A College-wide Migration Blackboard to Moodle in 6

A College-wide Migration Blackboard to Moodle in 6 months Alice Crisp Director of Instructional Technology and Distance Learning David Hutto Dean for Technology and Development BLUE RIDGE COMMUNITY COLLEGE FLAT ROCK, NC

Adjusting to Current Technology • State license required College to upgrade Course Management System – Blackboard 6. 2 to 7. 1 – 2007 -2008 academic year – New hardware platform – New Oracle Database – Increased costs • Issues: – Increasing online enrollment – Growing number of courses for curriculum and CE – Expanding demands on personnel

Options • Upgrade BRCC resources – hardware, software, etc. • External hosting: – Third Party – Blackboard. com • Move to “Open Source” solution – Moodle, Sakai, etc.

Long Range Transition Plan • Use Third Party Provider to host Blackboard 7. 1 for one year • Convert existing course and develop new courses in open source platform • Move to open source entirely by fall of 2008 • College had been “exploring” Moodle for about a year – a few early adopters

Blackboard Hosting Problems • Signed contract with Private Hosting Provider – License issues emerge – No 3 rd party hosting provision in state contract nor allowed by Blackboard • Blackboard agrees to host BRCC courses for $42, 000 per year • Hosting problems irreconcilable

Point-of-Paid • Future of Blackboard at Blue Ridge in doubt • Dissatisfaction with Blackboard • Moodle a known entity

Gathering Resources • Polled faculty and staff leaders • Discussed options with BRCC “Power Users” – Explained the options – Openly discussed the process and challenges to follow our own course – Proposed a move to Moodle • Gathered the Faculty Council • Unanimous acceptance of the Moodle migration option!

Get “buy-in” from Stakeholders • Presented the plan to the BRCC Management Team – Deans and President • Business Office support for spending less money • Provided support for: – – Summer Institute (discretionary training funds) Funds to outsource 18 course conversions Online Instructors to Guide Migration Eventual hardware upgrade

Migration Beginnings • Small pool of Moodle users – Early adopters of Moodle and Open Source – Strong support from IT for Open Source – BRCC - Flat Rock, NC 9 – Member of NCMUG • Purchased and Installed Moodle Servers for Curriculum and Continuing Education Courses

Migration Workflow • Used existing Moodle Dev Server • Built Templates • Located Trainers – scheduled training events • Organized Moodle “Boot Camp” • Setup online Moodle Development Course – Discussion Forums – Troubleshooting of Process – Investigation of Conversion Tools

Migration Mechanics • Install, configure, create course framework • Determine actual # courses to convert (approx 380 in BB) • Determine Roles, Admins – responsibilities (keep Directors in the loop!) • Schedule Marketing, lock in training

Moodle Expertise • D. I. Von. Briesen, experienced Moodle instructor to provides assistance & leadership – History with BRCC Faculty – Expert Moodle Developer and Ambassador • Assisted us in developing the conversion course in Moodle • Then left for Africa

Basic Developer Server set-up for Fall 2008 • • Gateway P 4 3 GHz Single processor 2 G RAM 2 - 80 G hard drives mirrored IMAP authentication w/ Open Source Web. Mail • Moodle 1. 5 upgraded to 6 (avoid 7)

Courses • 380 courses in BB (spreadsheet) • Multiple sections reduce to ONE course per section developed – then cloned • Total # of courses in Moodle: 260 – Curriculum: 146 – Continuing Education: 52 on one server and about 20 on another – Miscellaneous and Sandbox Courses: 62 (Each teacher has at least one and we have some faculty training and student demo courses included)

Project Management • • Locate & contract training Establish a communication plan Prepare Instructors – online, f 2 f, 1 -2 -1, Prepare Students – marketing (web, BRCC - Flat Rock, NC 16 print), tutorials, FAQ’s, plan orientations • Prepare Help Desk • Take Off!

