In my opinion...
I would say that the primary reason that HEI's are not Moodle'd yet is due to their early adoption of commercial VLE's. Now that they have "embedded" their commercial VLE's into the psyche of academia, including the resources held therein, they have essentially locked themselves into a solution.
Don't forget how much more money HE has to adopt these IT projects compared to the much poorer FE relation. In some respects the later adoption of VLE's by the FE community has paid dividends. Some FE colleges had adopted commercial VLE's a while ago, but some of these have proven to be fundamentally flawed. Therefore most FE (and smaller HEI's) Colleges are choosing this move to Moodle to reinvigorate the elearning uptake within their institutions.
Also, before the BB takeover/merger, most HEI's were happy to place their faith in a large & sustainable commercial enterprise with all of the excellent support and upgrades and security that IT directors insist upon. I have no doubt that some HEI's would like to move to Moodle, but it's more a case of the logistics involved in transferring learning objects, etc, rather than personal preferences.
The subject of Open Source still strikes fear into (some) IT directors who are wedded to the model of large IT companies must always be right/sustainable/customer focussed?
And.... remember Moodle is not "free", it has to be supported & most times this must be done in house.
Regards..
Kevin Brace. MSc. Bsc(Hons). PG-CERT. IEng. PDF-ELT
RSC-WM . HE Co-ordinator.
email: [log in to unmask]
Direct line : 01902 518931
Mobile : 07966282370
JISC Regional Support Centre : West Midlands
http://www.rsc-wm.ac.uk/
University of Wolverhampton
Wolverhampton Science Park
Wolverhampton
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-----Original Message-----
From: Moodle in UK Higher Education [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Bob Ridge-Stearn
Sent: 05 March 2007 12:27
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: FW: [VLES] Moodle in HE
Well, if the responses to this question on this forum are anything to go by
there do not seem to be many HEIs using Moodle as their primary VLE.
I am considering taking my college down the Moodle road, but there is a
feeling in some quarters that Moodle is for FEIs and HEIs use
Blackboard/WebCT.
Any comments?
Thanks,
Bob Ridge-Stearn
Head of e-learning
Newman College of Higher Education.
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