Web Campus:
Outages plague students and faculty alike
Luara Schwendeman
Issue date: 10/3/02 Section: News
Being first is never easy. Fairleigh Dickinson University has received national recognition for being the first college in the United States to require every undergraduate student to take one online course per year. However, problems with a contracted Internet server are causing headaches for students and faculty alike.
These Internet courses are taught on a web campus using a software program called Blackboard. Professors and students communicate on a discussion board, while assignments are researched and submitted online.
This program has allowed the university to develop a diverse and global virtual faculty. Professors include a senior political columnist in India and an economics professor from Malaysia. According to Dr. Michael Sperling, the Associate Provost of Interdisciplinary, Distributed and Global Learning, FDU will have another 70 or 80 professors from around the world in a couple of years as a way to educate students as world citizens.
These complicated online programs do have a downside, however. There have been multiple occasions during the past few weeks when students have not been able to access their courses.
Frustrated students have been overheard asking, "How are we supposed to take an online course if we can't even get online?"
There have been problems both with the databases and with the server identifying people. "Obviously it doesn't matter if it's the server or a problem with logging in. If you can't get in, you can't get in and that's terrible," states Sperling, who understands that these problems are "unacceptable."
Collegis is the outside organization that is hosting the university's Blackboard program. The problems have been occurring at the Collegis site, rather than on campus. "We've been all over Collegis on this. They've put their technical teams on this and they're working really hard," explains Sperling, who also noted that the university is reevaluating the contract with this company and looking at other alternatives.
So how much longer will students and professors have to fight to get into their classrooms? "I'm hopeful within another week or two we will be able to get past these server problems," Sperling predicted.
It is suggested that students print out some of the reading material so that they have something to work with during the times that the server is down. Also, assignments should be submitted to professors through e-mail, rather than through the program's Drop Box. The most important thing for students to remember is not to wait until a few hours before the assignment is due to work on it. Plan ahead, Blackboard may not!
Students can learn more about FDU's Web Campus by going to the University's global education site at http://www.globaleducation.edu.
These Internet courses are taught on a web campus using a software program called Blackboard. Professors and students communicate on a discussion board, while assignments are researched and submitted online.
This program has allowed the university to develop a diverse and global virtual faculty. Professors include a senior political columnist in India and an economics professor from Malaysia. According to Dr. Michael Sperling, the Associate Provost of Interdisciplinary, Distributed and Global Learning, FDU will have another 70 or 80 professors from around the world in a couple of years as a way to educate students as world citizens.
These complicated online programs do have a downside, however. There have been multiple occasions during the past few weeks when students have not been able to access their courses.
Frustrated students have been overheard asking, "How are we supposed to take an online course if we can't even get online?"
There have been problems both with the databases and with the server identifying people. "Obviously it doesn't matter if it's the server or a problem with logging in. If you can't get in, you can't get in and that's terrible," states Sperling, who understands that these problems are "unacceptable."
Collegis is the outside organization that is hosting the university's Blackboard program. The problems have been occurring at the Collegis site, rather than on campus. "We've been all over Collegis on this. They've put their technical teams on this and they're working really hard," explains Sperling, who also noted that the university is reevaluating the contract with this company and looking at other alternatives.
So how much longer will students and professors have to fight to get into their classrooms? "I'm hopeful within another week or two we will be able to get past these server problems," Sperling predicted.
It is suggested that students print out some of the reading material so that they have something to work with during the times that the server is down. Also, assignments should be submitted to professors through e-mail, rather than through the program's Drop Box. The most important thing for students to remember is not to wait until a few hours before the assignment is due to work on it. Plan ahead, Blackboard may not!
Students can learn more about FDU's Web Campus by going to the University's global education site at http://www.globaleducation.edu.