Partnership & Collaboration in Moodle Development:

Making it Work

Kathy Fernandes, Director, System-wide LMSS Project, CSU Office of the Chancellor

Andrew Roderick, CIG Chair and Manager of Technology Development, San Francisco State University

John Whitmer, Associate Director, System-wide LMSS Project, CSU Office of the Chancellor

Outline

1. Moodle in the CSU System

2. Strategic Campus Coordination

3. Implementing Governance

4. Services Created / Delivered

5. Lessons Learned

6. Crystal Ball: the future

MOODLE IN THE CSU SYSTEM

The California State University

23 campuses 412,000 students systemwide 43,000 faculty and staff systemwide LMSS efforts “coordinated” since 1997, within

decentralized academic technology leadership Moodle coordination started with “Moodle

Consortium”, transitioned to formal Moodle Governance in 2010

Campus Location & LMS in 2012

1. San Francisco State – 20072. Humboldt State – 20073. CSU Monterey Bay – 20094. CSU Maritime – 20095. CSU Northridge – 20106. CSU San Marcos – 20107. Sonoma State – 20118. Cal Poly SLO – 20129. CSU Fullerton – 201210.CSU LA - 2012

Diversity of CSU Campuses

(1,000 FTES)– Focused on Maritime trades/careers– take Moodle “on the boat” with them

each summer– one staff member for Moodle tech support

(25,000 FTES)– diverse metropolitan university– 1,000+ simultaneous quiz attempts in a single

course– 3 development staff for open source app

development

CSU Budget Crisis

2011-2012 will reduce budget by at least $650M (reduction to $2.1B), 23% single year cut

2009-2010 cut $625M (partially restored in 2010-2011)

Increased tuition, reduced enrollments, doing less with more is status-quo

Synergies, cost-savings, cost-avoidance all major motivators

STRATEGIC CAMPUS COORDINATION

LMSS Environment LMSS = Learning Management Systems and Services

System-wide LMSS Strategy

1. LMS Futures Group (Provosts, CIOs, Faculty) prepared 4 documents:– LMS Critical Elements– External Scan of Market & Higher Ed Systems– CSU System-wide Recommendations– LMS Governance Recommendations

2. Organize stakeholders to implement recommendations, starting with Moodle

LMS Futures Recommendations

Recommendation #1: Provide an “opt-in” services approach to supporting the LMS with the baseline services being a collection of bext practices vs. minimal services

Recommendation #2: Provide a centrally hosted “safety-net” LMS for campuses that are at risk. A system or consortium LMS service can result in significant cost savings, especially for small campuses currently using proprietary systems such as Blackboard

– We recommend having a limited production available by July 2010. During spring 2010 we will need to determine the specific services available for this first production.

– Moodle is the first LMS application that would be provided, followed by Blackboard

Approach: Decentralization / Coordinated Autonomy1

“California is not only a state, it’s a state of mind” (John Ittelson, CSU Monterey Bay)

Focus on social/strategic aspirations, above functional requirements

Consistent with higher ed. culture: individualism and autonomy within open, public, and engaged environment

Principles: mass individualism, robust flexibility, undirected direction, persuasive standardization, open privacy

Approach adopted from UCLA’s CCLE project

1. Term coined by Jim Davis, UCLA CIO Published writings at: http://bit.ly/h7V4Dc and http://bit.ly/fT4f2W

Stages of CSU Moodle collaboration

• Competitive

• Cooperative

• Collaborative

IMPLEMENTING GOVERNANCE PROCESSES

LMSS Governance Key Elements

1. Standards & Practices Group

2. Common Interest Group

3. Chancellor’s Office Staff

Standards and Practices Group

10 members, 1 member from each Moodle production campus (either current production or announced migration)

Diverse membership: Directors of Academic Technology, Chief Information Officers, and Faculty Development Directors

Focus: strategic and policy decisions, vision-setting, prioritization of tasks and collaborative practices

Moodle Common Interest Group

Open membership to any interested CSU staff 25-30 attendees per meeting, Programmers, Sys

Admins, Instructional Designers, Faculty Support

Chancellor’s Office Staff

• Meeting coordination and documentation• Project planning and activity management• Vendor management and research• Communication, communication, communication• “Glue” that holds together campus-driven

activities and priorities

Implementation Strategy Documentation

LMSS Project Scope Document Shared Code Base (SCB) Project Scope SCB Development Principles SCB FAQ Baseline assessments of technical environment

and faculty/staff/student perceptions of Moodle

SERVICES CREATED & DELIVERED

CSU MOODLE SHARED CODE BASE

CSU Moodle Features

Remote Import My Courses Tabbed Block Gradebook Analytics Block

– First iteration– Still more features to add

Files Area CK Editor And more… For more documentation on each feature,

visit http://moodle.calstate.edu/sharedcodebase

Shared Professional Development & Support Materials

Webinar Series – Moodle Administration– Moodle Architecture and Performance Tuning– Moodle 2.0 Evaluation

Moodle.calstate.edu collaboration environment

QuickGuides Tutorials– 170 guides– Customizable by campus instance

Lynda.com multimedia tutorials for faculty and students– Available via Shibboleth login, or campus network

Vendor Management & Collaboration

Moodlerooms– Co-lab Pilot Hosting Environment– Shared Technical Account Manager– Common Shibboleth & Conduit integrations– MoodleMoot !!

Other 3rd Party Licensing & Integrations – Respondus– iParadigms/Turnitin

Migration support and information sharing

Lessons Learned

Clearly define and over-communicate deliverables and timelines

Campuses have very different timelines, deployment approaches, staffing, etc, so

Document and formalize campus expectations Keep it simple and agile, especially considering

assessment and planning efforts Communicate, communicate, communicate

What’s coming next

Test, refine, and launch SCB into production Define requirements for SCB development in

2011-2012 Create resource model to distribute development

activity across campuses Continue plans for migration to Moodle v2.0

Contact Information

Kathy Fernandes (kfernandes@csuchico.edu)Director of System-Wide LMS Initiatives

Andrew Roderick (roderick@sfsu.edu)CIG Chair, Technology Development Manager at San Francisco State University

John Whitmer (jwhitmer@csuchico.edu)Associate Director of System-Wide LMS Initiatives