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In the winter and spring of 2006, the Faculty Mentoring Faculty program hosted a Sakai pilot, where in which instructors from various departments tested Sakai and provided their feedback as well as feature requests, provided comments and requested changes or additions. Intrigued by Sakai's features, various instructors have begun using Sakai both in and out of the classroom. As of now, programmers are working to enhance the QuizBuilder and GradeBook so they more accurately reflect the instructors needs'. In addition, the Sakai Community continues to enhance the core Sakai toolset. The timeline for these changes will allow UCD to make Sakai available for an extended pilot in the Fall 2006. Additional functionality in to support of large courses with multiple sections and instructors should be available for testing by Winter Quarter 2007. More detailed information on these developments should be available mid summer midsummer 2006.
What's in it for me?
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- What is Sakai?
Sakai is a sophisticated, easy-to-use, extendable set of course management tools that make it easy for you to organize and collaborate with anyone (students, colleagues, or research partners to name a few), from anywhere in the world where with an internet connection is available. - Who created it?
Sakai has its origins at the University of Indiana and the University of Michigan, where both universities independently began open-source efforts to enhance their course management and collaboration systems. The effective and successful collaboration between these two schools Their work caught the attention of The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Stanford, who soon joined the project, along with the Open Knowledge Initiative and the uPortal consortium. Today over 80 some one hundred institutions of higher education have partnered together for one goal: Sakaiare working together on the project. - Why did they create it?
The answer is simple: cooperation. Previously, institutions of higher education all worked separately, hiring programmers to develop software to suit their specific course management and collaboration needs at any given time. These systems proved useful, though difficult to extend and scale. As a result, institutions found performing much of the same work themselves duplicating others' efforts and rebuilding from scratch, when old approaches proved too limited. With Sakai, universities can join there their efforts to create a single system that is easy to customize, and thus able to keep up with the fast pace of technology. - Why UC Davis is adopting it
The course management tools in MyUCDavis have become increasingly difficult to extend and scale. By combining tapping into the combined resources, dedication, and expertise of the top universities, our campus will have gains the opportunity to transition move up to the next generation of course genration focourse management and collaboration tools. - What's in it for me?
- Instructors: Provide a collaborative learning environment for students that is accessible on and off campus, encourage collaborative learning by allowing students to build publicly editable wikis, encourage critical discourse on discussion boards, keep track of your courses, host virtual office hours from any location with high-speed Internet access.
- Researchers: Network with colleagues, organize data, collaborate on projects, chat in real time, brainstorm solutions on discussion boards, host video conferences, and stream PowerPoint presentations, just to name of few of the possibilities.
- Students: Host Web sites, plan events, share files, form social networks, organize student groups, host study sessions, collaborate on creative projects, create research groups, and more.
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Instructors teaching small classes with a single section , – or who often include group work, research, collaboration, and technology in their curriculum , – are encouraged to begin experimenting with Sakai this fall.
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At this time, Sakai does not adequately handle large classes with multiple sections. Programmers at UC Davis and UC Berkely are working hard to add this functionality. Until then, we recommend you stick with the old MyUCDavis course management tools. To be notified when the tools you need are added, please request to be added to askt to join the sakai-info@ucdavis.edu mailing list.
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Sakai has both a GradeBook and a QuizBuilder; however, at this time both tools are missing lack some functions that instructors may require. For that reason, it is we suggested that instructors use the traditional GradeBook and QuizBuilder within MyUCDavis until all issues are resolved. However if you are new to online quizzing and/ or grading you may wish to start becoming familiar with the new tools as existing features will likely remain while new ones are while GradeBook and QuizBuilder are refined. Plus, other new and interesting tools may be added in the coming months. To be notified when the tools you need are addedavailable, please request to be added to the sakai-info@ucdavis.edu mailing list.
What is the Sakai pilot project and why should I join?
The Pilot Projects pilot projects provide a route for those people interested in Sakai to play a primary role in its construction and release. By practicing with help shape its evolution. By trying the system and offering suggestions, pilot users provide programmers with an invaluable perspective on users needs.
Pilot participants participate in the following these activities:
- Test and closely evaluate new collaboration and learning tools
- Identify suggestions and
- Address any issues encountered
- Prioritize enhancements to suit the system to your needs
- Receive one-on-one technical support from team members , as well as the dedicated and ET Partners.
