The story of e-learning in HKU SPACE

In 1999, the HKU School of Professional and Continuing Education (SPACE) established the SPACE On-line Universal Learning (SOUL) Project. SOUL is now serving over 20,000 users. Compared to other off-the-shelf e-learning solutions, the SOUL Platform is tailored for students and teachers. The major barrier of e-learning development by teachers is the heavy reliance on technical team support. Most e-learning systems are too technically complex for teachers to use easily, necessitating lengthy communications with a technical team. Another problem is lack of support in the quality maintenance of e-courses. There is no method or indication built into such systems for teachers to identify structural problems with their teaching materials and the curriculum design. Furthermore, there is limited capacity for personalized study paths. To address these problems, three new major features in PowerEdBuilder (the R&D component of the SOUL project) called Content Engineering (CE), SmartTutor and e-Course eXchange (eCX) have been implemented. These innovative breakthrough technologies are a milestone in e-learning helping to bridge the gap between pedagogy and technology.