Europe

Quick Take: Blackboard Catalyst Award winner initiative E-Learning Pioneers helped bring knowledge to female students through online learning tools in Saudi Arabia.

Quick take: Using embedded videos provides global, full-time access to content and enhances the student experience. Explore how lecture videos have been implemented at the University of Southampton in the UK.

Quick Take: By providing an adequate virtual learning environment and valuable online resources, the University of Southampton manages to overcome disparities in learning experiences within clinical placements.

Quick Take: Learn more about how the University of Southampton is engaging with learners to receive feedback and disseminate best practices to improve the learning environment.

Quick Take: Change is hard, but with a unique training approach, Arab National Bank (ANB) was able to improve employees’ learning experience with the use of innovative tools.

Quick take: As businesses continue to face ongoing challenges, finding the right strategy for employee learning and development is crucial. A specialist shares her views on how corporate universities can successfully fulfill this role supported by online learning.

Quick take: At Glasgow Caledonian University, academic staff are encouraged to explore new possibilities in teaching, learning and research through the use of technology.

Quick Take: See how Blackboard Learn is supporting the world’s first and only fully Flipped Learning university and the first outcomes of their innovative approach.

Quick Take: Keeping students from dropping out depends on a retention strategy that is based on understanding why they are choosing to leave school in the first place.

Quick Take: Learning analytics is going global. Read more about how Charles Sturt University (Australia), the University of Windsor (Canada) and the University of Groningen (Netherlands) are putting it into practice.

“If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it” – Peter Drucker Just over 20 years ago, Blackboard set out to solve the most critical challenges of education institutions. Blackboard founders recognized the impact that the Internet could have on…

Quick take: The first institution to adopt Blackboard Predict in the European Union is increasing student retention with predictive analytics combined with a longitudinal, long-term approach.

Read the essentials or go deeper In this special: Inclusive education and digital access: Is your institution on top of it? Highlights from Blackboard’s Global Accessibility Awareness Day.

Quick take: University of Derby wants to create a culture of inclusive practice to benefit all learners. The right technology can support that by automating a few steps along the way.

Quick Take: The Exemplary Course Program (ECP) allows Blackboard clients to examine their courses’ design, collaboration and interaction, assessment, and learner support characteristics, and to share insights with other community members through peer review.

Quick Take: By keeping systems testing to the bare minimum, Keele University deploys security fixes faster and keeps up with the latest software developments.

Zurich, Switzerland E-Learn spoke with the organizing team of Moodle DACH/Moodle DevCamp 18 to find out what event-goers can expect in the upcoming second edition. The conference brings together Moodle users, administrators, teachers, developers and pedagogues working in university environments…

Quick Take: Looking for a multicultural experience when studying abroad? One of the three Benelux countries might be the right choice for you.

Quick Take: To solve key organizational challenges, companies depend on employees to have the right tools and training to be avid problem solvers. Corporate universities are a great resource companies have been implementing to ensure employees are motivated and stay ahead of the game.

Quick take: As markets, jobs and activities evolve, new skills become needed. Companies will have to work in collaboration with individuals and education institutions in order to develop these capabilities.

Quick take: The BITS Program started seven years ago and now it is expanding to offer international clients the opportunity to engage in webinars focused on higher education best practices.

Quick Take: How can previous work experience within a university setting help consultants assist educational institutions solve key challenges? Five Blackboard consultants share their experiences.

Quick Take: An efficient way to grade exams, provide authentic assessment, and improved feedback: this is what digital exams are all about, and more.

At Blackboard, we recognize that an LMS is simply not enough to solve your most critical challenges.  As we look to the future, we are focused on developing a comprehensive, digital learning environment aimed at helping institutions to solve their…

Quick Take: Do you know about UDL? Universal Design for Learning is an approach to curriculum that gives students equal opportunities to learn and succeed.

Every time I sit down with an instructor to talk about the rollout of a new course, I’m amazed by how many different work streams must come together to launch a new course. All of this happens before the course…

Quick Take: Using technology to enable staff and students to be alignment between staff and students and achievement of outstanding performance results. With this approach, City of Westminster College promotes learner engagement, enhances the learning experience and motivates staff with a culture of continuous improvement.

Since the first learning analytics conference, held in Canada in 2011,1 the field has been developing rapidly. Some of the trending areas in research are teacher and learner dashboards, predictive analytics and automatic feedback. There is also rising use of…

Quick take: Adopting learning analytics strategies may come with some ethical and legal concerns. Educational institutions should be prepared to deal these appropriately.

Quick Take: France is known for welcoming international students to their high standard universities and Grandes Écoles. Now, the government is investing more each year in order to continue providing a remarkable educational experience for French students as well.

Quick Take: Large-enrollment classes present some challenges to achieve student success. Predictive learning analytics has helped prove to UCEM that its strategy has been working quite successfully.

