Keys to Success: How a small French university manages and supports Sakai CLE

ULCO, with about 10,000 students, is shared between several cities in the north of France and covers the four broad fields excluding Health Sciences.

Due to a small team, which manage Sakai CLE, some choices had to be made: support for users, decentralization of workspaces administration, etc.

We will show the various developments: interfacing with LDAP, integration of PmWiki, adding social networking profile, LaTeX generator, editing and creating roles, etc.

We present a return on our uses, showing the positive points of CLE: matrix navigation, roles modulation, communication tools, etc. However, we will also discuss some obstacles such as francization, the impossibility to automate some tasks, or the inflation of the database.

Although CLE is used as a majority in blended mode, we also have a full remote training and several uses in project mode. It allowed us to evaluate the platform, from the point of view of users. We present our vision of the use and expected evolutions.

Transcript

1. 1 1 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Keys to Success: How a small Keys to Success: How a small French university manages and French university manages and supports Sakai CLE supports Sakai CLE
2. 2 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 2 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT A very young university: 20 years old A small university: about 10,000 students Approximately 1000 academics/staff members A distributed university between 4 cities: Boulogne sur Mer, Calais, Dunkerque and Saint-Omer 40km/25miles Context 20
3. 3 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 3 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT ULCO covers the four broad fields of teaching and research except Health Sciences First installation of Sakai CLE: 2009 (2.6) Currently, we use the 2.8.1 version (an update to the 2.9.1 is scheduled for next month) Number of websites (projects/courses) : > 600 Context
4. 4 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 4 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT A small team to manage Sakai with limited time : An engineer, F.Dooremont An associate professor, E.Duquenoy A small team Context Time spent on Sakai and other tasks.
5. 5 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 5 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Consequences A strategy of decentralization: The university staff (teachers, professors, lecturers, engineers, etc.) can create as many spaces as they wish on Sakai They can enroll anyone: student or staff of the university via the LDAP or anyone with only an email. The focus is on staff training: classical courses, online courses, tips and tricks, hotline, mailing list, etc.
6. 6 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 6 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT History & Why Sakai? Epistemon (first platform): fork of Ganesha (in 2002) Developers
7. 7 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 7 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Why Sakai? Ergonomics Technology Criteria Philosophy
8. 8 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 8 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Ergonomic EPISTEMON Tools Sites or Spaces
9. 9 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 9 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Ergonomic Tools Sites or Spaces
10. 10 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 10 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Philosophy The analogy of classroom The teacher is the only master Use the platform with both collaborative and learning purposes
11. 11 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 11 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Technology Have the same technology stack Uportal...
12. 12 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 12 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT And the winner is ...
13. 13 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 13 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Obstacles - brakes
14. 14 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 14 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Translation
15. 15 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 15 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Deployment milestones July 2010 : setting up of a production server 2010 – 2011 : Use of both Epistemon and Sakai 2011 – 2012 : Epistemon (archive mode) September 2012 : May Epistemon rest in peace... Currently we used Sakai CLE 2.8.1
16. 16 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 16 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Some developments With web services: Search tool into the LDAP and quick enrollment/unsubscribe tool, Website rename tool, Pmwiki integration, Etc. Code modifications: Drop Box Statistics tools integration LaTeX online editor
17. 17 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 17 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Searching & Enrollment Some developments Students and staff members are into the LDAP. To find a staff member What ? To find students by name To find students by curriculum. To unsubscribe students with one click
18. 18 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 18 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Searching & Enrollment Some developments It was not possible for an instructor to find his students into the LDAP Our tool enable looking for students or staff members into the LDAP... ...without the help of an administrator Why ? Student list curriculum.
19. 19 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 19 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Searching & Enrollment Some developments With Sakai Web Services and a little bit of PHP For more information, see : https://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/WEBSVCS /How+to+use+the+Sakai+Web+Services How ?
20. 20 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 20 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Rename a sakai website Some developments A very simple tool that allows an instructor to rename a website What ? The user type the new name here
21. 21 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 21 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Rename a sakai website Some developments Why ? With Sakai, only an administrator can change the name but we want that an instructor can do it
22. 22 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 22 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Rename a sakai website Some developments Again with a piece of PHP code and web services. How ?
23. 23 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 23 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT PmWiki integration Some developments PmWiki* is a evolved wiki, programmed in PHP. Many plugins (“cookbooks”) to extend it. What ? *http://www.pmwiki.org/
24. 24 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 24 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT PmWiki integration Some developments We used it on Epistemon, our previous LMS, also, it was necessary to install it on Sakai because of a lot of works created with PmWiki. Today, PmWiki is less and less used and we advise our users the native sakai wiki. Approximately 100 wikis opened at this day, but only 6 created this year. PmWiki is now mainly used by researchers Why ?
25. 25 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 25 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT PmWiki integration Some developments The interface between Sakai and PmWiki How ? Student only see this Teacher can save/load the wiki to/from his hardisk That means we able to transfer a wiki from a website to another.
