BCcampus is ten years old in 2012. To commemorate, we're publishing a series of articles that illustrate some of our milestones and describe how we got here. This is the first article, featuring BCcampus-supported online Collaborative Programs....

Knowledge gathered from ApplyBC user testing will soon lead to a better user experience. BCcampus conducted the first formal usability tests for our post-secondary application service at the Vancouver location in January. We wanted to identify errors and critical problems, and gauge the level of difficulty for an applicant to complete two forms: the ApplyBC.ca common form and the institutional form. We wanted to understand the cause of any difficulties that were encountered, gather feedback and suggestions from test participants and suggest improvements to the user experience for consideration in future ApplyBC development...

At BCcampus we usually get only one chance in any year to travel to Ottawa...

If I don't say this all the time I should because I sure think it a lot! I'm so grateful for my membership in CPsquare, and especially the partnership between SCoPEand CP2 to organize quarterly field trips together. Well, after I typed that I immediately wanted to add also especially the monthly "my practice" series where I learn so much from other community of practice leaders...

In the past two years at BCcampus we haven't focused much on post-secondary students as an audience. The primary audience for our communications efforts is made up of representatives from post-secondary institutions themselves. After all, it's the presidents, vice-presidents academic, directors of information technology, registrars, people at centres for teaching and learning technologies who we deal with regularly. They're the ones we have to persuade that working with BCcampus is cost-effective and provides better service to students and faculty. Students are attached to their university or college, and therefore are a secondary audience for us...