CT Industry
:: NEWS
BRINGING PROCUREMENT TO KUALI. eProcurement provider SciQuest has become a commercial affiliate of the Kuali Foundation, and will help develop integrated electronic procurement functionality for the open source Kuali Financial System.
THE LINDEN PRIZE will recognize innovative projects in Second Life. Will your campus be a winner?
VIRTUAL WORLD, REAL DOLLARS. Linden Lab has announced a new annual award called the Linden Prize, which will award $10,000 to one Second Life resident or team, for an innovative SL project that improves the way people work, learn, and communicate in their daily lives outside of the virtual world. Anonymous judges will consider a wide range of projects that have achieved tangible, compelling results outside of Second Life; have demonstrated high quality of execution, aesthetics, or technical sophistication; and are capable of inspiring and influencing future development, knowledge, creativity, and collaboration across the virtual and real worlds. Applications due by Jan. 15, 2009; entry form is available here.
AUTOMATIC ACCESSIBILITY. This month, North Idaho College is implementing the SpeakerBox classroom capture system from ClearSky Systems as part of an effort to provide accessible education to students with disabilities. SpeakerBox is designed to capture and distribute lectures without intervention from instructors; it automatically captures voice, along with everything displayed on the instructor's computer screen. Read more here.
SEEKING SAKAI INNOVATION. The Sakai Foundation is seeking nominees for its second annual Teaching With Sakai Innovation Award, recognizing innovative and transformative educational applications of the Sakai learning environment. Entry information is available at OpenEdPractices.org; the application deadline is Feb. 27, 2009. Entries will also seed a collection of innovative practices in the OpenEd Practices repository, a community of practice for teaching and learning with open source tools, supported in part by rSmart, the Association of American Colleges and Universities, and Marist College (NY).
LECTURE CAPTURE PARTNERSHIP. A partnership between Echo360 and Blackboard will give instructors at more than 2,000 Blackboard institutions access to a free personal version of the Echo360 lecture capture software. The companies inked a three-year deal that calls for Echo360 software to be distributed with Blackboard solutions to its higher ed client community in the US and Canada, beginning this spring.
CLASS CAPTURE MILESTONE. The Arizona State University Ira A. Fulton School of Engineering recently recorded its 10,000th lecture with Mediasite by Sonic Foundry. Since 2003, more than 100 ASU faculty members have used the Mediasite platform to support 13 graduate degrees, recording and streaming about 60 course selections each semester, for an average of 180 lecture-capture hours per week. Read more here.
:: PEOPLE
KEEHN TO eCOLLEGE. Learning management vendor eCollege has appointed Anne Keehn as VP of sales and business development. With more than 25 years of experience in educational technology, Keehn most recently was president and CEO of technology and leadership consulting firm Quantum Thinking. She also served as senior VP of strategy, innovation, business development, and marketing for SunGard Higher Education.
:: M&A, Etc.
CAMPUS MANAGEMENT ACQUIRES TALISMA CRM. Campus Management has acquired the assets of nGenera subsidiary Talisma. The acquisition will add Talisma's constituent relationship management software to Campus Management's portfolio of solutions, while nGenera will retain Talisma's customer interaction management software product and business. Campus Management will also sell, integrate, and support nGenera's Knowledgebase software.
