Leveraging LMSs to Enhance Campus-Based Student Engagement Learning management systems influence student engagement and learning

We need to better understand the influence of learning management systems (LMSs) on student engagement in order to use these powerful technologies to improve campus-based education. Over the past 10 years, online learning management has been adopted by many campus-based institutions, becoming almost ubiquitous in many parts of the world. These systems have profound yet uncertain implications for university education. They have the capacity to influence the management of academic programs, teaching practices, and the way students engage with key aspects of their university experience. This article suggests an approach for monitoring how the systems may influence students’ engagement with their study and how they might be used to improve campus-based education. The widespread and rapid adoption of LMSs exemplifies the inroads online learning systems have made into campus-based education. Recent estimates suggest that in many countries, about three quarters of institutions have an LMS. This rapid uptake is somewhat surprising, given the caution with which many universities have embraced pedagogical innovation and the capacity of LMSs to influence the core university business of teaching and learning. LMSs have the capacity to influence how students engage with their study and to change collaboration, communication, and access to learning materials. LMSs enrich student learning by offering access to a greater range of interactive resources, making course contents more cognitively accessible, providing automated and adaptive forms of assessment, and developing students’ technology literacy. Asynchronous online tools allow students to interact with learning materials, their peers, and the entire university in ways not bound by time or place. Despite significant adoption of online learning systems and growing recogLeveraging LMSs to Enhance Campus-Based Student Engagement