UMW is a nice school, but I’ll be the first to admit we are not the center of the action in most ways. That said, in terms of the web stuff, I think we are just as impressive as the big boys, maybe more. And I say this as someone who routinely benefits from DTLT‘s awesomeness. Why do we stand out? One reason, I think, is that we’ve got a buffet instead of a prix fixe menu.
At most institutions, you buy into the CMS or you are left out in the cold. If you like blackboard, canvas, or whatever other tools are available, great! But if you don’t (like me) then you’re on your own. So it’s in or out, or, to go back to my prix fixe metaphor, you either love shrimp scampi or… You’ll still be eating shrimp scampi (or nothing at all).
But at UMW, I can choose to have a ton of arugula and quality mozzarella instead, bypass the shrimp, and go straight for the carpaccio.* DTLT allows me to not use canvas, our CMS, but still benefit from a million tools they have put at profs’ disposal.
For instance, they set up the blog aggregator for my Paris class. I love this thing: it keeps all my students’ blogs in one place, making for easy commenting and grading. They also set up the system for my scavenger hunt which will be held in Paris later in the summer. (And no, you can’t see it yet. It’ll be the star of another post) All I had to do was explain what I wanted, what had not worked last year (seriously, it deserved an #epicfail) and voila! Now I have a system that will make it easier on the students and on me, and will be ready for the next trip, too.
I can just imagine how this would have worked at another school. One scenario: “you don’t use the CMS? Then figure this out yourself.” Another: “let’s figure out how to make the CMS do this.” This second option would actually be WORSE. Some things you can’t shoehorn to work well together. It’s like garlic and chocolate. I’m not saying Canvas can’t handle photos, but I would imagine that it would be a very convoluted solution to have 40+ photos from different teams to be accessible on a single screen for easy comparison.
All this to say that I’ve been utterly spoiled by DTLT. So thanks, guys. You deserve an epic poem but I’m not good at the rhyming. So instead:
Oh, DTLT
You make the tech stuff easy
Jealous profs abound
* On second thought, buffet carpaccio sounds like a really, really bad idea. Maybe I’ll just go straight to the tiramisù.
Accolades for DTLT are all well-deserved. UMW has it so good — the stuff happening there is testament to the power of people vs. systems, thinking vs. reacting. While the rest of the world debates LMS’s and MOOCs, DTLT is simply making technology work for teaching and learning, not the other way around. Everything I learned that is worthwhile in higher education IT I learned from DTLT.
Thanks for the kind words, but as you know all to weel, it’s a two way street. We can;t do the stuff we love to do, experiment with faculty, if we didn’t have such awesome, engaged faculty as you (and even Greenlaw 🙂 ). So here is an ode right back atchya:
The UMW faculty, they teach 4/4,
And labor for love with an experimental galore.
But when it comes to the LMS, It’s nevermore, nevermore
They rock the open web, and innovation abounds
Augmenting learning with tech continually astounds
What’s more, I am one of those on the outside that wants to see this scavenger hunt, I am now very intrigued!
Absolutely!