Assessment plays a major role in education, as a student grading and support mechanism, but also in program improvement. All over the world, there are varying perspectives and approaches, and regions are taking action in different forms of assessment, both…

Paris, France. When implementing a new LMS, solutions need to be simple but also adaptive and open. That is one of the main challenges Eric Briantais faces as the Pedagogical Innovation Director at Paris-Sud University, where the institution’s context and…

Technology has always played a role in education. During the 19th century, it was the chalkboard that changed how teachers interacted in the classroom.1 During the 20th century, the advent of record players, radios, televisions, and eventually computers, led to…

Quick Take: Is your institution student-centered? Investing in a student-focused approach can ensure a better educational experience and increase student engagement. Virtual student services, the use of mobile technologies and cognitive solutions are examples of initiatives that extend beyond campus reach

The concept of student-centered learning (SCL) goes back to 1968 when massive student protests took place against the elitism of universities demanding them to be open for all society. Political recognition of SCL was gained in 2009 through the Leuven/Louvain-la-Neuve…

Despite all of the concerns Brexit has raised for UK’s universities, such as funding issues, the land of hope and glory remains a great choice for students who want to attend some of its most renowned and best-ranked higher education institutions.

Quick Take: Few universities teach their students basic abilities for their future career, such as how to find a job before graduating. Thus, these abilities become purely empirical knowledge.

Portland, Oregon, United States There are more than 15 Laureate International Universities campuses across Europe, imparting courses in 8 languages. This poses numerous challenges when running and maintaining an LMS in different institutions. One challenge is providing support materials to…

Active Blended Learning

Keele, United Kingdom In order for both students and teachers to make the best use of the resources offered by an LMS, not only should educational content be shared within the platform, the user experience should also be considered. This…

Sheffield, England The University of Sheffield, in the County of South Yorkshire, England, is now delivering 5% of its formal examinations online through the Blackboard Learn platform. This developing initiative is slowly transforming the learning environment and continues to engage…

Dubai, United Arab Emirates The Middle East has one of the highest rates of diabetes and obesity, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). To counteract this, the United Arab Emirates’ Government has implemented various initiatives, including among them life-skills…

Leeds, United Kingdom The University of Leeds is moving from a paper-based survey system to an automated one that delivers the questions online. This innovative strategy has made it faster, easier, and cheaper to evaluate the quality of students’ learning…

Maastricht, Netherlands No matter how technology is employed in education, it shouldn’t be introduced without thinking about a delivery method and how the students are going to welcome it. Today, with the amount of tools in both students’ and teacher’s…

Dungannon, Northern Ireland South West College has a presence in the counties of Tyrone and Fermanagh in Northern Ireland with four campuses located in Cookstown, Dungannon, Enniskillen, and Omagh. Over 500 full and part-time staff service 14,000 students and work…

Jeddah, Saudi Arabia The use of digital learning tools is often seen as a good strategy for courses like mathematics, sciences, and languages. Nevertheless, artistic and visual signatures are usually confined to the analog corner. Emile Burnham, Associate Professor for…

London, United Kingdom Education has changed through generations; and with that, professional demands and employment have done the same. Each generation transforms the way they learn, the way they see life, and their future due to the context they live…

Marseille, France Strengthening creativity in students, a critical perspective of situations, and the skill of finding good information and knowing how to summarize it, are some of the objectives of the French institution Kedge Business School. It is a business…

Aarhus, Denmark Through Blackboard Learn tools, such as blogs, students at Aarhus University participate in a rewarding peer feedback exercise that has become a great complement to teaching and learning. For Karen Louise Moller, a special consultant of the Faculty…

Gjøvik and Trondheim, Norway The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) has, since 1st of January 2016 been the biggest university in Norway. However, before that, it was three independent colleges and one university. The Norwegian government decided to…

London, United Kingdom Many tools on the Internet are used without thinking about the social repercussions they might have. Lots of tools are also used without reading the terms and conditions and understanding what they are doing with our data…

Instructional design Amsterdam, Netherlands. Marco D’Alessio is an e-learning designer with over ten years of experience in design and development of complex content. His background is in Instructional Design and Communication Science and he has worked in fields such as…

Northampton, England All institutions have a way of assessing their students on how much progress they have made if they have learned the subject matter and if the objectives of the class have been met. There are many types of…

Arald Den Brader Breda, The Netherlands In 1998, Arald den Braber returned to his alma mater to support the school’s IT unit. Over fifteen years, he would become a unique witness to the evolution of the LMS in the Netherlands,…

Derby, United Kingdom The University of Derby is one of the top ten United Kingdom universities for teaching quality and has been engaging in online learning for over 20 years. Today, more than 3,000 students from over 100 countries study…

Vienna, Austria The modern buildings of the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna, retain over 250 years of tradition in teaching veterinary students. Founded in 1765, Vetmeduni is the only academic educational and research institution in Austria that focuses on the…

