The effectiveness of the use of online collaborative project tracking and management tool on the processes of distance education course development

The aim of this research is to describe the need for a collaborative online project tracking and management tool, is to develop this tool according to determined needs, and to betray the effectiveness of using this tool in the distance education content development processes.This research, planned as a case study, was accomplished with the participation of 43 employees and 2 administrators working in the Content Development Team at Gazi University Community School of Distance Education in 2010-2011 academic year. Before the experimental procedure, the need for using such a tool in the organization was laid down, and an open source tool was chosen for this need, and this tool was adapted to the organization according to needs. In order to examine the effect the use of this tool on the content development processes, before and after the experimental process, pretest and posttest were applied to managers and employees for collecting their opinions. In the experimental process, single-group pretest-posttest experimental design was used. The independent variable of this research is the use of a collaborative online project tracking and management tool, and the dependent variable is employee opinions. The data obtained from the opinions of the organization managers and employees were analyzed with the Wilcoxon signed rank test, a non-parametric statistical method.As a result of the negotiations for the purpose of determining the need for content development processes at distance education organizations in our country, the need for a tool with innovative and specific for of distance education features to support project management and content development processes of these organizations was determined. The gains from the use of the tool in terms of managerial, communication, and tool have been put forward.In an organization, if collaborative online learning content development processes repeat several times, collaborative project management is inevitable. However, as in this thesis, project management; co-operation structure; building up the team; development or selection of tools has to be unique to the organization.In our country, in small-scale organizations of major universities and ministries except the major private sector organizations offering distance education, yet the corporate culture avoid, and in the larger ones due to the continued well-worn traditional ways of instructional design, online collaborative project tracking and management tools cannot find a place for itself in distance education organizations adequately. At the beginning of the road, organizations offering distance education, to bring such tools become a part of the functioning of the organization; will prevent the emergence of many problems. In this study, the features of collaborative online project tracking and management tools in accordance with the characteristics of content development processes functioning of the structure of distance education organizations in our country were betrayed. The findings of this study are: these kinds of tools build up the project management process and facilitate project tracking in content development processes in terms of management, save the time in reaching the end of the project, make team communication healthy and fast, and finally the usage of these kinds of tools is simple, functional, safe, and reliable in terms of tool. As a result, it is hoped to contribute to standardization of the use of these tools in the field of distance education.Keywords: Distance education, online content development, online project management, collaborative tools