Education Week - October 1, 2014 - Special Report - S11

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OCTOBER 1, 2014

Piecing Together a Smart LMS Strategy > www.edweek.org/go/LMS

"

A major issue I see
with schools is that
their [decision]
process isn't
rigorous enough. "
CHRISTOPHER HARRINGTON
President, eLearn Institute

the likelihood of making a big financial misstep. Even if the implementation costs are
low, the three- to five-year cost can be substantial, said Mr. Irwin.
To fully understand the longer-term costs, he
recommends that the following questions be addressed before purchasing an lms: What are the
support costs? How much will it cost to integrate
with legacy systems like an existing student-information system? What are the projections for
ongoing maintenance and licensing costs? What
kinds of initial and ongoing professional development will be needed for teachers?
The procurement process itself is an obstacle
when a district is constrained by regulations
that prevent it from "kicking the tires" on an
lms, according to Mr. Culatta, who likens it to
buying a car without being able to test drive it.
Complicating matters is the fact that learning management systems are difficult to assess.
"They need to support natural teacher and
student workflow, and many of these systems
were developed for higher education, so they
follow more of a higher-education-faculty workflow," said Karen Cator, the president and ceo of
Digital Promise, a Washington-based nonprofit
working to accelerate innovation in education,
and a former director of the office of educational
technology at the federal Education Department. K-12 education customers need "much
more information, much more vetting [of lms
choices], many more reviews, and much more
understanding about where the developer is
going with their decisions," Ms. Cator said.
She advises that it should
accommodate a teacher's

workflow, take into account what the teacher
provides for instruction and what Web resources
are brought in, see how new ideas can be incorporated, and determine whether teachers can
work together to add materials and resources.
"The user interface needs to be so simple
and intuitive that you don't need a lot of
training to use it," Ms. Cator added.

Rigorous Process
The complexity and expense of choosing an

lms for the first time, or replacing an existing

one, can be daunting for districts.
"A major issue I see with schools is that their
process isn't rigorous enough," said Mr. Harrington, and they feel an urgency to take action.
To help districts and lms providers judge
whether they are good partners for each other,
he recommends requiring a "scripted demonstration" from a vendor. In this scenario, the
district provides the list of what it would like
to see in an lms and requires companies to
respond specifically and sequentially to how
they will meet each of those needs.
"It takes time, but you can make much better use of that time," Mr. Harrington said, and
it's a way of ensuring that a district is comparing "apples to apples."
During the selection process, experts say it's
critical for districts to identify a company that
will be flexible.
Mr. Culatta said he recently spoke with a
district official who doesn't use vendors anymore. When he asked how that was even possible, the response was: "We only choose commercial partners who come in and work with

In a survey of teachers, technology coordinators,
and administrators from 300 schools around the
country, Washington-based Blackboard Inc.,
an education software company, asked about
preferences for LMS delivery systems.

47% said they were probably or definitely willing

to use a public cloud for LMS hosting

PUBLIC CLOUD

In this model, which is a type of remote
hosting, the LMS provider maintains the
system in a private, isolated environment
with dedicated servers just for that
institution.

Learning management system companies may contract out
with a public cloud provider such as Amazon or Rackspace
for this type of remote hosting.

PROS: Some experts believe this is more
secure than a public cloud option. Updates
can be made by the LMS provider, but the
district may have more control over when
those updates take place.
CONS: A private cloud approach may not
be able to adjust as easily to significant
fluctuations in usage. Plus, the district
doesn't always have the latest version
of the LMS because, in some cases, the
systems are not automatically updated.

PROS: Automatic updates mean the system is always the
latest version and will have little or no down time during
updates. Public cloud systems also allow for easily scaling
up and down for heavy and light usage, said Craig Wahl,
a senior director of customer support for D2L, a Kitchener,
Ontario-based company which offers learning management
systems in all three delivery models. "Everyone wants to get
into the system the first day of school," he said. "When we do
this in the cloud, it's a flexible infrastructure that can handle
that use."
CONS: The system can be hard to customize. In addition,
automatic updates may not allow enough time for
widespread training before new features come online. And
districts may not know, unless they specifically ask, that
their system is being hosted by a third-party cloud-hosting
company.

39% preferred a private cloud option
31% preferred a public cloud option
12% preferred self-hosting
21% might or might not be willing to use the public cloud
17% were not willing to use a public cloud
Of respondents who said they preferred
self-hosting for their LMS:

77% cited an increased level of control
71% said they had the in-house expertise to do so
61% said it gave them an increased level of privacy
58% said it resulted in lower costs
SOURCE: Blackboard Inc.

S11

us on tools to support our schools, as opposed
to someone selling something off the shelf."
The district's word choice, rejecting "vendor"
for "commercial partner," shows its expectation
of an ongoing relationship with whatever edtech provider it chooses.
It might take four to six months for a district
to evaluate and select an lms, but districts typically have to live with the consequences of that
decision for at least five years, Mr. Harrington
added.
As they are designed now, Ms. Cator said,
learning management systems can give their
K-12 customers a "very intelligent and intuitive way" to organize all their material-a
digital replacement for the filing cabinets of
materials and resources that preceded them.
But the next big step the systems need to
take, she said, is to help students track their
own academic progress.
On that note, Mr. Culatta said he notices
some movement from lms providers to
address districts' growing demands for
tools that help customize or personalize
teaching and learning. "I'm starting to see
a maturation of the types of tools being provided," he said, "but I wish it were happening faster."
Future functionality aside, districts are
making decisions today about lmss. At press
time, Bartholomew was nearing the final
stage of its lms selection process, taking a
straw vote to see which of two providers each
committee member preferred. The goal will
be to build consensus so the final choice is
unanimous, and the January pilot will begin
as planned. n

WHAT SCHOOLS PREFER

PRIVATE CLOUD

|

By Michele Molnar n

EDUCATION WEEK
http://www.edweek.org/go/LMS
Education Week - October 1, 2014 - Special Report

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