Reading, United Kingdom The University of Reading, located in South East England, has been taking giant steps to fully introduce its whole community of academics, lecturers, administrators, support staff and students into the world of technology for teaching and learning…

For Blackboard, nothing is more important than learning. The reason is simple: in today’s global economy, the organizations that are adapting to today’s challenges yet preparing for tomorrow’s will be at the forefront of innovation and growth. A company’s most…

Copenhaguen, Denmark The decision to adopt a digital platform as a new training method promises to bring future graduates closer to the career they want. Copenhagen Business Academy is Denmark’s largest business academy. A few months ago, this academic institution…

Madrid, Spain E-learning has been a world changing industry because it has been able to mold to certain people’s needs and allow them to get an education in conditions that they otherwise couldn’t have. However, in a simple analogy, e-learning…

Lübeck, Germany Since their first appearance, Massive Online Open Courses have helped to make education available to everyone; nevertheless, these are still the early days for MOOCs, in terms of developing their maximum potential. Andreas Wittke, an expert on this…

Coventry, United Kingdom As globalization becomes more and more imminent, languages become a bigger and more important factor in our world. People are learning languages as a means of travel, as a way of communicating with other people, as a…

Dublin, Ireland Moodle may be one of the open source software with the biggest community surrounding it. Hundreds of people who don’t work with Moodle, still contribute towards making Moodle a better tool every day, simply because they love it….

Barcelona, Spain We spoke with Francesc Busquets, Online Services Coordinator and the person in charge of the Agora-Moodle project in the Catalonia Education Department, the body responsible for education policies in the non-university sphere in this autonomous community. How does…

Barcelona, Spain Pompeu Fabra University believes in strong, interactive teaching, and that is why it started working with Blackboard Open LMS, the LMS that  enables it to expand the institution’s learning and performance strategies.

Paris, France E-Learn Magazine presents an interview with Henri Isaac, Vice President of Digital Transformation in the Paris Dauphine University, pioneer in pedagogical innovation and author of a report on Digital University requested by the Ministry of Higher Education and Research….

Helsinki, Finland When Moodlerooms decided to offer MOOCs for Higher Education institutions, the objective was to create an alternative that was reachable by everyone interested in furthering their education with the possibility of having interaction with instructors, peers and other…

Valencia, Spain The 1st Moodle Solutions Forum for Universities and Public Administrations (also known as #itmLE16) was held the last 26th and 27th of May in Valencia, Spain. The event was organized by Pentec – Samoo, with the support of…

London, United Kingdom Oleg Figlin is Vice-President heading the International consultant at Blackboard.  He has held this post for a little over a year, after spending 14 years with another large software company – SAP. His story shows just how…

London, England For over 50 years, The American Institute for Foreign Study (AIFS) has been committed to cross-cultural exchange. Under the guidance of founder Sir Cyril Taylor, AIFS operates as a social enterprise based in Stamford, Connecticut. The organization maintains…

Leeds, England AdaptiVLE CEO and Moodle and Blackboard contributor Lewis Carr is a technology geek with over 12 years’ experience in designing virtual platforms. Companies and education establishments turn to him to make their wishes come true through web development….

Madrid, Spain Blackboard and Moodle recently signed agreement covers 12 countries, strengthening the commitment to this open source community and Moodlerooms customers. Blackboard Inc. and Moodle Pty Ltd.’s relationship first began in 2012 as a result of the acquisition of…

Barcelona, Spain Institutions and teachers find teaching mathematics via online courses a big challenge, due to the complexity of the task and the high drop-out rate. A number of different Moodle-compatible tools therefore exist that can solve these problems. When…

Staffordshire, England Francesco Group is one of the biggest and most reputable hairdressing salons in the United Kingdom. It started out as a family business in 1967 and today has more than 33 salons all over the Midlands, in central…

Arnhem, The Netherlands Bas Brands is a web developer and open source expert, and has been a great freelance developer for the Moodle community. We spoke with him in Holland and he explained for us his expectations and views about…

London, United Kingdom Phillip Miller is the International Vice President of Open Source services at Blackboard. He has worked there and in Moodlerooms, the main Open Source product for education from Blackboard for over 10 years. Phillip works with 1,500 Moodle clients…

London, United Kingdom With a history that dates back 130 years, Middlesex University is an educational institution that arose from multiple colleges and training institutions in North London, England coming together. Today, it is a world-class institution with campuses and partnerships that…

Ipswich, United Kingdom Becoming an independent or self regulated learner is an important part of becoming a more effective learner. The characteristics of a self regulated learner include “their responsiveness to feedback regarding the effectiveness of their learning, and by their…

Madrid, Spain Sergio Vasquez, Learning Innovation Manager of ESCP Europe, tells about his experience as the director and creator of the Executive Masters in International Business (EMIB) for the ESCP School Campus in Madrid. ESCP Europe is the oldest business…