No abstract

A cloud-based collaborative environment for online course provision between universities can facilitate a cost-effective, efficient and enriched education enabling good student experience. However, there are a number of challenges and issues that should be taken into consideration prior to adopting the collaborative environment. They relate to management and administration, cost, collaborative Virtual Learning Environment, ownership, development of courses and teaching resources, as well as culture. To address these challenges a conceptual framework is proposed for this environment which highlights key issues and associated relationships between them. The framework contains five main elements, including Quality, Legal, Security, Operation and Education. The framework illustrates the relationship between the elements. A prototype is also discussed which was designed to test part of the framework. CCS Concepts • Social and professional topics → Computer supported cooperative work • Social and professional topics → Computing education Keywords Cloud-based collaborative online course provision; cloud-based collaborative environment; Relationship between elements; prototype for cloud-based collaborative environment;

The number of online courses offered worldwide by higher education institutions has been growing rapidly. There are a number of issues that affect student learning, such as the experience of academic staff and students in online courses, the design of course structures, creation of suitable teaching resources, and the study culture. One possible way to address them is to adopt a cloud-based collaborative environment between universities. This paper presents the results of a study that explores the issues that universities should consider before establishing such an environment. Two surveys were conducted sequentially. In the first survey, 16 heads of online courses at UK universities were interviewed. In the second, two questionnaires were used to gather the perspectives of over 250 academics and students with regard to cloud-based online courses. The research identified a number of issues which were categorised into challenges and opportunities. The challenges relate to education, operation, quality, legal matters and security. The opportunities identify potential benefits from the perspectives of universities and students. The paper also indicates a future plan for the outcome of this research.