OCL News

AFCEA/USNI West 2008

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Elluminate New DL Collaboration System

The New Technology and Innovation Center (NTIC) and the Office of Continuous Learning (OCL) are working together to ensure that the academic experience for nonresident students is every bit as rich as it is for resident students. NTIC spent four months evaluating available web-based collaboration systems and measuring criteria such as functionality, usability, accessibility, scalability, cost and Elluminate Live!, which is compatible with NMCI systems, was chosen as the best fit for NPS. The system went live on July 5.

“Distributed Learning is a vehicle to help reach the total force and our partners, which is Goal #2 of the NPS Strategic Plan. Elluminate is one excellent method of delivery to extend learning,” says Val Moule, Deputy Director of OCL. Completely web-based, Elluminate’s classes can be scheduled, taught and attended from any internet-connected computer throughout the world. All Elluminate sessions originate in the NPS server room — no class content is stored off-site — and the system can be used on bandwidths as low as 12Kbps. Fully integrated with Blackboard, Elluminate is also available for student-to-student collaboration.

NTIC/ITACS is the technical lead, and OCL is the functional lead, working in tandem to resolve issues with Elluminate and to train its users. Since Eluminate’s inception, 350 events have been conducted; 500 personnel have been trained; logons have totaled 11,000, and students at NMCI, Air Force and Army commands have all connected successfully. Ten classes this quarter are using Elluminate and twenty will use it next quarter. Meteorology is using the system to collaborate on research projects and GSOIS students are working on group projects. Two instructors per quarter in OCL’s Systems Engineering Management are using Elluminate, and the Leadership Education for the 21st Century (SEM-PD21) degree program is relying on Elluminate also. For the first time, content will be delivered through Elluminate for OCL/Faculty Development’s Interactive Teacher Learning, a course that models how to teach online.

NTIC is working with MIIS and NRL to allow them to use Elluminate’s infrastructure, and is investigating how to make Elluminate available for secure sessions.

To learn more about Elluminate, see http://www.nps.edu/Technology/Elluminate/index.html, which will soon include a video example of a current NPS course being taught by Professor Steve Landry.

NPS Faculty Participate in ITL

NPS Faculty members engage in group discussions, Friday, October 12, in the first seminar session of the Interactive Teaching and Learning (ITL) course. ITL is offered by the Office of Continuous Learning and prepares faculty to develop and teach a distributed learning (online) course and/or enhance classroom- based instruction through the application of principles of teaching and learning and the use of technology tools. The course features face-to-face, asynchronous and synchronous technology-enabled components. Participants create a syllabus and a module, or unit of learning, for a specific course they teach, using either new materials or adapting current materials for technology-enabled delivery.