WASHINGTON, Jan. 10, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Blackboard Inc.
(Nasdaq: BBBB) today announced full support for two key industry
standards – Common Cartridge and Basic Learning Tools
Interoperability (LTI) – that make it easier for instructors and
others to share educational content and resources. The
announcement, and the growing popularity of the open database
initiative for the Blackboard Learn™ platform, mark key
milestones in Blackboard's work to establish a more open platform
for teaching and learning.
Conformance for both standards – Common Cartridge 1.0 and Basic
LTI – was certified by the IMS Global Learning Consortium in
November 2010. Support for the
standards was made available to clients in December as part of
Service Pack 4 for Blackboard Learn, Release 9.1. The company plans
to continue support for each standard going forward to give clients
and users greater choice and flexibility in the use of course tools
and course content.
"We committed to being a leader in the development of open
education standards – not just a participant, and we've now
delivered on that initiative," said Ray
Henderson, President of Blackboard Learn and a member of the
IMS board of directors. "This is a big milestone for us and for our
clients, and a sign of the maturity of the education technology
industry. We thank IMS Global for their partnership and their focus
in helping the industry move forward in this important area."
With Common Cartridge, educators and instructional designers can
use learning tools and content across various learning platforms to
promote greater sharing of content and resources across the global
teaching and learning community. With LTI, clients have more
choices for integrating external learning tools within Blackboard
Learn courses, and publishers can develop high quality content that
can be distributed to the teaching and learning community more
easily.
"Blackboard deserves a lot of credit for its significant
investment in helping to develop these open standards and making
them available to clients," said Dr. Rob
Abel, Chief Executive of IMS Global. "Educators and
institutions using Blackboard Learn are going to realize
significant benefits in terms of being able to remix content and
access to a wide range of discipline specific learning tools."
In addition to supporting LTI, Blackboard has adopted the
standard in its work with McGraw-Hill Higher Education to develop a
new solution that combines the best of the Blackboard Learn and
McGraw Hill Connect platforms. Using LTI, the companies are working
to achieve a deep, seamless integration of content, tools and
platform that will offer a significantly streamlined workflow for
instructors and students.
Blackboard Learn Open Database Gains Traction
Blackboard also reported that its open database initiative for
Blackboard Learn has gained popularity since its launch in
July 2010 with several hundred
clients moving to explore newly established access to the
Blackboard Learn platform database.ens
The open database gives institutions that host Blackboard Learn
locally direct access to their system data, enabling them to better
diagnose and troubleshoot to help ensure better system performance
(Blackboard Managed Hosting clients already enjoy this level of
access). The initiative also gives clients access to detailed
reporting on system usage so they can determine which tools and
features are being used more often by students and faculty in order
to make for informed decisions about technology and training
investments.
Blackboard is the only major education focused provider of
learning management software to offer such access to its system
database, while ANGEL Learning had done so previously.
For more information about Blackboard Learn, please visit
http://www.blackboard.com/Teaching-Learning/Learn-Platform.aspx.
For more information about the IMS Global Learning Consortium,
please visit http://www.imsglobal.org/.
About Blackboard Inc.
Blackboard Inc. (Nasdaq: BBBB) is a global leader in enterprise
technology and innovative solutions that improve the experience of
millions of students and learners around the world every day.
Blackboard's solutions allow thousands of higher education, K-12,
professional, corporate, and government organizations to extend
teaching and learning online, facilitate campus commerce and
security, and communicate more effectively with their communities.
Founded in 1997, Blackboard is headquartered in Washington, D.C., with offices in North America, Europe, Asia
and Australia.
Any statements in this press release about future
expectations, plans and prospects for Blackboard and other
statements containing the words "believes," "anticipates," "plans,"
"expects," "will," and similar expressions, constitute
forward-looking statements within the meaning of The Private
Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual results may differ
materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements
as a result of various important factors, including the factors
discussed in the "Risk Factors" section of our Form 10-Q filed
on November 5, 2010 with the SEC. In
addition, the forward-looking statements included in this press
release represent the Company's views as of January 10, 2011. The Company anticipates that
subsequent events and developments will cause the Company's views
to change. However, while the Company may elect to update these
forward-looking statements at some point in the future, the Company
specifically disclaims any obligation to do so. These
forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as
representing the Company's views as of any date subsequent to
January 10, 2011.
SOURCE Blackboard Inc.