Time-to-Adoption: Two to Three Years
Enterprise systems are already widely used in academia for administrative purposes, and will soon move to a service-based model that can be used between campuses and in the classroom. The next generation of enterprise and web services will include net documents, web applications, and place-based services designed to answer the needs of increasingly mobile users, who will want easy access to media, research, and work documents wherever they (the users or the documents) happen to be.
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Relevance for Teaching, Learning & Creative Expression
- simplifies complex systems, making them more likely to be adopted and used
- facilitates bringing information from faculty research to courses or on-line discussion groups
- allows access to documents, information, and work-in-progress from any computer with an Internet connection
- encourages collaboration on individual, group, and institutional levels
Examples
- The Stellar Course Management System at MIT provides website updating, class rosters, and RSS feeds; coordinates academic calendars with class schedules; and even offers copyright information, among other features. http://mv.ezproxy.com.ezproxyberklee.flo.org/
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- The University of Toronto Library is taking part in a collaborative effort among eleven research libraries to maintain a Jewish history web portal. Librarians are able to keep the information up to date and not duplicate each other's work though this collaboration. http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlissues/effectiveprac/acrleffectivepracticesuniversitytoronto.htm
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- Pachyderm, a web-based multimedia authoring tool, allows non-technical authors to create compelling learning objects using web browsers. http://www.pachyderm.org
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For Further Reading
Convergence
(Campus Technology, December 2005) Part of a list of 101 best practices in educational technology, this set of case studies and examples demonstrates various ways that campus services are converging. http://www.campus-technology.com/article.asp?id=17564
Is It Time to Start Sharing the Course Management System?
(Frank Tansey, in Campus Technology, April 2005) Discusses the value of sharing the CMS between instructional and administrative departments on campus. http://www.campus-technology.com/article.asp?id=10896