UG staff members are getting a first glimpse of Brightspace, the new learning management system which will replace Nestor in September. The feedback so far: it works, it’s easy and it looks modern.
Auke Plantinga, associate professor at the Faculty of Economics and Business, is testing Brightspace and feels ‘it is more intuitive than the previous system’. ‘I’m running a course on it and it works okay. It’s easy and looks very nice. I think in the end it will be an improvement for everybody.’
Currently, eighteen courses have been implemented on the system, divided over all the faculties. A hundred teaching assistants have been trained in the use of Brightspace and are ready to support teachers when the system is scaled up. Faculty secretaries, 150 in total, have also had training.
Annemiek Nijp, secretary at the Faculty of Arts, thought it was ‘quite easy to use, mostly because it was very similar to Nestor.’ However, she did notice one change: ‘It looks more modern, more up-to-date than Nestor.’
Digital test
Project manager Michiel van Geloven is satisfied with the process so far. ‘We’ve had our first evaluation meeting and people gave positive feedback both on Brightspace and the support they receive’, he says.
His team is working on a joint course template, to make sure that all courses have the same structure on Brightspace.
In April, 130 more courses should be working on Brightspace. At the end of May, the first digital test will be run on the new system. ‘That will be an important step, as we now rely on Blackboard for digital testing’, says Van Geloven.
Brightspace should be up and running by September.