What is procurement management?

Procurement Influence: Who decides what learning management system (LMS) to use at a university?

• At a large school, college or university, who are the decision makers that decide what LMS to use, how much they need to spend on it and what they need?

• Answer:

  A decision about something as important as a LMS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_management_system) would be made at the very highest level. Many larger schools, such as the University of Michigan, are now hiring Chief Information Officers who are responsible for coordinating the various IT initiatives on campus. I recently heard a presentation from the current CIO of Michigan where she talked about the impending switch of the Email services from University owned computers to Gmail. She stated that in deciding to switch lots of people from the faculty, administration and students all contributed to the decision. In fact, Michigan even had a sort of contest where the students were allowed to vote between a solution from Microsoft and Google. I would assume that a decision concerning a LMS would happen similarly. People representing every group who used the LMS would be consulted. The groups consulted would include: the elected student assembly, the faculty senate and representatives from the administration. At the end of the day, the President of the University and the CIO would be the ones to decide.