e-Literate

Present is Prologue

Tag: resignation

  • Blackboard’s SVP of Product Development Gary Lang Resigns

    Gary Lang, Blackboard’s senior vice president in charge of product development and cloud operations, has announced his resignation and plans to join Amazon. Gary took the job with Blackboard in June 2013 and, along with CEO Jay Bhatt and SVP of Product Management Mark Strassman, formed the core management team that had worked together previously at AutoDesk. Gary led the reorganization effort to bring all product development under one organization, a core component of Blackboard’s recent strategy.

    Michael described Blackboard’s new product moves toward cloud computing and an entirely new user experience (UX) for the Learn LMS, and Gary was the executive in charge of these efforts. These significant changes have yet to fully roll out to customers (public cloud in pilot, new UX about to enter pilot). Gary was also added to the IMS Global board of directors in July 2014 – I would expect this role to change as well given the move to Amazon. (more…)

  • Major Change at UF Online: Exec director abruptly resigns

    I wrote a post several weeks ago about UF Online, partially based on a phone interview with the executive director Betty Phillips.

    Several weeks ago the University of Florida Online program opened for the Spring 2014 semester, accepting 600 transfer students, and the new program will accept Freshmen starting August 2014. This announcement comes just 2 years after the Florida legislature commissioned a study from the Parthenon Group on how to best leverage online programs in the state, and this program is probably one of the highest profile new online programs in the US within the past few years (along with California’s online initiative, Open SUNY, SJSU / Udacity and GaTech / Udacity). [snip]

    What UF Online is, however, is an exclusively-online baccalaureate program leading to a UF degree for lower costs than the traditional on-campus experience. This is about expanding capacity and access to a research university, and the program aims to meet the same academic standards as the traditional UF experience . . .

    Well it seems like the situation in Florida changes rapidly in multiple directions. Just two and half months after she officially took the new position, Betty Phillips has abruptly resigned. By all appearances, this move was unexpected as the University of Florida appears to have been caught flat-footed. The Gainesville Sun reports:

    (more…)