CLE Hosting
Statewide Collective Action:
Shared eLearning Services in Ohio
Cable T. Green
Director of Technology
Ohio Learning Network
Shared Services Vision v.1
The Ohio Digital Commons for Education (ODCE)
will provide Ohio institutions with reasonably priced
access to hosted, enterprise level collaboration and
learning environments (CLE) including faculty and
admin training, an integrated institutional & learning
object repository within which students and faculty
may archive and access digital content, and single
sign-on to these services for all Ohio faculty, staff,
and students.
Shared Services: The Big Picture
The ODCE asks “What are the mission critical
eLearning services most Ohio institutions are running
or plan to run in the next 2-3 years?”
Those services become candidates for shared services
hosting.
Current list includes: CLEs (WebCT & Bb), institutional
& learning object repositories, ePortfolios, and
Shibboleth (for SSO).
 Exploring new solutions in OLN’s Open Source Pilot
Ohio Digital Commons for Education
Technology Initiatives Grant Project
 Enterprise CLE Hosting
 The ODCE has partnered with Kent State University to provide WebCT Vista
(v.3.x) hosting and with the University of Cincinnati to host Blackboard Learning
System (v.6.x). = Ohio Learning Network
 Digital Resource Commons (DRC)
 A digital content repository will extend OhioLINK's existing content distribution
capabilities by providing tight integration with the hosted CLE environments.
= OhioLINK
 Federated Authentication (Shibboleth)
 OSC is experimenting with Shibboleth to provide a federated authentication service
between CLE hosting, OhioLINK's DRC services, and existing authentication systems in use
on Ohio campuses.
= Ohio Supercomputer Center
CLE Hosting Project Overview:
Statement of the Problem
Over 110 institutions of higher education in Ohio
with over 585,000 students.
Nearly all of these campuses require CLE hosting
and associated system administration, faculty
training, digital content repositories, and
authentication to online resources.
Why Collaborate?
 Many institutions choose not to develop (or lack) the
resources and staff expertise to deliver robust collaboration
and learning environments (CLE) and content repository
services as a 24x7 enterprise, with sufficient server capacity
and disaster recovery capabilities to maintain these resource
intensive services.
 But all require CLE services – with associated system administration,
faculty training and support, digital content repositories and so on.
 Left to the independent efforts of each Ohio higher education
institution, it is not likely that a robust shared infrastructure
across institutions will develop, but rather basic, duplicative
services will be created with limited State funds.
Timing is Right for Shared Services
Decreasing State budgets have prompted calls for
increased inter-institutional collaboration (e.g., Ohio
Governor’s Commission on Higher Education and the
Economy): www.chee.ohio.gov
Calls for “shared services”
Educational technology has become mission critical
CLE is growing in complexity, cost, and importance
Outsourcing has become less alien to higher education
Timing is Right for Shared Services
CLE is a better candidate for shared services than
legacy administrative systems
Third Frontier Network: 1,600 miles of fiber
backbone to connect higher education institutions
and P-12 schools
Ohio Commons, OBR, Kent State, and UC eager to
LEAD in this new K-20 eLearning space
CLE Hosting Project Phases
Phase 1: Pilot Two & Four Year Public & Private
Institutions of Higher Education
Phase 2: Add Additional Institutions in:
 FY07 (August 2006) & FY08 (August 2007)
Phase 3: K-20: Add K-12?
 Example = UC and Catholic Archdiocese
CLE Hosting Goals
 Logistical
 Enable institutions to move into enterprise level CLE
hosting and services.
 Intellectual
 Facilitate collaboration, sharing, and community building
around content and services.
 Leverage existing CLE infrastructure and services in
Ohio.
CLE Hosting Goals
 Financial  Save Money
License Savings (Bb = X%; WebCT = X%)
Hosting and Support Savings
Reduced costs by leveraging shared infrastructure
OLN $$$ to reduce overall costs
Services Surrounding CLE Hosting
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License negotiation (OLN)
Hardware, Software , Backup, Updates (Hosts)
Migration & Implementation Services (Vendors)
Faculty and System Administration Training (Hosts)
Bb and WebCT Councils
 Share best practices & training materials
 Meet monthly online
Project Status?
