The Linux Integration Networking Connections (LINCS) project is helping to meet the need for Linux technicians by preparing students to have a strong practical and theoretical knowledge base, to adapt to technological advances, and to participate in creating new information technology solutions using Linux and other open source technologies. The project has four key elements: (1) a 2+2+2 articulation plan beginning in high school, transitioning to a community college, and completing a bachelor's degree in IT; (2) a distance education option with curricula based in part on workplace competencies identified by business partners; (3) active learning opportunities using Linux clustering and virtualization that provide students access to remotely served networks on demand from almost any location and platform; and (4) a cross-institutional open source course management system to provide students with consistent distance learning experiences and greater opportunities for interactions among and between students and teachers at participating institutions.
The LINCS project improves student learning in computer science and engineering education programs by increasing student access to hands-on application experiences through remote access virtual labs. It also increases access to a geographically diverse population of potential students, many of whom would not otherwise be able to participate. The project leverages already established strengths of the participating institutions with a long history of collaborations with the business community.
The resulting prototype being developed serves as a national model for technology education because it creates an educational pathway into the IT field and supports life long learning opportunities. A community advisory board comprised of IT business partners plays an integral role in the project, including: identifying necessary skill sets; field-testing of course content; and providing field experience opportunities for students. All products (learning units, curricula, infrastructure design, and best practices) are being made available on the LINCS wiki site to facilitate replication by other institutions.
grant was funded by the National Science Foundation to create an advanced, comprehensive degree program specializing in Linux system administration. The project was a joint effort between Polk State College (PSC) and the University of South Florida (USF) to produce a fully articulated researched-based approach to open-system Linux technology training through the development and implementation of online courses and laboratory experiences leading to the preparation of highly qualified system administrators with technical, higher-order thinking, and problem solving skills. A secondary goal was to create a distance education system with pedagogically innovative curricula based in part on workplace competencies identified by business partners. The curriculum was designed in modular format to allow for cross-instructional reuse and repackaging of content to meet myriad student needs. Dual-enrolled students in high school taking college IT classes, community college students pursuing an AS degree in IT, and undergraduate students at the university would be able to use the same content in varying packages to complete their bachelor’s degree in Information Technology. Consequently, the curriculum incorporated on-line media strategies such as peer learning, active learning, discovery learning and problem-based learning which resulted in a curriculum designed to encourage creativity in troubleshooting and problem solving of Linux-based technical issues. Project Outcomes: More than 55 online Linux modules were built and deployed to our open-source LMS installation. Students are actively enrolled in classes and are gaining the skills and competencies we established at the beginning of this endeavor. A fully articulated educational pipeline exists between Polk State College and the University of South Florida, and the college, with the help of its industry partners, has developed and modularized its five Linux training courses. The university has incorporated many of these modules into three online offerings that equate to five courses (P1 – P5) offered by the college. USF has also built and taught additional online courses for the BSAS degree that would be needed by students who completed the five Linux courses taught at the college. This approach provides multiple paths to degree completion to students in both institutions as illustrated in Figure 1 which shows two pathways to degree completion for students enrolled in associate or bachelor degree programs in IT. Fig. 1 To help ensure students enrolled in our online Linux classes are being equipped with higher-order thinking skills, the LINCS team used Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy (RBT) as an educational framework to create learning objectives and assess learning outcomes. Our research team developed a tagging process by which the assessments, quizzes, and assignments were categorized based on the six levels of Revised Bloom Taxonomy (RBT). Basic skills that required rote memory, basic understanding, and directed application of knowledge were ranked at levels one, two, or three respectively. All such levels were considered low-order thinking. Assessment items that required student analysis, evaluation, or creation of new knowledge were ranked at levels four, five, or six respectively and were deem higher-order thinking. Using this taxonomy, our team analyzed all assessment items to determine whether we were producing students with strong skills in the upper levels of RBT. Our data analysis found promising results from assignments attached to each module suggesting that the difficulty of assessments items increased in subsequent courses and required higher-order thinking for successful completion. However, basic quizzes and introductory materials still relied on understanding and rudimentary application of knowledge. The tagging process has been applied successfully to student results from the first three offerings of PSC’s initial course with promising results. Several publications concerning this endeavor are available for review and have been presented to two conferences. Additionally, Polk State College developed corporate course offerings and piloted its first three courses with partner participation. We are currently updating these courses based on industry feedback and plan to offer all five Linux courses to corporate partners during the spring and fall semesters in 2013. Acknowledgement: This material is based in part upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under award number 0802551. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.