26. 26 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 26 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT PmWiki integration Some developments Thanks to the Web Services, we can keep the user name and follow the student work: How ? User name inherited from Sakai
27. 27 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 27 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Drop Box modification Some developments Drop Box modification to increase the number of choices for "recent changes" Currently, 1 week max What ?
28. 28 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 28 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT In many departments, students have an internship for several weeks or even several months More and more students follow a work/study training program So, maximum 1 week between two uploads, seems too tight Currently, 1 week max Drop Box modification Some developments Why ?
29. 29 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 29 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT We are not developers but the software code is easy to understand: So, we have submitted a Jira (SAK- 22266) with the changes, but we have not feedback yet... sakai_resources_list.vm Now, 1 month Drop Box modification Some developments How ? How ?
30. 30 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 30 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Statistics Some developments Google Analytics integration.
31. 31 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 31 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Statistics Some developments Piwik Integration.
32. 32 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 32 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Teaching with LaTeX What ? The question is: “how to insert an equation into a quiz?” A LaTeX equation
33. 33 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 33 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Teaching with LaTeX Right-click to save how ? Inline LaTeX editor LaTeX editor + equation embedded into the URL The result in T&Q
34. 34 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 34 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Training and user help E-learning and classical courses Discussion forums (on Sakai, of course) Quick small user guides Home page (of Sakai) with advice/tips and tricks Internal Mailing List Francophone community on Sakai Confluence Phone, emails, and, of course, coffee room, ...
35. 35 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 35 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Training All training supports are created with the french editorial chain Scenari* (an english version exists) The main interest of Scenari is the modularity: a course is considered like a sum of "grains" (or teaching units). *http://scenari-platform.org We can build very quickly, a custom course from several grains
36. 36 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 36 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Working with Sakai Only one e-learning course. The most of the courses are blended learning courses. Half of the websites is “project” type, the other half is “course” type (>600 websites) Pedagogical secretaries use Sakai to organize university curriculum: announcements, messages and schedule. Not only use to teaching: a team of researchers use Sakai for a distance work with students in Ph.D Thesis.
37. 37 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 37 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Distance learning Currently, only one course: a “D.U.”* grading (it's not a national university degree) since 2 years. Public: graduates, engineers, employees, etc.. around 15 students each year from all over France Only courses (PDF) and some assignments Topic: Integrated management of coastal zones. Duration: 1 year *Diplôme d'Université
38. 38 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 38 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Blended learning The Stats Tool is very useful to understand how students work. For instance, we can see that many students work outside of the classroom. Especially, of course, just before the exam date... This means (see next slide) that a course is not only a session in the week but continues to exist the other days.
39. 39 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 39 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Blended learning The peaks represent the lesson days. Students work outside of classroom “Le silence après Mozart, c'est encore du Mozart”
40. 40 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 40 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Schedule Easy to use without groups Exportation easy Main difficult: not easy to use with many groups
41. 41 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 41 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Using Sakai for Research Projects Main Problem Main Problem: to be able to work with a Moroccan university (Faculté des Sciences et Techniques de Tanger) PhD Thesis: Moroccan students and French professors Weekly meetings and many scientific reports Real time work Calais Tanger What ?
42. 42 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 42 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Using Sakai for Research Projects Use of Sakai to centralize the documents Home tool to explain the use of the Sakai website Syllabus tool to keep a history of work Big Blue Button tool for weekly meetings and presentations Small inline LaTeX editor Etherpad 1.1 for realtime text raw edition and picture importation PmWiki for reports and LaTeX edition How ?
43. 43 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 43 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Use of an inline LaTeX editor Using Sakai for Research Projects How ? Right-click to save to the harddisk Inline LaTeX editor
44. 44 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 44 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Use of an inline LaTeX editor Using Sakai for Research Projects This is not the ideal solution, but it works How ? From the harddisk Inserted image
45. 45 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 45 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Use of PmWiki to write reports Using Sakai for Research Projects Why ? Etherpad 1.1 is used only during weekly meetings. PmWiki is best to write collaborative reports with LaTeX equations. Remark: it's possible to use the Sakai rwiki. But its LaTeX engine is jsMath whereas PmWiki uses MathJax* http://www.intmath.com/blog/wp-content/math-rendering-comparison.php right-click
46. 46 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 46 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Use of PmWiki to write reports Using Sakai for Research Projects Why ? Editing Rendering LaTeX Picture
47. 47 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 47 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT MOOC experience Since February, we work, with some others universities (including UPMC and UVHC), on a MOOC prototype* based on Sakai CLE 2.9.1 *http://francemooc.fr/ Our job: administrator of the MOOC (Fred & Eric) Currently, 1,200 students enrolled Dates: from May 6 to June 30 for the experimental phase. Public: french students / Francophone students, mainly from Africa. From October, 2013, 20,000 students are expected!
48. 48 San Diego, CA June 2-7, 2013 48 Eric DUQUENOY & Frédéric DOOREMONT Conclusion We manage Sakai since 4 years with less and less problems (No failure since the beginning of the year). There are fewer users to train each year We have now a variety of uses: for instance, some researchers use now Sakai after they used them for teaching. Thanks our recently MOOC experience (see next BOF @11:00am), we are ready for the 2.9 upgrade.