Phase 1: Pilot Running Now
 Edison Community College = Enterprise Bb launched in August ’04.
 Started with 22 courses / 541 students, now 244 courses, over 4640 students
 FULL Datatel integration.
 Marion Technical College = Enterprise Bb launched in September ’04.
 Started with 70 courses / 1300 students, now 615 courses, over 3550 students
 Capital University = Enterprise Bb launched in June ’05
 In Bb hosting discussions with one small & two large Community
Colleges
 Rio Grande Community College = WebCT Vista launched in August ‘04
 Started with 232 courses / 1842 users, now 989 course sections, over 4300 users
 Completely off WebCT CE by Spring / Summer ‘06
 Youngstown State University = WebCT Vista piloted since October ’04
 Now 117 course sections, over 950 students
 Completely off WebCT CE by Spring / Summer ‘06
Lessons Learned
 The climate is ripe and right for collaboration
 It’s about institutions sharing services and expertise, leveraging for a
greater common good
 Drawing on others’ expertise to focus on their core competencies and
mission
 CLE is a relatively new system/service – why ramp up for it?
 A better service/product – ensuring the latest releases, features, etc.
 Invite everyone to the party
 CLE consolidation is a leadership opportunity
 Emphasizing long-term project commitment
 Keep the focus on the project goals
Lessons Learned
 Partnership – not a business relationship, but run like
a business
 Vendors are willing to partner with good partners
 Compromise, flexibility, patience, and shared decision making
 Transparency with successes and issues
 It can work, on time, with excellent client satisfaction.
 Higher Education will spend money for long term
savings and improved services
 But there are issues – trust, ownership -- some institutions will not
come even if it’s FREE.
Why Some Institutions did NOT Join
 Perceived Loss of Control
 Clients retain FULL Control
 Branding (URL, colors, logos, etc.)
 System administration over virtual installation
 Authentication and SIS integration
 “We can do it better, cheaper in-house.”
 Run a TCO of local vs. hosted technical capabilities,
support, auxiliary services, and costs.
 Then compare the two.
Why Some Institutions did NOT Join
 “I’ll loose my job”
 Or might skilled staff be re-tasked to work on other high
priority IT projects?
 What are the opportunity costs of not moving to shared
services?
 Wrong Combination of Folks at the Table
 Get the right people on the team
 Open-minded, experienced, looking toward the future
 Project leaders involved in ALL negotiations
 Similar “levels” of players in all discussions
How much does it Cost?
(Many Factors: Some Info Pending)
 License Costs
 MiCTA RFP results Dec ‘05
 OLN will renegotiate with vendors in WI ‘06
 Current license fees used to ball-park for planning purposes
 Hosting Costs & Service Level Agreements
 Details in presentations
 Oracle costs (in negotiations) – possible move to MS SQL
 Integration Costs (optional)
 WebCT & Bb services teams
 UC & KSU will discuss basic integration services included with hosting
 OLN’s Roles
 Banker, Negotiator (drive down costs), Project Manger, & Mediator
Cost Model
+ Hosting Fees
+ License
+ Integration Costs (optional)
-----------------Sub-Total
- OLN Support
-----------------Total CLE Hosting Costs
Timeline for Joining CLE Hosting
 Fall ‘05
 Informal discussions with OLN, Host, Vendor
 Presentations at your institutions
 Winter ‘06
 All Costs (Licenses and Oracle) known
 MiCTA RFP results
• OLN renegotiates contracts with vendors
 New clients make decision to move to CLE Hosting
 Sign license agreements and SLA
 Spring / Summer ’06
 Testing, migrate courses, and faculty & admin training
 Fall ’06
 Full production in Hosted CLE
Questions?
For more information contact:
Cable Green
Director of Technology
Ohio Learning Network
[email protected] / 614-995-3240