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Online University Adopts New LMS To Improve Student Experience

  • By Dian Schaffhauser
  • 01/13/15

A for-profit online university has completed a migration to a new learning system started earlier this year. Aspen University, run by the Aspen Group, adopted Brightspace, the integrated learning platform from D2L (formerly Desire2Learn). Students and faculty have moved immediately to the application. Aspen's course scheduling lets students start a course every other Tuesday throughout the year.

The migration was funded in 2013 from a round of financing raised by the sale of a convertible loan. At that time, Aspen Chairman and CEO Michael Mathews said the $2 million raised would be used for improving the "student experience" and adding support staff in academic operations.

According to the institution, over the past seven months, it has updated and improved its curriculum for 440 courses on Brightspace across all of its schools.

Chief Academic Officer, Cheri St. Arnauld said the new platform would support a curricular model "designed to provide students with engaging, media-enhanced, rigorous coursework intentionally aligned to professional and workplace standards. Moreover, the system's analytics are uniquely aimed to monitor student outcomes for continuous improvement driven from our comprehensive assessment plan."

Brightspace incorporates course management functionality with content management and data analytics. The latest release, issued in December, bolstered user support with 24 hour online chat help and the ability for a client to work with the company to integrate game-based learning into the implementation of the learning system.

"D2L is committed to the transformation of learning around the world and we are thrilled that Aspen University is joining our platform, making learning more pervasive, perceptive and personal for faculty and students," said D2L CEO John Baker.

About the Author

Dian Schaffhauser is a former senior contributing editor for 1105 Media's education publications THE Journal, Campus Technology and Spaces4Learning.

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