I have written before on this blog about the way in which Weston College is using VLE standards to improve the use of the VLE by staff at the college and increasing use of the VLE by learners.

There is a now a case study on Weston College on the Excellence Gateway.

Through the development of a set of standards, Weston College has improved the quality of its Moodle virtual learning environment (VLE) course provision.

Weston College has had a VLE since 2003. In August 2007 it went live with Moodle as its preferred VLE, developed, hosted and supported in-house. In the first year of cross-college deployment, Moodle was well adopted without any particular pressure on staff to achieve specific targets. The new system, in comparison to its former VLE, was seen as intuitive and there was a general level of enthusiasm from staff to receive staff training. ILT enthusiasts were used as champions of the new VLE, developing and sharing good practice. A student and staff Resources User Group was established to feedback on the new VLE and guide its early development.

The VLE standards were devised to set a minimum expectation for online provision to ensure that all learners on full-time courses had a corresponding VLE course. The aim of the standards was to provide and facilitate exemplary course provision through dynamic materials and e-learning resources.

The standards are graded into three categories, which are:

• Gold
• Silver
• Bronze.

Every course must be at Bronze standard and yearly targets are set for the achievement of Silver/Gold standard courses.

Read the full case study.

Last week I reflected on the JISC RSC SW Annual Conference and discussed Vicky Weavers’ session on VLE standards. As part of her presentation she showed a video clip showing interviews with staff and learners on the impact the improved use of the VLE was having.

Here is the whole video which has interviews with the A’Level History lecturer and learners on the impact of the improved VLE resources.