Recently,
Canvas held its first community user group in the Philippines at the De La
Salle University Henry Sy, Sr. Hall. The meeting connected the first Canvas
customers in the Philippines to discuss their use of education technology to transform
education provision in their institutions. Principals and senior leadership
from Baliuag University, University of the East, Jose Rizal University, De La
Salle Lipa, Centro Escolar University and other schools were present, such as
the host College of Computer Studies department at De La Salle University and
EdTech leadership from Far Eastern University.
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The Instructure team. (L-R) Troy Martin, Colt Kwong, Debbie
Thompson, Barrett Doran, Julian Yballe, Faith Chaza
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Technology
has allowed other industries to compete globally and education is no different,
with each institution sharing their strategic visions of how they can and will
use education technology to enhance teaching and learning as well as compete
for students in the region. Through
their use of the Learning Management System Canvas, each of these Philippine institutions
are deepening their adoption of the latest innovations in teaching and
learning, such as blended and flipped classrooms, which allows for greater
focus on student engagement and personalized learning.
Roselle
Basa, Program Coordinator for ICT at UE, was among the attendees who were new
to Canvas. UE faculty have been training with the LMS since March, and the
system will be deployed in full this year. “Canvas allows us to develop courses
that are geared to student-centered strategies. It pushes the envelope of
teaching strategies development and helps us avoid being confined to the
classroom in a very enjoyable and engaging manner,” Basa said.
Canvas from
Instructure was created in response to poor user experience of legacy LMS
software by its founders as graduate students. They wanted a more flexible and
personalized learning experience, one that was mobile and easy to use and
extend with a wide variety of learning resources.
As an open,
mobile and native cloud-based platform, Canvas allows students to easily access
learning materials, take online tests, collaborate on the move, and drive their
own learning journey. Teachers are able to deliver more personalized learning,
choose from a wealth of learning resources to deliver a richer learning
experience, grade tests more quickly, as well as use data in real time to give
feedback on student progress. This
approach puts teachers and students at the center of the learning environment
rather than the technology.
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Regional Director Julian L. Yballe talks about the open
nature of Canvas
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Regional
Director Julian Yballe also took to the podium to explain Canvas’ view on
openness and equity of experience. Instructure envisioned Canvas as endlessly
extendable open APIs and the ability to add apps via the LTI standard. This allows teachers to use the vast global
resources that exist, exposing students to a huge variety of learning materials
in a simple and easy way.
Along with
this growing partner ecosystem, the Canvas community of global institutions,
helps educators from around the world share ideas and experiences both online
and at community events such as this user group session. These leading institutions in the Philippines
are now contributing to the community with their founding of the first user
group in South East Asia.
Yballe
underlined this specific focus on student-centeredness. “The feedback for
Canvas from every stakeholder in this teacher and learning environment has been
positive. And a lot of it is a combination of timing and how student-centered
learning is becoming more of a focus due to two reasons, workforce
preparedness, so graduates can contribute immediately, and a more competitive
environment for a limited number of students, both locally and globally,”
Yballe said.
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| Representatives from De La Salle Lipa at the conference |
What’s next
on the roadmap for Canvas? APAC VP Troy Martin spoke of the company’s expansion
plans in a post-conference interview. “We’re excited with the customers that
have emerged over the last two years in the Philippines, particularly here in
Manila, but we are excited to welcome some new institutions from Cebu City and
we look forward to hearing from new institutions contacting Instructure about
working with Canvas.”
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