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Software Review
More Than Open Source: A Second Look at Sakai
3/14/2007
University of Toronto (Canada)--as well as a representative from a Sakai commercial affiliate. With such diverse representation across types of colleges and institutions, Sakai's leadership guides the vibrant Sakai community in areas like managing contributions to future Sakai requirements, quality assurance, and tool and project coordination. As universities choose a course management system, it is a welcome change to have an option that is not only designed by fellow educators, but also governed by your peers.As the governance of Sakai continues to mature, it prioritizes needs common to the entire Sakai community. Sakai has evolved from a coders' project to a full-fledged course management system that brings both innovation and a pedagogical orientation to the field. Recently, the Sakai board has turned its attention to improving the user experience in Sakai, with its ultimate goal being outstanding accessibility and "user delight."
Regardless of your IT budget or staff, you can adopt Sakai. There is a large community of pioneering faculty, instructional technologists, librarians, administrators, and developers ready to collaborate with you and your campus. And, there’s a growing group of Sakai commercial affiliates (see box) who can help you when you need it. So whether you have faculty who need a collaboration space, administrators who need an advising system, assessment professionals who need a suite of portfolio tools, or you just need a course management system, take another look at Sakai.
[Editor’s note: Wende Morgaine will moderate a panel on leading open source portfolio initiatives at Campus Technology 2007, July 30-August 2, in Washington DC.]
| Vendor Support for Sakai A number of vendors provide hosting, technical support, and implementation support for Sakai, including: | |
| IBM ibm.com/industries/education (the rSmart Sakai CLE) The Longsight Group longsight.com The rSmart Group rsmart.com Serensoft serensoft.com | SingleMind Consulting Inc. singlemindconsulting.com Stoas www.stoas.nl (the rSmart Sakai CLE) Unicon unicon.net |
Wende Morgaine is a faculty member in Portland State University's award-winning University Studies program and a former Sakai conference co-chair. Morgaine recently co-led the implementation of both Sakai and the Open Source Portfolio at Portland State University (OR). She is also the Chief Open Source Evangelist at SingleMind Consulting Inc.
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