Project Management…part 2 • Training Approaches and Calendar – Humboldt Univ. , Moodle book by Rice, Cole’s Manual with local additions – Sandboxes for each instructor – Conversion training (b. Free and SFSU – forget the import or do localhost ) – Online instructor and course – DEMO course – In-house BASICS (tools, editing, file mgmt. )

Migration Tools • b. Free – http: //its. unc. edu/tl/tli/b. Free/about. php • SFSU – http: //welearn. sfsu. edu/ctt/index. html

Web 2. 0 Tools • Use del-icio-us – it will change your life! – (reference links last page) • Coordinate using Google docs /spreadsheets • SKYPE! Works great to Senegal!

Cost Factors • Cost – Direct and Indirect: Total hard cash $11, 175 • $6100: Direct Pay Out for Delivered Training, Stipends for adjuncts and 9 month employees, Hired Course Conversions for 18 courses • $675: Printing Moodle Manual for Faculty • Time for conversion averaged about 40 hours per course (rebuild) • $4400 Hardware Server upgrade (1 st courses ran on 1 server not redundant)

Reporting before Take Off 8/23 • As of 8/13/07, we had 41 sections, – Internet Only, and 35 unique courses. • Of the 35 courses – 11 are 100% ready – 14 are between 50 -- 98% ready – 11 courses (31%) are not ready to begin – classes on August 23 (0 -20% completed).

Reporting – Fall 2007 • • • Distance Education Curriculum By Program Courses Students ITV 12 78 Full Internet Classes 46 550 Hybrid Classes 48 372 Online Con Ed 44 1412

Lessons Learned • RESET ANY TEMPLATE or COURSE before copying it to a new course • Browsers act differently depending on type, version, and operating system – Running Win. XP, SP 2 with Firefox 2 – cannot – add a table in html editor – but CAN with IE 6 • WATCH your backup configs and monitor – hardware CLOSELY first 2 weeks after – classes begin

Lessons Learned • START 18 months out • FLATTEN all previous LMS files as much as possible • Make an outline – in BB from Course Files in case you no longer have access to BB before conversion • Locate and utilize a champion with Moodle expertise & experience • Give your Early Adopters EVERYTHING they need – even if running multiple LMS

Lessons Continued • UTILIZE Web 2. 0 to advantage – including tutorials in You Tube and Google Video • Beef up your FAQ’s • Build or Remodel Student & Faculty Guides

Award & Recognize • Recognize achievements of participating faculty and staff • Formally award achievements

Examples of Moodle Resources • • • Framework and template Faculty experiences Moodle course pages Integrating communication technology Engaging students

Current Server Specs (2) • Dual Quad core 1. 8 GHz Intel processors with 8 MB cache (essentially 8 processors) • 4 GB RAM • 6 250 GB SATA II Hard drives • Drives are configured in RAID 5 (1. 5 TB total) • Redundant power supplies • OS is Cent. OS 5 (Open Source version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux)

• Entire system is replicated to a second, identically configured system each night. • System is also backed up to an external storage (EMC 4 TB) system nightly, along with other servers. • Currently running 8 instances of Moodle, using approximately 68 GB. • Current Moodle version is 1. 8. 3+ (2007021534) • Systems are Gateway/MPC 9525 R – cost was less than $4500 each.

References • Eduforge Guidelines for • SFSU BB to Moodle Migrating Conversion Tool (new 09 - big files can take up to 2 hrs to – http: //eduforge. org/wiki/ convert!) eduforge/? pagename=Guide lines%20 for%20 MIgrating – http: //moodleconverter. lsu. edu/ • HSU Moodle Support Manual nd – http: //www. humboldt. edu/~m • Using Moodle Book 2 Edition oodle/instructor/manual/inde x. html – http: //docs. moodle. org/en/ Using_Moodle_book • b. Free – BB file extractor – http: //its. unc. edu/tl/tli/b. Free/a • Cheap Moodle host &– Siteground bout. php – http: //www. siteground. com/ moodle-hosting. htm

Blue Ridge Community College Flat Rock, North Carolina Contact Information: Alice Crisp alicec@blueridge. edu 828 -694 -1899 David Hutto davidhutto@blueridge. edu 828 -694 -1881