June 28, 2022
| Dear Faculty, Staff, and Students, The Brightspace Core Implementation Team has begun its work to ensure that the UVM community successfully transitions to Brightspace by the 2023 fall semester. Here are some recent highlights: ETS has contracted Newgrange IT Consulting to support us in managing the project. The Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) has hired an LMS Transition Specialist and welcomes Darrell Abney to UVM. Darrell’s primary role will be to support faculty as they transition to Brightspace. He has been on LMS transition teams at Rutgers University and Princeton University. The Core Implementation Team is now meeting weekly with D2L (the Brightspace vendor) to map out the implementation process (discovery and needs analysis, site design and configuration, training and coaching, and preparation for launch). Later in June, they will have a timeline to share with time periods for each phase. One of the first priority tasks is conducting a test run of moving a variety of Blackboard courses into Brightspace, using D2L’s course converter tools. After we complete this test, we will have a better idea of what is needed in terms of documentation and support. The full Brightspace Transition Team, comprised of faculty, staff, and student representatives, will convene once everyone returns in September. Meanwhile, this summer the CTL, the tech team, and the Professional and Continuing Education online team are learning the ins and outs of Brightspace and will share some of their discoveries on the new Moving to Brightspace web site. Brightspace preview sessions will be offered in mid-September to provide an overview of how the system operates. More technical “how to” workshops will begin later in the fall semester. Future communications will come from the Brightspace Core Implementation Team: Justin Henry, LMS Administrator, Center for Teaching and Learning Alex Messinger, Manager, Information Systems and Online Learning, Professional and Continuing Education (PACE) Rachel Seremeth, Director of Enterprise Applications/Database Services (co-lead) Wendy Verrei-Berenback, Assistant Director for the Center for Teaching and Learning (co-lead) They will provide regular updates this summer as we work through the details of the implementation plan with D2L. Please email your questions to brightspace.implementation@uvm.edu, bearing in mind that specific time frames are still being determined. Thank you for your continued engagement and patience. Simeon Ananou, Chief Information Officer Jim Vigoreaux, Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs |
May 16, 2022
Dear Faculty, Staff, and Students,
We are pleased to share an important update regarding the recommendation of the UVM Learning Management System (LMS) Review Committee to select Brightspace from Desire2Learn (D2L) as our new institutional platform. Following such recommendation, the UVM Board of Trustees passed a resolution on March 1 authorizing us to proceed with negotiations until a fully executed contract is in place with D2L. We are excited to inform you that these negotiations have now concluded, and we have a fully executed contract in place with D2L to begin the implementation of Brightspace at UVM.
This important development paves the way for us to convene a Brightspace Transition Team, comprised of faculty, staff, and student representatives. This team will work closely with D2L to develop an implementation plan and project timeline, including milestone dates, and concluding with a complete migration from Blackboard prior to fall 2023 semester. We will publish this plan on our LMS Transition web site this summer.
As our Brightspace implementation needs to be technically sound and informed by the needs of faculty, Enterprise Technology Services and the Office of the Provost will continue in jointly sponsoring this work. An initial project core team has been established, and it includes:
Wendy Verrei-Berenback, Assistant Director for the Center for Teaching & Learning
Rachel Seremeth, Director of Enterprise Applications/Database Services
Justin Henry, Information Technology Professional Sr. in the Center for Teaching and Learning
Alex Messinger, Administrative Support Sr. in Professional and Continuing Education (PACE)
Please join us in thanking Wendy and Rachel, who have graciously accepted to serve as institutional co-leads for the project.
We are committed to providing you with the support and resources needed to transition to Brightspace. In fact, professional project management services will be retained to support this important large-scale project. Over the summer, we will be preparing to introduce you to Brightspace in the fall. When the semester begins, we’ll host workshops to get you started, provide a “sandbox” so that you can test drive Brightspace, and be available for consultations to address your questions.
We remain excited about the features Brightspace offers and the way in which its use can be scaled for novices, “power users,” and everyone in between. Brightspace exceeds requirements in many areas, including:
- User interface, including mobile features for faculty and students
- Analytics, reporting, and learning outcomes assessment Technical infrastructure and integration with other systems, such as MS Teams
- Support for a robust non-credit portfolio
We will continue to seek feedback from our stakeholder groups, such as the Faculty Senate Educational Resource and Technology Committee and Student Government Association, as the project moves along, and we will be looking for early adopters to test the system as we work with the vendor to fine tune the course-migration process. We will keep the entire campus community informed about the Brightspace rollout.
