1. The Project:JISC call 11/00 – ‘Pilots To Prove the Concepts of Interoperability within Managed Learning Environments in the Further Education Sector’(England)

2. The Project:JISC call 11/00 – ‘Pilots To Prove the Concepts of Interoperability within Managed Learning Environments in the Further Education Sector’(England) • Encourage Vendors to embrace interoperability • Establish the validity of interoperability • Provide Vendors with a supported but realistic test bed for their implementation of IMS specifications • Enable Vendor to Vendor cooperation • Enable colleges to gain supported experience of the issues involved in setting up an MLE • Disseminate the experience

3. The Bids: • 23 bids • 12 funded • Relatively small amounts of funding • At least 2 Vendors a bid • The Projects: • City College Manchester • Cornwall College • Colchester Institute • Myerscough College • North Lincolnshire College (including Thanet College) • Reading College of Art and Design (including Newark and Sherwood College, Sheffield College) • New College Durham (including Derwentside College, Stockton and Billingham College) • South Birmingham College • Ridge Danyers College • Stoke College • Staffordshire University Regional Federation (including Burton College, Cannock Chase Technical College, Leek College, Newcastle-under-Lyme College, Rodbaston College, Shrewsbury College of Arts and Technology, Stafford College, Stoke-on-Trent College, Stoke-on-Trent Sixth Form College, Tamworth & Lichfield College, Walford & North Shropshire College) • Tameside College

4. The Science bit • Specifications IMS LIP , Enterprise & SCORM • MIS - VLE • MIS - IPS - VLE • VLE - Content

5. The MLE(?) • Becta diagram (deceptive?) • VLE LMS MIS Components • Specifications or standards(?) • Vendor commitment • Versions

6. J F M A M J J A S O N The Plan Content – VLE exchange 2nd Pilot students testing MIS-VLE-Content MIS – VLE exchange 1st Pilot students testing VLE only D • Fits in with FE timetable • Building blocks • Real delivery Bid Initial meeting Final report VLE install

7. J F M A M J J A S O N The Reality • Mission critical staff • Reorganisation • Calendar • Mission critical item • 2 0ut of 3 not bought a VLE • Rewriting of brief Content – VLE exchange MIS – VLE exchange MIS – Mediating server exchange 1st Pilot students testing VLE only D VLE installation Final report Bid Standards meeting VLE install

8. The Successes • First time competing Vendors have worked together using IMS specifications (in the world). • Cultural sea change - sharing of knowledge • Raising profile of MLE’s • Value for money • Emergence of MLE development process • Bringing together of college departments, MIS, IT, ILT, curriculum, SMT

9. The Issues (1) • Unique user ID • Matrix hierarchy of roles within VLE - link VLE ID to College to LDAP for authentication • Who owns the DATA • SCORM limitations • Definition of Granularity • Size of Vendor- ability to implement change within life time of the project • Proof of concept but how will all Colleges cope with complexities of MLE’s

10. The Issues (2) • Tool bash needed to demonstrate complete interoperability • Timeframe needs to be long enough for the development process of Colleges and Vendors • Project participants locked into their solution • Limitation of standards • Impact of pedagogy / FE needs(?) • FE sector being used to do what should be commercial developmental work(?) • Content object packaging tools do not yet commonly exist as commercial products

11. The Problems • Many bespoke solutions- is that truly interoperable • Non implementation of LIP by all projects within project lifetime • Outcome of pilots did not produce a working FE standard • Agenda still Vendor led(?) • Lack of support for group working, personalisation, variable content sequencing and mixed mode learning

12. The Spin Off Standards Compliant Content Generation Tool

13. The 4 Areas • MLE success creates resource hungry circle • Proof of concept - Demonstration of practicality next • Widening participation, life long learning and the ISR • Interoperability means interchange through time and space • Divergence or convergence?

14. The Project:JISC call 11/00 – ‘Pilots To Prove the Concepts of Interoperability within Managed Learning Environments in the Further Education Sector’(England) Contacts Mark Williams e-learning manager Reading College of Arts and Design williamsm@reading-college.ac.uk Acknowledgements FE MLE Interoperability Final Project Report - Richard Everett FE MLE Interoperability pilot Final Technical Report - Richard Everett