In the past, the use of open source software (OSS) in higher education was generally limited to system-level applications like operating systems and Web servers, largely because personnel who could modify and customize the software came with the territory. But according to new study by The Campus Computing Project, colleges and universities are far more likely to select open-source Learning Management Systems (LMS) to handle online courseware and e-learning collateral.
The open source community has offered several LMS options over the past several years: Tutor, Claroline, and OLAT, for example, all have their adherents, but the front runners among U.S. colleges and universities are Sakai and Moodle.
Just how big a bite these systems have taken out of the commercial LMS pie is hard to determine. For one thing, the low barrier to entry that Open Source LMS Moodle offers with its free-download option suggests there could be a big gap between the number of installations and the number of functional sites that actually use the product. Yet in evaluating Web traffic for LMS systems, the Alexis Web Traffic report found Moodle was second, trailing behind only Blackboard.
OSS is Alive and Well at a College Near You
“Open source is here and it’s going to be with us for a long time,” said Kenneth C. Green, director of The Campus Computing Project. Green presented this year’s findings at the EDUCAUSE 2007 annual conference, which described The Campus Computing Project on its website as “the largest continuing study of the role of information technology in American higher education.”
As part of the project, CIOs and other senior campus officials from 555 institutions answered questions about their use of open source. The findings reveal what Green calls an “affirmative ambivalence” toward open source—a willingness to consider it, but uneasiness about how it will play out.
Green saw a clear differentiation in attitudes about two distinct software categories—those administered by technical staff and those used by faculty, staff, and students. In the first category, back-end OSS applications have long been a staple of academia, where Linux and Apache are widely deployed. According to the survey, these applications had a greater than 60 percent usage rate. For the second category, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) applications, “the numbers fall by half because we’re only in the initial stages of deployment…for non-technical end-users,” said Green.
Even so, the new survey suggests that Sakai and, especially, Moodle are gaining rapidly in their rate of acceptance. “We’re seeing in our 2007 survey some big jumps in these numbers, “Green reported. “The 2007 data suggest that 10 percent of campuses have standardized on an open-source application, and it’s upwards of 20 percent in private four-year colleges, where Moodle is overwhelmingly the leader. This is big news.
“This has happened in a relatively short period of time,” Green observed. “Very short for Moodle, very short for Sakai—especially when you consider the campus calendar is rigid. These things don’t happen mid-year.”
Embracing Ambivalence
For the academic CIO, ambivalence about the software they purchase is not limited to open source. At a study last year sponsored by the Mellon Foundation and others (see Software and Collaboration in Higher Education: A Study of Open Source Software, participants voiced three concerns about commercial software:
• Cost concerns: Vendors could phase out commercial software after institutions had invested heavily in it.
• Performance: Commercial software is not optimized for use in an educational setting.
• Control: Software firms in this market have shown how easily they can consolidate, reducing competition and giving vendors unfair pricing leverage.
Concerns about open source software, by contrast, center on legal issues and liability. How could software purchasers ensure a specific OSS application had been appropriately licensed? Could individuals or institutions be liable if the code infringed on someone else’s work?
Those keeping an eye on such legal issues to see how they evolve will want to monitor work of the Software Freedom Law Center, which, according to their website, offers legal services “to protect and advance Free and Open Source Software.”