Please visit UVM’s Brightspace website to stay up-to-date and to sign up to be an early adopter.
Many thanks,
Simeon Ananou, Chief Information Officer
Jim Vigoreaux, Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs
March 1, 2022
Dear Faculty, Staff, and Students,
We are pleased to share some important updates about the Request For Proposal (RFP) that was issued in fall 2021 at the request of Enterprise Technology Services and the Office of the Provost. The request was for information about the cost and technical requirements for the planning, implementing, and ongoing support for a Learning Management System (LMS). For background information on why we need to move from our current LMS, Blackboard, please see our LMS Evaluation website.
As you might recall from our last update on November 17, 2021, Desire2Learn (D2L) proposed their Brightspace platform and Instructure proposed their Canvas platform. Each vendor submitted a proposal that met the submission requirements, and the LMS Review Coordinating Committee performed an initial evaluation to conclude that each one of the two vendors did meet the minimum requirements to warrant consideration as a semi-finalist. During November, these vendors demonstrated their LMS platforms to the campus community. The LMS Coordinating Committee then enlisted additional stakeholders (e.g., staff from Enterprise Technology Services, Office of Institutional Research, Human Resources, Career Services, and Professional and Continuing Education; UVM Extension faculty and faculty associated with the Center for Teaching and Learning) to conduct a thorough and detailed analysis of each platform, using vendors’ demonstrations, written responses, and conversations with vendors’ references.
As a result of that analysis, the Committee recommends that we award the RFP to D2L for their Brightspace LMS platform. Subsequently, the UVM Board of Trustees passed a resolution this afternoon authorizing us to proceed with negotiations until a fully executed contract is in place with Desire2Learn. We are excited about the features Brightspace offers and the way in which its use can be scaled for novices, “power users,” and everyone in between. Brightspace exceeds requirements in many areas, including:
- User interface features for faculty and students
- Analytics, reporting, and learning outcomes assessment
- Technical infrastructure and integration with other systems, such as MS Teams
- Support for a robust non-credit portfolio
While we are excited about the possibilities Brightspace holds for improving faculty and students’ experiences with the LMS, we also realize that leaving Blackboard is a significant change, impacting the demands on your time and how you do your work. Given the magnitude of this change, we are committed to providing institutional solutions to minimize your workload, and resources to support learning the new interface.
This decision to join the D2L community is really the beginning—there are many more important decisions to make and work to do. Once a fully executed contract is in place, the next step is to convene a Brightspace Transition Team, comprised of faculty and staff representatives. This team will work closely with D2L to develop an implementation plan and project timeline. We know that this announcement may generate questions, and in the next few weeks we will share with you the preliminary transition plan—including milestone dates, and concluding with a complete migration from Blackboard prior to fall 2023 semester—as soon as the plan is finalized. While implementing a new LMS will involve change in technologies, moving existing courses to a new LMS, and a new user interface, it is also an exciting opportunity to imagine new possibilities to transform teaching and learning. We know the stakes are high and we are committed to providing you with the support and resources needed to transition to Brightspace.
We’ve seen how supportive the UVM community has been in other significant transitions. During the Brightspace implementation, we will continue to seek feedback from our stakeholder groups, such as the Faculty Senate Educational Resource and Technology Committee. We will be looking for early adopters to test the system, as we work with the vendor in migrating course spaces and developing training and supporting documentation. We are confident that, with your patience and participation, our transition to Brightspace will be successful.
