Columbia is accelerating the move to Sakai, an open-source learning management system (LMS), as the successor to CourseWorks/Prometheus. Many departments and schools have experimented with Sakai during a lengthy pilot period that began in 2007. This fall will begin a concerted move that is expected to take three to four semesters as the original CourseWorks software is phased out.

The new Sakai environment will be called New CourseWorks (powered by Sakai) and this fall it will be host to approximate 800 courses or one quarter of total number of courses currently offered in CourseWorks.

CCNMTL will be assisting faculty with the transition in a number of ways: introductory workshops, new documentation and screencasts, one-on-one sessions in the Faculty Support Lab, and custom departmental workshops.

This transition, originally approved by the Trustees in 2008, but delayed due to funding issues, will begin a much anticipated move away from the aging CourseWorks/Prometheus environment, originally installed in 2002.

Sakai is a product of the Sakai Project, a global community that exists to enhance teaching, learning, and research, and comes together to define needs of academic users, create software tools, share best practices and pool knowledge and resources in support of this goal.

See also from EnhancED: 7 Things You Should Know About LMS Evaluation