November 15, 2002. CourseWorks@Columbia, the University's course management system, less than a year old, is now in use by over 1,000 courses this semester. The adoption of CourseWorks has been surprisingly strong, surpassing goals set by the CourseWorks team. In addition, students have also embraced the system with over 11,000 students accessing the system this semester.

New features and bug fixes continue to improve the environment. "It is with the help of our faculty users that we fine tune the system. The faculty has been great at providing us feedback for improvements," commented Dan Beeby, who spearheads CCNMTL support for CourseWorks.

Recent features added to the system include Third Space, a CCNMTL-created application that allows instructors and students to "quote" and comment on video and audio materials. Other new features include competency tracking tools used at the Health Sciences campus to reinforce student learning goals and a course migration option for easily moving course content from semester to semester.

CCNMTL CourseWorks workshops have been well-attended this semester. The workshops encourage faculty to move beyond the rote creation of HTML pages, enabling instructors to discuss features of CourseWorks to meet their educational goals.