Executive+Summary

Background of the schools and the districts
The Uniform City School District (fictional) operates four elementary schools (grades K-6), two middle schools (grades (7-8) and one high school (grades 9-12). The students in this district come from racially diverse, working class families. There are approximately 300 certified and 275 uncertified staff members servicing approximately 4,000 students in the middle and high schools.

Current environment
﻿Currently, none of the schools use a Course Management System (CMS). There are 17 teachers who have developed their own class web sites and/or Wikis and utilize other open source programs to maintain their online grading. However, even among this group there isn't any consistency. Although these teachers are trying to be proactive and innovative, the fact that they are all using different programs and systems often require students and parents to have multiple user names and passwords. Using an independent program also causes these teachers to re-enter their grades in the districts' report card system before report card can be printed out. Several of these teachers have suggested that we adopt their programs, however, we have decided to assemble a team to further research our options before deciding on a CMS.

Key anticipated results
﻿﻿With the implementation of a CMS at the middle and high school we expect to achieve the following results:
 * Efficiency:
 * reduce the number of user names and passwords for students and parents
 * have one system that will be used for all staff at the high school and middle school
 * ﻿Communication:
 * improved communication and feedback to students and parents
 * improved communication of assignments and course work for students
 * ﻿Financial:
 * reduced cost for making copies
 * reduced maintenance expenses for the copiers
 * ﻿increased costs for initial training and staff development
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">increased costs for initial purchase and implementation of the CMS
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">﻿Pedagogical:
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">﻿increased student performance due to improved communication of assignments
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">increased student performance due to online collaboration among teachers
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">increased student performance due to being able to integrate more Web 2.0 activities into curriculum.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">increased student performance due to a more "self-paced" learning environment