- Provide recommendations to guide the direction of Sakai development.
If you are interesteed in joining a pilot project or would simply like more information about how you can get involved with Sakai, please send an e-mail to sakai-info@ucdavis.edu.
How do I arrange for a presentation to my department, encouraging them to explore and perhaps adopt Sakai for their own needs?
- The Sakai Program Manager, Kirk Alexander (kdalex@ucdavis.edu) and the Training and Support Coordinator, Nancy Olsen (nsolsen@ucdavis.edu) are both is available to speak with you and members of your department. Please e-mail them him your questions and requests for more information.
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The Faculty Mentoring Faculty Program provides UC givesUC Davis faculty an opportunity a chance to mentor and to learn from other faculty interested in instructional technology. Participants will learn about Sakai, as well as tools other toosl such as Macromedia Breeze.
Have others already tested and used Sakai?
More than 100 Universities universities across the globe have embraced SAKAISakai, including its originators: MIT, Stanford, University of Michigan, and Indiana University. Moreover, many of our campuses, including UC Berkely Berkeley and UC Merced are cooperatively testing the Sakai system. On our campus, specificically, faculty recently Here at UC Davis, faculty tested Sakai in both the Winter and Spring 2006 pilot project under the Faculty Mentoring Faculty Program. In addition, several Several students have already also experimented with the system and were trained to provide one-on-one support to faculty interested in using Sakai.
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For questions, concerns, and technical support, contact IT Express at 530-754-HELP (4357), e-mail them at ithelp@ucdavis.edu, or visit 182 Shields Library for walk-in assistance.
Are you offering training for
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people interested in using Sakai?
- Yes. For information on training and classes, please see our Training and Support Page
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At this time, Sakai has many of the same features and several additional ones. The Sakai system is still evolving dramatically, however, and the more sophisticated tools are the ones which will continue to change the most. GradeBook and QuizBuilder are in this category and still lack some of the features you may find useful in MyUCDavis. In particular, those instructors teaching large classes with multiple sections should continue using MyUCDavis Course Management Tools at this time.
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- Discussion forums for critical discussion and group work.
- A Wiki or dynamic Web site created, edited, and maintained by your students, club-members, or research - associates. *
- Web - Content for incorporating external Web content sites and HTML documents directly into your project's Web site.
- A Drop Box for file sharing
- Sequential Modules for automating the process of releasing content on your project's site slowly over the course of the quarter, year, etc.
For a complete listing of tools, please see LINK TO TOOLS PAGE
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These tools do not yet provide adequate support for larger classes with multiple sections. Thus, their use is not recomended at this time. These tools are expected to be fully compatible with instructors needs by winter of 2007. To receive updates about Sakai and related announcements, please send a subscription request to sakai-info@ucdavis.edu
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- The next release of Sakai will use a different web Web editor that supports multiple fonts including Greek symbols. This is not quite the same as having a fully functional equation editor but it will permit direct editing of mathematical symbols.
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If you're teaching a class in Sakai, visit http://www.sakai2.ucdavis.edu and login using your kerberos name and password as always. You're Your class and roster should be available automatically. If, on the other hand, you'd like to create a personal worksite for your own personal project, please fill out the worksite request form at XXXXXX ASK KIRK ABOUT THIS ANSWER.
How do I give a guest access to my Sakai worksite?
- All access to Sakai requires a registered University Login university login ID. Faculty and Staff may request temporary access to University university systems including Sakai by filling out a Temporary Affiliates Form (http://email.ucdavis.edu/forms/files/taf.pdf) or
using the online service to register such an account (coming soon).
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- At present this is accomplished by enrolling one of the test student accounts in your course, and then logging in to this account in a separate browser. Please contact Faculty Support for assistance.help
Can I resort the buttons on the left?
- This is currently possible Yes, with the assistance of a system administrator. A future release of Sakai is expected to delegate this privilege to instructors. Note, however, that for consistency from course to course it is recommended that the ordering of these buttons should not be altered significantly.
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The top button tool is the one that will apppear appear on the front/default page. Pointing the top button to a personalized Web site or HTML file will allow you full control over your main page's look and feel.
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