Training
blackboard > about blackboard > blackboard vs. webct > training
Training is necessary for the following three groups: faculty, students, and product administrators.
Faculty
Focus on a basic feature set: chat, discussion, calendar and HTML display (they need to provide content)
Content acquisition must be automated
Provide them with a template for the user interface
Offer additional training for those who want to make changes or add functionality
Students
An online tutorial should be provided for students
Administrators
It should be easy to automatically create and maintain courses
Must oversee global changes made to courses
WebCT
- Already have a present intellectual investment in the training of faculty and administrators
- The e-mail list they provide is a rich source of information for administrators
- Already possess training and administration infrastructures
- Can customize visible course site functionality at the user interface level
Blackboard
- Independent studies found it to be easier to train faculty to use than WebCT
- Includes easily accessible tutorials and help guides
- UT's lack of experience with this tool makes the level of difficulty in training students harder to judge
- The content is primarily contained within databases, simplifying the administration process
Conclusions
Blackboard would be easier for faculty already familiar with computers, but
for those who are unfamiliar, there would not be an appreciable difference between
the two products. Not only is there an existing user base for WebCT, there is
also a training program in place. A good user interface and information design
should ease the learning process for students. The administration issues discussed
dealt with both content administration and product administration. Though the
flat file and directory (as opposed to a database) method of organization that
WebCT uses was a concern, the existing knowledge base weighed more heavily in
the product's favor.
Outcome: Tie for faculty, Undecided for students (it depends on the User Interface), and a WebCT win for administrators
Support materials for Bb 9 are available at:
https://wikis.utexas.edu/display/bbsupport/
Blackboard is a campus-wide initiative of:
comments about the site to: Malaika Boyd: mboyd@mail.utexas.edu.
