Reflections on Sakai China Conference 2013

By: Yuechuan Dai, SIAS University

A Sakai China Conference took place on June 14th and 15th at Fudan University in Shanghai. Over 25 universities attended the event, and attended workshops which included Sakai cooperative development & fudan Sakai CLE, Sakai localization development process, Course site exchange between different universities, Teaching with Sakai CLE and Open Courses based on Sakai CLE.

The event is the largest Sakai meeting to be held in China to date, and demonstrates considerable and growing interest. Currently, more and more universities in China are beginning to focus on better education technology which can help students success in their academic study and research. Choice of LMS is currently a major consideration, in terms of direction. Since commercial platforms have nearly taken 60% market in the greater China area, lots of schools are looking for new efficient and flexible systems to meet their changing needs. Until now, more than 10 universities are using the Sakai CLE in production, including Sias International University, Fudan University, and the University of Michigan-Shanghai Jiao Tong university Joint Institute. In this meeting, one significant purpose is to show how Sakai and the Sakai China committee can provide long term services to educational institutions. We believe that more institute will join this team and provide more localization contribution in the near future.