In the history of virtual learning environments, the 1990s was a time of growth, primarily due to the advent of the affordable computer and of the Internet.
1980s
1985 The Free Educational Mail (FrEdMail) network was created by San Diego educators, Al Rogers and Yvonne Marie Andres, in 1985. More than 150 schools and school districts were using the network for free international email access and curriculum services.
1990s
1990 Formal Systems Inc. of Princeton, NJ, USA introduces a DOS-based Assessment Management System. An internet version was introduced in 1997. (In 2000, Formal Systems changed its name to Pedagogue Solutions. The Athena Project at MIT, which started in 1983, has evolved into a system of "shared services" that look remarkably like many current VLEs or learning management systems. The network hosted software from multiple vendors, and made it all work together. Here is a list of the features of the system as of 1990: printing, electronic mail, electronic messaging (Zephyr), bulletin board conferencing (Discuss), on-line consulting (OLC), on-line teaching assistant (OLTA), on-line help (OLH), assignment exchange (Turn in/pick up), access to system libraries, authentication for system security (Kerberos), naming-for linking system components together (Hcsiod), and a service management system (Moira). Pavel Curtis created LambdaMOO, an early Multi-User Dungeon (MUD), at Xerox PARC. HyperCourseware created by Kent Norman at the University of Maryland, College Park was originally written for use in the AT&T Teaching Theater, a prototype electronic classroom. The original version was written in WinPlus, a Hypercard like program, and ran on a local area network with one server and numerous client workstations. It included an online syllabus, online lecture notes and readings, synchronous chat rooms, asynchronous discussion boards, online student profiles with pictures, online assignments and exams, online grading, and a dynamic seating chart. A Web-based version was introduced in January 1996, which continued to function up until the end of 2017. The US Navy's Naval Technical Training System was designed as a curriculum development system. It included course management tools for the storage, retrieval and dissemination of information. An article in Electronic Learning by Therese Mageau describes Integrated Learning Systems (ILS) as "networked computers running broad-based curriculum software with a management system that tracks student progress." A report by George Mann and Joe Kitchens reviews the Curriculum Management System (CMS), a system that generated individualized learning plans every two weeks for each student. FirstClass is launched by SoftArc, initially for the Macintosh platform.
1991 Thousands of FrEdMail users gained access to the NSFNET via newly established gateways at two NSFNET mid-level network locations: Merit/MichNet in Ann Arbor, MI, and CERFnet (California Education and Research Federation Network) in San Diego, CA. FrEdMail subscribers began to exchange project-based learning electronic mail with the entire Internet community. The FrEdMail-NSFNET Gateway Software was available free of cost to any mid-level network, college, or university which had an interest in collaborating with local K-12 school districts to bring electronic networking to teachers and students. Through FrEdMail, educators were able share classroom experiences, distribute curriculum ideas and teaching materials, as well as obtain information about workshops, job opportunities, and legislation affecting education. At its peak, FrEdMail was used by 12,000 schools and 350 nodes worldwide. When the World Wide Web became available to the public in 1993, the FrEdMail Foundation became the Global SchoolNet Foundation and launched its first website, GlobalSchoolhouse.org. The following year the National Science Foundation also awarded Global SchoolNet a grant to introduce a desktop video-conferencing program called CU-SeeMe. CU-SeeMe was used for many educational video-conferences and in 1995 by World News Now for the first television broadcast live on the Internet, which featured an interview by World News Now anchor Kevin Newman and Yvonne Andrés. iEARN (International Education and Resource Network) launched among schools in nine countries, using the IGC/APC system of "conferences/newsgroups" to better enable students to conduct theme-based online projects. The history page of the TEDS company states that they developed the first Learning Management System. Jakob Ziv-El of Interactive Communication Systems, Inc. files for a patent for an Interactive Group Communication System (# 5,263,869) (similar to the prior art of the IBM 1500 system). A 1990 foreign patent and a 1972 patent by Jakob Zawels (# 3,641,685) are referenced. The patent is granted in 1993. The patent is referenced in a 2000 patent filing (# 6,988,138) by representatives of BlackBoard, Inc. Murray Turoff, the guru of EIES, publishes This distills lessons from a research programme run by him over the preceding 16 years, from 1974. A collaboration of faith based groups (Ecunet) start using a product called BizLink (which later became Convene) in teaching their missionaries and staff around the world using the internet. Gloria Gery publishes Electronic performance support systems: how and why to remake the workplace through the strategic application of technology, which influences thinking about technology and learning in the workplace.
