The following sites may be of assistance to anyone who has experienced problems at Capella University. For those who require the use of assistive technology, please note that the links on this page will open new windows. After reading the information on the sites provided here, we suspect that most visitors will begin to wonder about the professional competence of those at Capella who were involved in implementing WebCT as the sole means for students to access their courses.

WebCT Studies, Use Cases, Student Surveys

Funny, but other universities don't report that WebCT is "universally praised" for being "exceptionally user-friendly and intuitive." Unlike Capella University, these institutions are also not afraid to post their findings. Of course, that takes a lot of integrity and academic competence! It should be pointed out; however, that accessibility is not a topic that is frequently covered in most surveys.

• The American University in Cairo - Two Years into WebCT: Perceptions of AUC Students (this link will open an Adobe .pdf file)
• East Georgia College - WebCT-Vista Professional Opinion Survey (this link will open a Microsoft Word .doc file) - Wow! Take a look at the responses from Faculty regarding WebCT Vista! For example, in answer to the prompt (see table 14), "I believe that most of my students like Vista," 46.2% of faculty responding either disagreed or strongly disagreed with this statement!
• Ramapo College of New Jersey (This link will open a Power Point Presentation - be sure to examine the complete slide show)
• University of Kent - Considering the Alternative (to WebCT) - this site is not a survey or study, per se, rather an argument for the use of alternatives to WebCT.
• University of Lethbridge (Alberta, Canada) Curriculum Re-Development Centre - click on "global results" to view findings.
• University of North Texas - Links to two pages are listed here:
  • WebCT and Distributed Learning - Student Computing Survey Results (Note UNT's finding that nearly 30% of their students surveyed stated that they did not prefer classes that used WebCT!)
  • Student Comments to Survey

WebCT and Accessibility (Rather, Lack of Accessibility)

The problems with WebCT's failure to meet accessibility standards spans many years. The following sites provide just a sampling of the information that is readily available on the topic. Capella's decision to use WebCT, without regard for the needs of their students with disabilities, flies in the face of even the most basic requirements for testing software applications.

• American Library Association (Adobe .pdf) - An excellent presentation on the need for accessibility in Distance Education
• Conformance of WebCT v3.6 to W3C's Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 - This study is posted on the World Wide Web Consortium's (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative's (WAI) site - arguably the most important site regarding accessibility of software applications on the Internet! While this study was conducted on an older version of WebCT than the one used by Capella University - many of the same problems exist today!
• Georgia State University Disability Services (Adobe .pdf) - The summary section of this fine paper says it all - " We have attempted to discuss the issue of accessibility to WebCT courses. Again, we applaud WebCT’s commitment to future accessibility. However, for students who need more immediate access to full course participation, more immediate solutions are needed. While we have discussed many barriers to accessibility there are two important ones we have not yet touched upon. These are ignorance and apathy. Many course designers don’t design for access either because they have never thought about it or they don’t care. As shown by example above, educators can work around many of the current barriers to accessibility if they are willing to use a little imagination and take a little more time in the design phase of their courses. It is our sincere hope that this paper can help eliminate the barrier of ignorance. However, the barrier of apathy is outside the scope of this or any other paper, it is a matter of personal choice" (emphasis added). It is the opinion of CapellaUniversitySucks.us that ignorance and apathy is responsible for Capella's failure to ensure that WebCT is fully accessible to students with disabilities.
• Illinois Center for Instructional Technology Accessibility - Evaluation of WebCT Vista Version for Accessibility - it appears as if a WebCT representative made a statement that WebCT " conformed to W3C specifications" but "didn't know which ones!" CapellaUniversitySucks.us contends that WebCT Vista still does not conform to the W3C specifications.
• La Troupe University (Australia): WebCT Conformance Report - this site contains a reprint of the W3C study that demonstrates that WebCT was not in compliance with accessibility standards.
• Manchester Metropolitan University - Pay particular attention to Figure Three in this document that notes the fact that there was considerable concern regarding WebCT and the lack of accessibility to students. In fact, every school (except for Education, not surprisingly) voiced a concern about accessibility!
• Southern Cross University - Accessibility Issues for WebCT - The WebCT Accessibility Audit cited on this site provides an excellent overview as to why WebCT is not accessible.
• University of Illinois - "Even if your course content is fully accessible, you will not be able to make courses on WebCT accessible if you plan to use all of its features."
• University of Minnesota - Right in Capella University's own back yard - is Capella clueless or what?!
• University of Minnesota (another page) on WebCT: Accessibility Support
• University of Wisconsin - An "older" study in which WebCT failed accessibility tests.
• United States Department of Education, Office of the Chief Information Officer: Requirements for Accessible Electronic and Information Technology Design
• University of Washington - National Center on Accessible Information Technology in Education states that "courseware packages [including WebCT] have historically presented access challenges to people with disabilities."
• Virginia Community College System - Notes from a meeting held on May 26, 2004. Note the comment that, "WebCT sent Carole faculty usage data. They also asked if we had any other questions. One comment from the colleges was that WebCT is not as intuitive as Blackboard, Desire2Learn, and Angel and that it would probably take twice as long to train faculty on it as opposed to the other CMS." Hey Capella, why is a junior college able to notice the problems with WebCT and you can't?
• WebCT: How to Ensure Accessibility
• From the "official" WebCT web site - it should be noted that WebCT seems to have suddenly started removing pages (or moving them to other locations, since the complaints against Capella University were made (the first complaint was filed on April 9, 2004). As a result, some of these links are either dead now or may soon be in the very near future. Enjoy them, while you can!
  • Bringing Your WebCT Course Into ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) Compliance (this link will, hopefully, take you to a PowerPoint Presentation") The last page of this slide show states, "The biggest barriers to ADA compliance: Ignorance (and) apathy" - We agree! So Capella and WebCT, when are you going to actually DO something about "ignorance and apathy?"
• Colorado State University's web site notes a link (which is also found elsewhere) to a 40-minute video on WebCT's site entitled, "Bringing your WebCT Course into ADA Compliance." CapellaUniversitySucks.us suspects that this "movie" has recently been removed because we believe there is simply no way to make WebCT fully compliant with the ADA without significant redesign.
• WebAIM: Web Accessibility in Mind - Web Applications and ADA/504 (not 508) Compliance - This link speaks for itself.

WebCT Problems (Not listed above)

• General Problems with WebCT at (the) University of British Columbia - What, problems at the school where WebCT was designed? While this information may be "old" (2001), it merely demonstrates the ongoing problems with WebCT.

Web Sites That Are Highly Critical of WebCT

• Slashdot - The comments about WebCT on this well known Internet Bulletin Board simply speak for themselves!
• WebCT: Non-line Learning
• Why WebCT Sucks