This year our VIP team’s research focus is on data that we've collected through Georgia Tech's online platforms. This includes mass-market courses hosted on Coursera, our online masters programs on edX and data from Canvas, the learning management system that services both our online and on-campus courses. To introduce the students to learning analytics using data from online platforms, we hosted Dan Davis, a PhD student from the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands.

Over the past few weeks, several of us in C21U have been working with others at Georgia Tech Professional Education (GTPE), Georgia State University (GSU), the University System of Georgia (USG), and USG eCampus to plan a series of events on “precision academics.” Precision academics is a relatively new term – we’re using it to describe technology-enabled, data-informed, and empirically-evidenced instruction.

This summer I moved my course to Canvas and the jury is in – I can work with it! I approached Canvas with the same skepticism with which I’ve approached many other learning management systems (LMS) in the past. Part of the challenge that I have had with the design of various LMSs is that they are quite often not suited to the type of work that we do in humanities, specifically writing and communication classes. I have to say that Canvas excels as a management tool, providing both instructor and student with an opportunity to manage class and individual activities as the course develops throughout the semester.

We’ve started a research roadmap to outline some of the latest trends in educational innovation that we think will make for the next generation of the university – flipped classrooms, MOOCs, competency-based education, and so on.