1992 CAPA (Computer Assisted Personalized Approach) system was developed at Michigan State University. It was first used in a small (92 student) physics class in the Fall of 1992. Students accessed randomized (personalized) homework problems through telnet. Convene International is founded by Jeffery Stein and Reda Athanasios to provide collaboration tools via the Internet. UNI-C, the Danish State Centre for Computing in Education (which became a Blackboard user in the 2000s) supports a wide range of online distance courses using PortaCOM, a conferencing platform, for example in the TUDIC project, funded under the EU's COMET Programme. Extensive theoretical work undertaken by, amongst others, Elsebeth Korsgaard Sorensen, whose web site has a detailed bibliography. Collaborative Learning Through Computer Conferencing, also known as the Najaden Papers, edited by Anthony Kaye in the NATO ASI Series, and published by Springer-Verlag (). Provides several case studies of online learning in action, and an overview by Jacob Palme providing a comprehensive inventory of the functionalities available in computer conferencing systems, including SuperKOM. This last paper describes in detail the underlying functions of what would now be called a virtual learning environment, including, for example, roles, voting, expiration times, exams, moderation, deferred operations. Open University (UK) installs (reputed to be server license number 3) after an extensive evaluation of tools suitable to deliver online learning across Europe for the just-started JANUS project funded by the European Commission under the DELTA programme. (FirstClass was then a product of SoftArc in Ontario, Canada.). The New York University School of Continuing Education (SCE) introduces its Virtual College and develops a digital network to deliver courses to students. SCE uses Lotus Notes at least through 1997 for computer conferencing and to provide online computer laboratory access to student home PCs. GeoMetrix Data Systems founded. They produce the learning management system called TrainingPartner. [LearnFrame] of Draper, Utah founded. They initially produced online courseware and an authoring tool, and in 1995 developed Pinnacle Learning Manager, that accepted and managed courses from a wide variety of vendors. Following several years of preparatory studies, the European Commission DELTA programme starts. (DELTA stands for Developing European Learning through Technological Advances.) Over 30 projects are funded, each lasting for around three years, many relevant to VLEs, perhaps the most relevant ones being MTS, JANUS and EAST. The DELTA programme built on preparatory studies going on since 1985 into portable educational tools environments (proto-VLEs), networked multimedia and hypermedia, satellite networks, and a Learning Systems Reference Model (in some ways a precursor of IMS). There seems to be almost no Web information now on the preparatory studies, except for an interview with Luis Rosello in DEOSNews. Authorware Inc. merges with MacroMind/ParaComp to create Macromedia. MacroMind specialized in animation software (Director) and ParaComp specialized in 3D imagery (Swivel 3D). Macromedia goes public only months after the merger and remains the leading purveyor of multimedia tools. Terry Hedegaard of UOP online picks Convene International's Internet collaboration tools to run a pilot for teaching UOP students online exclusively. The MUD Institute (TMI/TMI-2) provides the TMI Mudlib and online environment for learning MUD programming, including e-mail, bulletin boards, shared file spaces, real time chat, and instant messaging. Terry Anderson coordinates a net-based "virtual conference" in conjunction with the 16th World Congress of the International Council for Distance Education. This project used email lists and Usenet groups distributed on the early Internet, Usenet, BitNet, and NetNorth. Humber College's Digital Electronics program used a learning management system to support a set of online courses. The program featured individualized instruction and continuous intake. University of Wales, Aberystwyth awarded internal funding to further develop its 'integrated project support environment for teaching software engineering'.
1993 Jakob Ziv-El of Discourse Technologies, Inc. files for a patent for a Remote Teaching System (# 5,437,555) (similar to the prior art of the PLATO system), referencing his 1991 patent. The patent is granted in 1995. The patent is referenced in a 2000 patent filing (# 6,988,138) by representatives of BlackBoard, Inc. XT001 Renewable energy, a "landmark" experimental course developing techniques for collaborative and resource-based online learning at a distance, was the first "real" course to use FirstClass as its core online tool at the Open University. There are many references (mostly forgotten now) but particularly useful is. Convene International contracted to work with University of Phoenix to develop the first large-scale commercial product for use in Virtual Classrooms. Convene's unique characteristic enabled students to capture data and then work offline (at a time when people were often charged by the hour or minute for online time). University of Phoenix' Thomas Bishop brands the product "ALEX" for Apollo Learning Exchange." As Convene finishes the development of ALEX for University of Phoenix the pilot enrollment grows to 600 students within the first few months of implementation. Brandon Hall puts out the first issue of his Multimedia and Internet Training Newsletter, one of the first regular publications in the field. Jisc (the Joint Information Systems Committee of the UK Higher Education Funding and Research Councils) is established on 1 April 1993, as a successor body to the Information Systems Committee. Also in 1993, ALT - the Association for Learning Technology - was founded in the UK, initially with the assistance of a donation by BT.