Fred Estrella shared, there is a swell of things happening in ITS, and this is the busiest time he’s ever seen. He said the LMS is the most-used system on campus by far. He knows this will be a big change for people and assured the committee that it will be supported one-hundred percent.

Next meeting – October 8

PACAC Minutes for September 9, 2010 – Page 4