Sep 12, 2008 1:00 AM EDTMoodle Featured in Chronicle of Higher Education and OStatic
Open Source Considered as Alternative to Blackboard
The Chronicle of Higher Education wrote an article posing open source software as a market challenge to Blackboard. OStatic followed up this article with some further insight on the validity of open source.
Jeffrey R. Young wrote a great article covering a growing trend to open source learning management systems in higher education. The article focused on the expectations of NG on many campuses.
Here is a great quote from the Chronicle of Higher Education article:
Blackboard is heading for a showdown with the free-software movement, according to some observers. Although Blackboard remains the clear market leader — about 66 percent of American colleges use its software as their standard, says the Campus Computing Project, an annual survey — there are signs that open-source alternatives are starting to gain ground. The survey found that the proportion of colleges using Moodle as their standard rose from 4.2 percent in 2006 to 7.8 percent in 2007, and that about 3 percent of colleges have selected Sakai.
Read the full story on the The Chronicle of Higher Education website (Subscription)
Kristin Shoemaker wrote a response article in OStatic probing the issue even further.
"The fact that open source course management applications are being used more frequently now in a wider range of institutions than even two years ago seems an extremely good sign for projects like Moodle and Sakai. Though their market share is small, the increase is by no means insignificant. Timing is everything, and the Blackboard Next Generation release is still in mock up, with no estimated release date for a final product."
Read the full story on OStatic
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