On forming a Sakai Special Interest Group NL

September 7, 20061st European Sakai Day

including results of feedback of participants

Wytze Koopalhttp://elearning.surf.nl/sakai http://sakai-nl.blogspot.com

We have just started!

Agenda

• Some facts and figures from NL

• Some (personal) viewpoints

• Some context

• Sakai SIG NL

• (Some) Discussion

• What’s next?

Dutch facts and figures

• VLE in primary and secondary education: very fragmented market

• Higher Ed: large market share of Blackboard (~ 50 %), plus local players

• HE: Total of ~60 institutions, 500 k students

• Within HE: some 3-5 institutions that are evaluating Sakai

• Some commercial interests in Sakai…

Sakai at our institutions

• Amsterdam (University of Amsterdam and VU)• University of Twente• Utrecht• Rotterdam• Saxion• Stoas & Hotelschool The Hague• Leidse OnderwijsInstellingen (LOI)• 3TU: TU Delft & TU Eindhoven

Some viewpoints - 1• There is a lot of discussion in NL about VLE’s

recently etc• But: there is lack of information regarding

– open source / open standards, and– how to move forward– how to collaborate (really!)

• Although: 80% of our (administrative) processes are the same….[mainly based on thorough legislation]

• But: we are ‘direct’ competitors in certain ways

Some viewpoints - 2

• ICT in Education: NL HE sector is very well organized; thanks to SURF (http://www.surf.nl/en)

• SURF is really active on the forefront of innovation, for example:– NL standards community (http://elearning.surf.nl/six)

– E-framework– Studielink (http://www.studielink.nl)

– Elearning research programme (http://www.surf.nl/elr)

– NL portfolio community (http://elearning.surf.nl/portfolio)

– Sakai community (http://elearning.surf.nl/sakai)

Some context

• More and more interaction (quite recent) between SIS and VLE ‘specialists’

• SURF has formed Sakai SIG NL (more on this in a minute)

• SURF is more and more involved in e-framework (close collaboration with JISC)

• Almost no fuzz (or ‘spin’) regarding Blackboard patent in NL

What is Sakai SIG NL?

• Informal, virtual community, started in July 2006

• Coordinator (1 day/week, this is me)• Work plan: communication,

communication, exchange of experiences• Website / weblog: just to inform those that

do not know (yet)• Just getting started: focus of different

member institutions of different subjects

1st results Sakai SIG NL

• There is more to Sakai than programming! There is– QA (UvA)– General requirements for tools (Resources,– Requirements for OSP– European (Dutch) requirements: Bologna, Lisbon

(see Portier, Koch & Oldsjö)– Localization & Internationalization (I18N & L10N)– …

Challenges Sakai SIG NL

• Lurking… ?!• Them (US) and we: there is no they!• Lack of knowledge of Open

Source/Access/Standards• Not invented here• Is there a longterm leadership

commitment on institutional level?: relationship with strategic plans of our institution

Discussion

• Take a look at http://www.sakai-pilot.utwente.nl/sakaiwiki/european_dutch_enhancements (also on handouts)

• Divide in 4 or 5 groups• Ask yourself (and take 5 minutes):

– What’s missing on this list? I need at least one item from every group

– What should have high priority? Only 3 please – Are you willing and able to work on it?– Who will (wants to) be ‘owner’ of this list (or a

subset) ?

Result: What is missing on the list?

• Regarding the Dutch community: we need a sort of roadmap (what are reasons that will result in management buyin)

• Migration support (how to migrate from current VLE to Sakai): technical stuff, but also user support materials

• Regarding issue of surnames: first collate use cases (might not be the same all over Europe) and then write down requirements.

Result: What should have priority?

• Item #6 (international date and time formats): 7 votes.

Result: What is not an issue (any more)?

• There is a patch for #6 (date and time format)

• # 9: (sort of) you can use webservices to overcome problem; this is a hack

• #12: seems to be solved in Version 2.2

• # 5: is actually a localization issue

What’s next

• Check out:– http://sakai-nl.blogspot.com– http://elearning.surf.nl/sakai– Wiki:

http://bugs.sakaiproject.org/confluence/display/EUROSAKAI/Home

– Collab: DG: Euro Sakai• Let’s talk: leave your business card / email

address

Thanking you for your attention and collaboration!