University of Cambridge Adopts the Blackboard Academic Suite
Tuesday July 27, 3:00 am ET
Cambridge to Become a Blackboard University Development Partner Focusing on e-Research
WASHINGTON, July 27 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- The Centre for Applied Research in Educational Technologies at the University of Cambridge has signed a new partnership agreement with Blackboard Inc. (Nasdaq: BBBB - News). The agreement includes the adoption of the Blackboard Academic Suite(TM), participation in the Blackboard Learning System .NET beta program, and a university development partnership that will initially focus on building-out e-Research capabilities at the University of Cambridge.
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In licensing the Blackboard Academic Suite, Cambridge will not only benefit from the teaching and learning functionality in the Blackboard Learning System, but will now also be able to take advantage of the advanced community, knowledge-sharing and research features provided by the Blackboard Portal System(TM) and Blackboard Content System(TM).
"The University of Cambridge looks forward to working with Blackboard to explore the potential of the full Academic Suite on our Campus," said John Norman, Director of CARET, University of Cambridge. "We are keen to offer the extensive additional features of the Academic Suite and evaluate the capabilities of the .NET framework. We have adopted a strategy of working with a leading commercial provider and a leading open source project, and will be looking to integrate and maximize the flexibility of the combined feature sets under an open and supported platform. We also hope to provide a significant value add from the community of practice for both solutions, particularly in the area of e-Research capabilities."
In addition to the licensing of the Blackboard Academic Suite, Cambridge has also become one of Blackboard's university development partners joining the beta program for the Blackboard Learning System to be built on Microsoft's .NET framework. As a university development partner, Cambridge will help guide the creation and development of future Blackboard products, primarily in the area of e-Research. The Blackboard .NET Beta program provides Cambridge and other leading institutions the opportunity to work with Blackboard to easily integrate and extend the Blackboard Academic Suite with custom applications and learning tools. For example, using both Blackboard Building Blocks technology and Microsoft .NET, Cambridge will explore workflow driven peer-to-peer collaborative learning applications and complex group assignments such as those demanded by the Clinical School.
"We are thrilled to be working with Cambridge on a number of fronts," said Andrew Rosen, President of Blackboard's international business. "We are most excited about the opportunity to further our e-Research initiatives. Blackboard has a proven record of developing industry leading technologies that positively influence learning and community worldwide. Adding Cambridge University as one of Blackboard's education and technology partners will help extend our product capabilities for the benefit of all of our clients."
About Blackboard Inc.
Blackboard is a leading provider of enterprise software and services to the education industry. The Company's product line consists of five software applications bundled in two suites, the Blackboard Academic Suite(TM) and the Blackboard Commerce Suite(TM). Blackboard's clients include colleges, universities, schools and other education providers, as well as textbook publishers and student-focused merchants that serve education providers and their students. Blackboard is headquartered in Washington, D.C., with offices and staff in North America, Europe and Asia. |
