Blackboard and a black hole of accountability

16/05/2008 by nicola.

Probably worth reiterating that the views on this post and elsewhere on this site are entirely my own (’cept any unintentional plagiarism) and do not reflect those of my employer. Have also spent limited time putting this post together.

Background - have been following some of the Blackboard commercial practices - from the sidelines over the last year - mostly via Stephen Downes OL Daily.Was asked if wanted to attend Manchester Blackboard conference this week, due to having joined a uni which has a VLE from a company that was acquired by Blackboard, was thought that it would be educational event for me re finding out other unis practices with these etc. I did and it was useful. See also Niall Sclater’s post about this conference.

Still wrestling with concept of Blackboard operating as a commercial entity in the public sector. When asked by BB employees about reaction to the keynotes - attempted to explain this (albeit these were 1-2 min conversations en route to sessions). Response to this was generally along lines of corporate sector operating differently in terms of level of compliance and regulation. In some senses can’t believe that am recommending more regulation but I think its essential.

Why? Blackboard are in a unique position in education. They are operating in over 70 countries and ‘large’ (?) amounts of institutions using them at HE or FE. They were presenting research at the conference (useful research actually, due to being in this highly unique position) having spent time talking to governments and international education bodies. So, it would appear that they can obtain new businesses in new countries because they have a model from a variety of places which can be adopted and especially where countries have an entangled education system, this is very attractive.

Don’t have a problem with the model in principle. Information on their website indicates that they are healthily financially with increased revenue. Are corporate entities in education a bad thing - not necessarily but should have enhanced, independent scrutiny.
If a public sector institution is investing in a corporate solution there are a number of stakeholders who are affected financially - government public spending and linked to this, the tax paying public; students as fee payers etc

Blackboard’s vision on their website is

“Our role is to improve the educational experience with Internet-enabled technology that connects students, faculty, researchers and the community in a growing network of education environments dedicated to better communication, commerce, collaboration and content.

Blackboard’s large and diverse community of practice supports, enhances and extends our offerings every day, all over the world. The Internet offers great potential for education and the educational experience. While our role as the platform is important, communities of practice make the best solutions. The value of the network is connectedness. Each Blackboard client makes every other Blackboard client’s solution more valuable as a result of that connection.”

So to the black hole:

I think they are underselling their influence as a ‘platform’ provider in an institution. A VLE is a strategic technology partner which can directly impact on student achievement and satisfaction. Blackboard are not a blackboard - there was not a huge learning curve for either staff or students to pick up a piece of chalk and scrawl across or read a blackboard and a range of financial and technical backgrounds will not affect learning in the same way.

One might argue that companies such as Microsoft who are also a major corporation in education have similar influence ? i.e. recent cases in Europe regarding anti-competitive, antitrust practices. I disagree that Microsoft have the same direct impact - i.e. as a member of staff or student it is now possible to incorporate technologies into your learning without using a Microsoft product. I would also suggest that direct competition in terms of VLE provision is smaller (at the moment).

I believe that there is a certain amount of ‘chaos’ in education which is why scrutiny / technology governance is fragmented, inconsistent so who becomes accountable ? Does a technology contract and SLA cover this ? I don’t think it goes far enough. To outline further:

When an institution selects a VLE, eLearning / learning technology / Information technology teams spend a large amount of time on training and support (e.g. I’m delivering a day’s training today) and adoption of the VLE may spread across the institution. Staff are roughly in 3 categories

• those with technology proficiency and enthusiasm/interest in new technologies
• those who feel that technology has a role to play but they might have less technology proficiency and experience themselves so approach with extreme caution
• those who have no interest and/or do not see a value of using technology in learning

Students also use a VLE with mixed levels of technology experience/proficiency, devices and usability, accessibility issues too.

Some common themes - some of this from spending time talking to colleagues in other institutions at the conference (some of this is similar to corporate use of LMSs too)

• A large amount of time devoted to preparing, delivering training, technical, learning & teaching support and consultancy with staff
• Staff time involved in designing and monitoring courses on VLE even when training and support available
• Staff trying learning ‘experiments’ with VLE with mixed reactions from students and other colleagues, mixed levels of access and use
• Even when examples of good practices shared, common frustrations also prevalent - could be design, system downtime or other issues
• Use of VLE to complete assessments - highly complex in terms of issues to be discussed, evaluated, especially for summative assessment
• Wider use of other technologies - blogs, wikis, podcasts but often used in conjunction with a VLE
• A view (don’t know how widely held) that HE is not responsible for students technology proficiency, this should have been addressed before entering HE

So who is held responsible for managing these issues and if students don’t achieve what they hoped and/or levels of student satisfaction with use of technology. Staff and students. A platform provider ? Not really. Are VLE’s evil ? Not really. What about other quality assurance bodies ?

This situation in education is unprecedented, dealing with accountability is not.If a business has issues in terms of operation which are affecting its success, accountability can be scrutinised, suggestions made, reported and monitored. When businesses get into trouble, soulsearching - looking at the heart of the issues - rather than glib, general reporting will hopefully result in common sense discussions and actions to improve the situation. Which I guess is why there are four very successful multinational corporations providing these professional services.

Can education scrutinise and report on the actual impact of VLE use - difficult to find evidence of this at the moment - who, how and in what countries ? In the UK there are bodies such as QAA responsible for ‘enforcing’ quality assurance in higher education. For example the Code of Practice - no use of technologies categories - looked at the programme design document and did not find any specific references. There is evidence of international discussion e.g. the recent OECD forumsAlso the report where themes of governance, regulation, impact of technology on performance etc

Looked at four big audit companies websites for further information - there is some about technology governance and public sector governance, but needs further digging to get education specific stuff. There is a recent report from PricewaterhouseCoopers, which is about bigger issues than this, however I think there are parallels in terms of how business and education can work together be regulated in order to achieve successful, public-private partner relationships.

This may seem over the top but as everyone that cares, knows, we don’t have time and money to waste in education, it is too important, too special for individuals and the future workforce in every single nation.

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