CASE STUDY

Provide training for a new online information system to USPS Environmental Compliance Auditors

Question:

Can Travis Lynch & Associates (TLA) design, develop, host and deliver a SCORM conformant and 508 compliant course to a highly diverse learner community within a project timeline of 60 days? Will this course also meet a directive to reduce the time required for training so that a new online information system could be used for all USPS Environmental Compliance Reviews (ECR) in 2003?

Project summary:

TLA proposed and delivered a solution within time and budget constraints. The first course was designed around a "blended" learning approach. This was to help facilitate change management and to mitigate risk because the targeted learner community was not accustomed to asynchronous distance learning. The following components were included in the course.

20 interactive learning modules covering all aspects of interaction with the new system
Live online activities in a fully functioning application "sandbox"
Supplementary Web Conferencing sessions (using WebEx)
Customized interim LMS with learner authentication, sequencing and tracking features
Assessment (integration of 3rd party assessment engine with LMS)
Certificate of successful completion

Result:

The project succeeded in meeting or exceeding all of the above requirements. In addition, five performance metrics were used as project success criteria.

Project schedule (days deviated from project schedule)
Budget (dollars over budget)
Section 508 compliance review (number of violations counted in testing process)
LMS server uptime statistics
Conformance test suite (boolean value for each of three conformance categories)

The project came in on time and within budget. There were zero violations of Section 508 guidelines detected in the testing process. The LMS maintained an uptime rate of 100%. Finally, the results of SCORM conformance tests yielded the following. All of which are the highest conformance levels offered by the ADL SCORM Conformance test suite.

Conformance Category Conformance Label

Content Packaging ADLCP-PIF1

Metadata MD-XML1+Optional

SCO Run-Time Environment SCO-RTE1+Mandatory

Conclusion:

TLA's ability to deliver creative, non-proprietary e-learning solutions on short project timelines is a major differentiator for it in today's market.

News:

Keeping Up: Don't Get Stuck With Out-Of-Date E-Learning

October 1, 2004
In the early days of standards for Web Based Training (WBT), keeping up with the trends was easy. The standard changed slowly and was almost always backward compatible. Now the industry is moving much faster and a new standard (SCORM) has taken over, but not without some growing pains.

Full story