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Is it time to start sharing the course management system?
4/4/2005
An obvious downside might be a desire to control the CMS. However, I doubt that there is any compelling argument that can be made to wrest away something as obviously instructional as the course management system. In fact, it is likely that instructional technology would be strengthened rather than weakened by this sharing.
Students and faculty are direct beneficiaries of well-trained staff since it is not unreasonable to expect better service from more knowledgeable staff. In addition, the opportunities for cross and tangential training where offices interact are a significant opportunity. For example, it might be helpful for an academic advisor to access the training content on key aspects of the Registrar’s Office. Such training might avoid many unnecessary petitions to overcome "misunderstanding" of university regulations.
To maximize the impact of this sharing, it is important to have more than just a few isolated training courses. Online training, like online instruction, requires regular use for staff to become comfortable with the technology. Remember back to the initial installation of the course management system when significant support time was devoted to issues like logon and basic system features. If you are now a regular online instructor, you rarely deal with these issues.
In the end, widespread use of the CMS across the campus will benefit instruction as much as it will benefit campus areas that rarely touch the instructional aspects of the university.
Frank Tansey is a technology consultant and co-editor of the SmartClassroom eLetter (formerly Technology-Enabled Teaching).
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