National University of Holistic Education - Implementation of Learning Management System

During the past two decades, many educational institutions have implemented or are in the process of implementing webbased Learning Management Systems (LMS) to enhance learning. In early 2013, National University of Holistic Education (NUHE) decided to implement its own LMS with the help of open source software called BLACKBOARD.Most new technologies, though useful, are often complicated. Hence, successful implementation of new technologies in any organisation presents several challenges for the top management.

At a meeting on January 17, 2015, Dr Keshav Gupta, Chair of NUHE's IT division and the Project Director of the NUHE's LMS project, made a presentation about the status of the university's LMS. He presented the growth data ­ department-wise enrolment of faculty, staff and student users of the university's LMS system and concluded that the university has been successful in LMS implementation. While few Senate members supported his claim, majority of them openly disagreed and tagged LMS as a complete failure. The two sides supported their stands by sharing their experiences and those echoed by various stakeholders in the course of their informal talks.

However, Dr Keshav Gupta now faced a dilemma as majority of the members of the university's Academic Senate tagged the implementation of LMS as a failure while his departmental data revealed otherwise.

Dr Keshav Gupta had to seek answers to many questions ­ Did NUHE create a strategic vision and subsequent goals for the LMS implementation?
Were decisions regarding the change forced on the stakeholders rather than emerge from consensus?
Were all the benefits of the system explained and illustrated to the various stakeholders? Did the management try to identify and eliminate any apprehensions that the stakeholders may have had towards the LMS?

PROF MANOJ KUMAR, Faculty Member, FLAME School of Business, FLAME University, Pune

PROF NIRAJ MANKAD, Faculty Member, FLAME School of Business, FLAME University, Pune

BASUDHARA CHOUDHURI, Student, FLAME School of Liberal Education, FLAME University, Pune

(Source: http://epaperbeta.timesofindia.com/Article.aspx?eid=31818&articlexml=National-University-of-Holistic-Education-Implementation-of-Learning-15122015014039)