Moving a Large University from Blackboard to Sakai CLE with no Increase in Support Tickets. Really?

What are key factors for a successful transition from Blackboard (or another LMS) to Sakai CLE? This presentation will examine NYU’s transition to Sakai CLE and the factors that have proven most important to us in ensuring a smooth rollout.

University IT teams planning a migration to Sakai may be asking questions such as:
- How much time should we invest in online vs in-person training?
- How do we most effectively communicate with our users?
- How can we ensure buy-in from stakeholders?
- What are the challenges associated with migrating content from Blackboard to Sakai?

We will examine the different components of our transition, including a data-driven analysis of the effectiveness of our efforts.This session is ideal for institutions planning to make the move to Sakai. We will also have an extended question/discussion period, which will provide the opportunity for other schools and organizations who have gone through this transition to share what has (or has not) worked well for them.

Transcript

1. Moving a Large University from Blackboard to Sakai CLE with no Increase in Support Tickets. Really?
2. •  Largest private university in the U.S. •  ~50,000 students •  14 global sites, with three portal campuses (NYC, Abu Dhabi & Shanghai) •  Blackboard since 2001 •  “NYU Classes” – NYU’s instance of Sakai CLE New York University
3. The Basics
4. Phase 1 •  Exploratory group of ~20 faculty from across the university and global sites •  Basic Integration with SIS Phased approach Phase 2 •  Fully transition two mid-sized schools. •  Full integration with SIS and self-service course site creation •  Begin migrating Bb content to Sakai Phase 3 •  All schools and global sites fully transitioned to NYU Classes. •  Full production infrastructure in place to support over 40K users
5. •  Project Manager •  Tech Project Manager •  Tech Lead •  QA Lead •  Communications Lead •  Service Lead •  Training and Support Lead •  Design Lead •  Usability Testing Leads •  Vendor support (Longsight) Project Team Composition
6. •  Bb to Sakai import code from community •  Automatically migrated five semesters of content (Summer 2011 – Fall 2012) •  Provided automated request process for archives older than Summer 11 •  Migration straightforward overall, with some small difficulties…but resolvable o  Test and Quizzes: e.g., missing embedded images and mp3s, fill in the blank question types, questions pools changes o  Resources: long folder names and file names Migrating Content
7. 1.  Get buy-in 2.  Communicate communicate! 3.  Early Training, Many Options 4.  Self-service Site Creation (the sooner the better) Factors that make the difference Support Tickets Jan 2012 = Support Tickets Jan 2013
8. 1. Get Buy-in
9. On November 14, 2011, Provost David McLaughlin announced the plan to replace Blackboard with Sakai CLE, with the goal of fully completing the transition by August 2013. "Among the most important decisions we make as an institution is the selection of the technologies we use to improve the educational experience for students.” Provost David McLaughlin NYU Classes Project
10. Governance Model Teaching Technology Committee LMS Subcommittee NYU Classes Project Team Technical Advisory Group Use Advisory Group Provost
11. •  Initial Announcement from Provost •  Email communications from Deans •  Project Team Communications Setting the Stage for Project Team Communications
12. 2. Communicate Communicate
13. •  Project website: www.nyu.edu/nyuclasses-project Communication Channels
15. •  Early, in-person outreach to support partners in schools •  Emails to Faculty and Support Staff – short, actionable, clickable graphics •  Posters and other promotional materials •  **Blackboard Banner** - Drove 70% of the traffic to our training and support site Communication Channels
16. 3. Early Training, Many Options
17. •  Online o  Self-paced training modules o  Short videos o  Weekly webinars o  Knowledgebase articles •  In-person o  Classroom training o  One-on-one training, by appointment or walk-in o  On-site training / info sessions •  Phone or Email o  Specialized Tier 1 staff for roll-out o  Dedicated option in the phone tree Training and Support Options
18. Example Email: Since our email last week, we are pleased to report that as of today nearly 70% of the total anticipated number of course sites have been created… Sign-up for Training To access online training and sign up for in-person sessions visit our NYU Classes Training Page (www.nyu.edu/nyuclasses-project/training.html). For Additional Assistance Please contact askits@nyu.edu or call 212-998-3333. Getting users to Training – Actionable Communications!
19. •  Early outreach and training to IT support partners in schools to ensure buy-in and empower them to train users •  Get users to view online training modules and overviews early •  Get users to create their courses sites as early as possible Key Project Team Goals for Success – How did we do?
20. First Day of Classes Communications and Online Training Resources
21. 4. Self-service Site Creation
23. Why Self-Service Site Creation? •  Puts decision to combine sections in the hands of faculty and admins •  In-line with self-service approach of other university services (e.g. google sites) •  Moves faculty towards early and direct engagement with the system Course Site Creation – Self-Service
24. Course Site Creation – Self-Service
25. Course Site Creation – Self-Service
26. Course Site Creation – Self-Service
27. Course Site Creation – Self-Service
28. First Day of Classes Course Site Creation Number of course sites created by users, per day – Nov 19th, 2012 to Feb 15th, 2013 92% of anticipated sites created Faculty Email #1 Faculty Email #2 Faculty Email #3 Return from Break Faculty Email #4 Faculty Email #5 Link to training site in Blackboard Banner Over 100% of anticipated sites created
29. Tracking Site Creation
30. •  Anticipated # of Course Sections to be Created: ~6500 •  Course Sections Created: ~6800 •  Percentage Created: 104% •  Total Visits to Training and Support Site = 26,675 •  Total Unique Visits to Training and Support Site = 19,604 •  No increase in help tickets opened with IT Service Desk in Jan 2013 (Big Push) as compared to Jan 2012 (Typical Jan) o  i.e., no rush on the helpdesk NYU Classes - Key Statistics
31. Questions?
32. •  Complete the transition from Bb to Sakai and discontinue the Bb Service on Aug 15, 2013 •  Enhancements to Tests and Quizzes tool (Samigo) •  Integration with BigBlueButton (Video conferencing) •  Integration with Grouper and Google Apps •  Updates to UI based on usability testing •  And MORE Usability Testing… o  Continual improvements, made possible by open source What’s Next for NYU
33. Core Tools Announcements Assignments 1 Chat Room Drop Box Forums Gradebook 1 Addendum - NYU Toolset for Course Sites and Project Sites Messages News Resources Roster Schedule Section Info Statistics Syllabus Test & Quizzes (Samigo) Web Content Contrib tools and plug-ins Blog Wow Lessons TurnItIn Media Gallery (Kaltura) Turning Technologies Clickers Delegated Access WIRIS plug-in (CKEditor) YouTube plug-in (CKEditor)