UoPeople Changing LMS Platforms

[TINASAM]

Instead of Moodle, UoPeople is moving to Brightspace and sent an alert that peer grading was going away because of the platform switch. It isn't immediate, looks like at the end of summer or such. Just letting everyone know in case it matters.

[SteveFoerster]

I wonder why?

[wow]

Great news they're getting rid of peer grading (the idea had potential but few students seem to apply it appropriately), unfortunate about Moodle though. I actually prefer moodle because it has much better options for downloading course content (not the textbooks, but the content created by the school posted with each module). Multiple webpages can be printed out/downloaded at once, whereas my experience with Brightspace is that you can only do one page at a time, and often you'll get an empty download with no text at all. I hope UoPeople has a way to work around those issues because they still have a lot of students with intermittent internet access.

[TINASAM]

They are starting with graduate programs transitioning first then undergraduate.
Three Waves of Implementation
Graduate Classes – Term 4 – April 9, 2026
Undergraduate Classes – Term 5 – June 18, 2026
Arabic Program – AY 2027 Term 1 – September 3, 2026

[icecubetr]

I wonder why?

1) Their moodle website is not WCAG 2.0 compatible. This is not moodle's fault. UoPeople needs to change some of the colors they use.
2) Not entirely sure about this one. Students can peer grade discussion posts without writing a reply with malicious intent, although they are required to write a reply before giving a grade. Even though instructors are required to review the grades to ensure fairness, that doesn't always happen and you are stuck with a bad grade. I am currently dealing with this issue.
3) The grouping system is confusing for some students in courses that have group projects. They can't find their project group, because they can't click a simple list to go to the discussion forum for their specific project group. They start posting on the general group, where all students in that class can see their post. Then they start interacting with each other like NPCs until somebody tells them, "You are in the wrong discussion forum."

[FireMedic_Philosopher]

Honestly...

As both a student and faculty, I LOVE Brightspace.
I think it is a lot cleaner platform. and more straightforward than most of the alternatives.

I also really like that the discussion/forum section allows for such such seamless use of a video file/audio file/ppt directly in the text chat.
if a student or instructor wants to use one or all they can... and it is very intuitive....

not like going through a dozen or so drop downs with platforms like Canvas.
Moodle... just seems too much like a Linux sandbox to me... nothing clean or intuitive.

As far as the idea that UoP does away with peer grading... awesome.

I honestly wondered how they got RA while still having that in place.