The season for learning

IBM has announced the availability of the IBM Lotus Learning Management System, described as a flexible, standards-based portfolio of e-learning components that can scale from departmental implementations to enterprisewide applications. IBM Lotus says its Learning Management System is designed to connect learning to an organization's core technology such as portals, ERP, HRIS, CRM, as well as other learning systems.

The Lotus Learning Management System solution, comprised of an authoring tool, content delivery server and offline learning client, is a strategic blend of advanced administrative and technical features, says Lotus. Key components include:

Continued support of industry standards. IBM says it’s the first to market with a LMS that supports learning activity sequencing based on the newly released IMS Simple Sequencing Specification, which enables the delivery of an instructionally sound learning experience and will be featured in the upcoming SCORM 1.3 release. In addition, the Lotus Learning Management System supports the SCORM 1.2 and AICC specifications for content interoperability, which enable organizations to use conformant third-party courseware and the courses they have already created in house.

Easy authoring. The authoring tool allows instructors, or subject matter experts (SMEs), to create courses with minimal technical training -- SMEs can create curriculums and custom courseware with no programming skills. Course developers can use the Authoring Tool to create courses for both the Lotus LearningSpace Virtual Classroom as well as for self-paced instruction.

Seamless collaboration between students and teacher. Lotus LMS features such as threaded discussions and chats are based on proven Lotus' synchronous and asynchronous collaboration technology.