Please join us in thanking the members of the LMS Review Coordinating Committee, who have played a critical role in bringing this RFP process to a successful conclusion:
Jennifer Dickinson, Vice Provost for Academic Affairs
Laurie Gelles, Educational Technology Team Lead, Larner College of Medicine
Justin Henry, UVM Blackboard Administrator
Jill Jemison, Assistant Dean for Technology/CIO, Larner College of Medicine
Alex Messinger, Manager, Distance Education and Information Systems, PACE; Committee Co-Chair
Jane Okech, Professor of Counselor Education / CESS Associate Dean for Academic and Faculty Affairs
Helen Read, Chair, Educational Research and Technology Committee, Faculty Senate; Senior Lecturer, Department of Mathematics and Statistics
Julia Russell, Associate Chief Information Officer
Rachel Seremeth, Director, Enterprise Application Systems & Database Administration
Wendy Verrei-Berenback, Assistant Director, Center for Teaching and Learning; Committee Co-Chair
Rory Waterman, Associate Dean, College of Arts and Sciences
Aidan Fleming, UVM Student/SGA representative
Sarah Wood, UVM Student/SGA representative
Sincerely,
Simeon Ananou, Chief Information Officer
Jim Vigoreaux, Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs
November 17, 2021
Dear Faculty, Staff, and Students,
We are writing to let you know about the next steps in the important process to select UVM’s next Learning Management System (LMS). We are encouraged by the community’s participation in the vendor demonstrations held Oct 25th –Nov 5th. We appreciate the thoughtful questions many of you posed during the demonstrations and the feedback you have submitted.
If you were unable to attend a session, you will be able to view all the session recordings and submit feedback until December 1st, 2021. Access to these recordings and the feedback surveys are available on the LMS Evaluation blog site.
The LMS Coordinating Committee will continue their review of the two options, D2L/Brightspace and Instructure/Canvas until the beginning of spring 2022 semester. The Committee will be interviewing references (other institutions who use Brightspace and Canvas), reviewing documentation, and analyzing survey data. The final choice will be vetted by Enterprise Technology Services to determine the technical compatibility of each LMS to current institutional systems (e.g., Banner, Blue course evaluation, MS Teams) and to the institution’s technology standards. At the end of their analysis, the committee will submit their recommendation to the Chief Information Officer and the Provost’s Office. Executive leadership will then negotiate the terms of the relationship with our new vendor partner and will announce the new LMS after signing the contract.
Our obligation to maintain confidentiality about proprietary LMS information and contract negotiations limits what we can share with the UVM community. While you may not hear any updates until the spring semester, be assured that we are working to find an LMS solution that will best serve the needs of our community.
Thank you in advance for your patience and please contact us if you have any questions.
Jim Vigoreaux, Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs
Simeon Ananou, Chief Information Officer
October 21, 2021
Dear Faculty, Staff, and Students,
We are writing about the next steps in UVM’s selection of a new Learning Management System (LMS). As UVM’s contract with Blackboard ends in September 2023, we needed to initiate a Request for Proposals (RFP) process. We have received proposals from two vendors: Instructure (Canvas) and D2L (Brightspace). Blackboard was invited to participate, but they did not submit a proposal. Therefore, according to the rules of the RFP process, Blackboard cannot be considered.
We encourage each of you to attend the below presentations for each vendor. All are welcome at any of these sessions.
D2L (Brightspace)
- FACULTY sessions: Oct 29, 8:30 – 10:30 am; 2:15 – 4:15 pm (same session offered two times)
- STUDENT session: Oct 27, 1:00- 2:30 pm
Instructure (Canvas)
- FACULTY sessions: Nov 3, 8:30 – 10:30 am; Nov 5, 2:15 – 4:15 pm (same session offered two times)
- STUDENT session: Nov 3, 1:00 -2:30 pm
Note: Staff are invited to attend any session of interest.
MS Teams’ meeting links to access these demonstrations are now listed at https://go.uvm.edu/lms-rfp (restricted by UVM NetID and password).
During each session, the vendor will respond to prompts that address specific LMS functions of interest to faculty and students. Attendees can also ask their own questions towards the end of each session.
Vendor presentations will be recorded (accessible via UVM netid). We would appreciate your feedback, and will provide a link to a survey during each session.
Selecting a new LMS vendor is significant – the outcome will impact our community for years to come. We know that many are concerned about leaving Blackboard and realize the time and effort involved in learning and using a new system. We are committed to providing support to the entire UVM community as we transition to a new LMS.
Thank you in advance for your engagement in this process.
Jim Vigoreaux, Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs
Simeon Ananou, Chief Information Officer
October 12, 2021
Dear UVM Community,
The LMS RFP Coordinating Committee and our colleagues have accomplished a great deal since the last update in May 2021. Over the summer, the committee synthesized information collected from faculty focus groups, campus surveys, and observations from the testing in “sandbox” course spaces provided by major LMS vendors (Canvas, Brightspace/Desire to Learn, and Blackboard Ultra). This feedback informed the writing of a comprehensive specifications list, the backbone of the Request for Proposals. Vendors were invited to submit proposals in August, with the due date of September 15th.
