UNC to leave Blackboard for Sakai by December 2012

Less than a year after the transition from Student Central to ConnectCarolina, the University will be facing another technological shift by December of 2012, when it replaces Blackboard.

In an effort to meet student and faculty needs in a more efficient and cost-effective way, the University said late Tuesday that it would switch to Sakai from Blackboard, the site that allows professors to post grades and course documents.

Charlie Green, assistant vice chancellor for teaching and learning, said Sakai will have broader applications than Blackboard, as it will be relevant for research and not focused solely on the teaching process.

“That was a source of heartburn for us because the tool was designed for so much more,” he said.

Sakai’s functions will include project sites, blogs and portfolios to help students manage their content. The system also allows students to create wikis — web pages created by the user that can be viewed publicly.

“That type of ability was somewhat limited in Blackboard,” Green said.

He said an example of the site’s extended applications is the ability of medical students to use virtual microscopes through the site.

Larry Conrad, vice chancellor for information technology, said Sakai will take over the services Blackboard provides. The system is open-source, meaning it can be modified by site administrators. Because it carries no licensing costs, Sakai will cost UNC $332,000 annually, as opposed to $620,000 for Blackboard.

Conrad said the University delayed its adoption of Sakai so that its introduction would not coincide with the initiation of ConnectCarolina.

“We just thought that would be too much,” he said.

Sakai will be more widely used than Blackboard, which only 35 percent of faculty uses, Conrad said.

“Quite frankly, those numbers were a bit lackluster,” Conrad said.

Sakai has been in a pilot phase at UNC since January 2008, with some professors using the system to judge its effectiveness.

“The techies going off in the corner and deciding product ‘X’ is the better product isn’t what we’re about,” Conrad said.

Some professors said they have found the system to be effective for teaching classes.

Journalism professor Ryan Thornburg, who used the system in the fall of 2009 and continues to use it this semester, said he likes that Sakai is open-source, allowing it to provide a community of users.

“It feels like a website instead of an application that’s on the Web,” he said.

David Eckerman, psychology professor emeritus who used Sakai in fall 2008, said he would typically use his own website but enjoyed Sakai’s ability to send information and respond to prior inefficiencies.

“I liked the rebellious spirit of Sakai at the time,” he said.

More than 350 institutions currently use the system, according to Sakai’s website.

John Moore, senior director for strategy and planning for learning technologies at Virginia Tech, said students and faculty have responded positively to Sakai. The university stopped using Blackboard last fall.

He said students have found the portfolio option helpful and faculty have liked the project site application, which allows committees to work on out-of-class projects.

Moore said it took the faculty some time to adapt, but they are now able to use the system efficiently.

The University is now in the midst of that teaching process.

Green said faculty will have the option to participate in tutorial sessions and online instructional tools, dependent on how much support the faculty member needs.

While some faculty have not begun to adapt to the system, Conrad said others have already enthusiastically adopted Sakai.

“We’ve already fired the starting pistol, so they’re ready to go,” he said.

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