UVM received two proposals: Instructure (Canvas) and D2L (Brightspace). Blackboard was invited to respond but chose not to. The vendors will be conducting presentations (virtually via MS Teams):
D2L (Brightspace) Student session: Oct 27, 1:00- 2:30 pm Faculty sessions: Oct 29, 8:30 – 10:30 am; 2:15 – 4:15 pm (same session offered two times)
Instructure (Canvas) Faculty sessions: Nov 3, 8:30 – 10:30 am; Nov 5, 2:15 – 4:15 pm (same session offered two times) Student session: Nov 3, 1:00 -2:30 pm
Note: Staff are invited to attend any session of interest.
We recognize that there is a wide variety of stakeholders, so vendors will prepare multiple presentations addressing the specific needs that surfaced in feedback from constituency groups (i.e., faculty/academic staff, students, campus leadership, and noncredit). During each session, the vendor will be asked to respond to specific prompts that represent UVM’s unique needs. Participants will also be able to ask their own questions towards the end of each session.
Vendor presentations will be recorded (accessible via UVM netid) to encourage as many people as possible to learn about the available options. You will be able to provide feedback (via a survey form) to let us know your impressions of each LMS.
Selecting an LMS vendor is a significant decision – the outcome will impact our community for years to come. The Coordinating Committee has received valuable feedback that shaped what was ultimately included in the RFP. We encourage the UVM community to stay engaged in the selection process by attending the vendor demonstration stations and providing feedback that will inform the University decision-making.
Links to access these demonstrations will be listed on this web page, restricted by UVM netid and password, prior to the times listed above.
Simeon Ananou, Chief Information Officer
Jim Vigoreaux, Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs
May 7, 2021
Following our March 18 communication, and the launch of the LMS Evaluation at UVM website, we are writing to provide a further update on the review process.
The LMS Review Committee has been gathering input from the campus community through several channels during the first phase of the RFP process. The goal of this phase is to identify the needs of the campus community for teaching in a digital environment. The committee is documenting needs for the future and evaluating LMS products on how they can not only meet the most common teaching needs but also connect to other campus technology resources.
Here is a summary of the committee’s activity this semester:
- Faculty survey: Faculty teaching credit-bearing courses and non-credit instructors have submitted over 180 responses to a survey designed to gather specific feedback on criteria that differentiate some of the major LMS products. The major themes thus far have been:
- Prioritizing the mobile experience for both students and faculty.
- Ensuring that any transition is as easy as possible for instructors, especially for those who have invested time in creating question banks for tests.
- Student input: Two undergraduate student representatives have joined the core committee and provide a crucial perspective in this process. Managing the calendar of assignments across multiple courses is a primary concern.
- Faculty focus groups: The committee has been working with the associate deans of each college to schedule focus groups during the month of May. The goal of these focus groups is to collect more nuanced feedback from faculty about what is important to them in an LMS. The committee received feedback from the Faculty Senate’s Educational & Research Technologies Committee (ERTC) subcommittee and the Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) Faculty Associates that helped shape the types of questions to be asked. There are currently two focus groups scheduled. If you are interested in participating in a focus group, please contact your associate dean.
- Sandbox testing: There is work underway to explore features in Canvas, BrightSpace D2L, and Blackboard Ultra. A weekly ‘charrette’ group has been meeting to understand and experiment with different features. While the RFP invites all bidders, these three systems have been sought out for a demo environment because of the market share that they hold within higher education.
- Feature list: The committee is adding to, combining, and refining a list of over 100 features that should be present in the next LMS. This list will be prioritized into must-haves vs nice-to-haves.
- Case scenarios: The committee has begun writing descriptions of several shared challenges that we currently face with the LMS. The vendors selected to demonstrate their products will be asked to prepare a response to these scenarios when they present to the campus community in the fall.
- General feedback: Over 55 faculty and students have submitted comments to the committee highlighting what is important to them in this process. You may submit general feedback at any time. The committee welcomes participation from all members of the university community.
Please feel free to contact any member of the coordinating committee with input. We will provide another update this summer.
Simeon Ananou, Chief Information Officer
Jim Vigoreaux, Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs