Stephen Gilfus

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Stephen Gilfus
Born Stephen R. Gilfus
(1970-05-24) May 24, 1970
Pittsford, New York United States
Ethnicity American
Alma mater Cornell University
Occupation Entrepreneur
Organization Gilfus Education Group
Known for Founder of Blackboard Inc.
Website
www.gilfuseducationgroup.com

Stephen Gilfus (born May 24, 1970) is a founder of Blackboard Inc. and CourseInfo LLC.

Biography

Stephen Gilfus grew up in Pittsford, New York, attended Pittsford Mendon High School and graduated from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York in 1997 as an academic scholar with a Bachelors of Science degree from the undergraduate business program within the Cornell University Department of Applied Economics and Management[citation needed] While at Cornell, he focused on the development of new businesses through his studies as a part of a burgeoning new series of studies within Cornell's Entrepreneurship Personal Enterprise program. In 1997, during his senior year at Cornell University, he co-founded CourseInfo LLC, a small e-learning company focused on the development of an innovative course management system.[1] As a founder and as Vice President of Marketing and Sales for CourseInfo he directed the businesses initial vision, writing the companies first business plan and developing its foundational sales and marketing strategy. - The Scientist : UCLA Taking A Leading Role In Mandating ... "It's a Web course-management tool," explains Stephen Gilfus, CourseInfo's vice president for marketing. "The entire structure is set up to provide areas...[2]

In 1998, CourseInfo LLC, founded by Daniel Cane and Stephen Gilfus, and Blackboard LLC, founded by Michael Chasen and Matthew Pittinsky merged to form Blackboard Inc. The first line of e-learning products was branded Blackboard CourseInfo, but the CourseInfo brand was dropped in 2000. Gilfus was one of the primary designers and inventors of the CourseInfo and Blackboard Learning System products as head of corporate and product strategy for the company and published the companies Blackboard's Product Strategy and Roadmap.. As the company expanded its market and business relationships Stephen along with Matthew Pittinsky (both company co-founders) jointly wrote a Blackboard Product Strategy & Vision White Paper on Building Blocks (B2) Initiative outlining the launch of a "Building Blocks Initiative" introducing new thought concepts to extend the Blackboard Platform and allowing for greater extensibility of the technology as an open platform for allowing for technology extensions. In 2001 the company (Blackboard Inc.) began to explore "mobile learning" initiatives and Stephen joined a Mobile Steering Committee established and led by the President and CEO of McGraw-Hill Ryerson to answer the question "What can “ anytime, anywhere” access to learning material contribute to the education experience?" Results where published in the following report: "Harvesting Fragments of Time" - Mobile Learning Pilot Project (Evaluation Team Report) Further to Blackboard's development path Stephen led the companies initiatives to introduce new learning standards as the Head of Corporate and Product Strategy collaborating with NDU, the National Defense University, and the ADL Co-Labs to design, implement and deploy a free Blackboard SCORM 1.2 through Blackboard Building Blocks. SCORM (Sharable Content Object Repository Model) is a specification of the Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL) Initiative, which comes out of the Office of the United States Secretary of Defense.

During this time, around 2004, still with Blackboard, Stephen began to assemble data from the experiences of thousands of Blackboard customers and authored the "Educational Technology Framework", a model used to contemplate organizational, technological, and social impact of educational technologies on academic institutions – sometimes referred to as “The Gilfus Model of Educational Technology Adoption”.[3] The model was updated in 2010.[4]

From 2004 to mid-2008, Gilfus was Vice President of Blackboard's Education Consulting Practice where he led a team of professionals focused on integrating and extending the Blackboard Platform, Serving over 450 academic institutions in integrating into PeopleSoft, Datatel, SCT and other SIS applications as well as creating custom applications. Gilfus worked closely with several customers and was one of the key strategists behind Fairfax County Public Schools launch of the Blackboard platform for Fairfax 24/7 Learning.[5] He also led a core team of individuals that designed and implemented Pearson's Course Compass, a private-label version of Blackboard for Pearson Education.[6] Gilfus worked cross-organizationally within Blackboard, holding key leadership positions throughout the company in Marketing and Sales, Product Management/Development, Strategic Development, Global Services, and the Office of the CEO as a facilitator and change agent and over the many years he has had various titles throughout the organization with his final initiative as a lead to Blackboard's K12 strategy.[7]

In February 2009, Gilfus left Blackboard to found the Gilfus Education Group,[8] an independent consulting and management company based in Washington, D.C. He is also an "Entrepreneurship@Cornell" advisory council member.[9]

On July 2011 Blackboard was purchased for $1.6 Billion by Providence Equity Partners [10]

Published Works

  • Roberts, Judy; Beke, Jensen, Mercer (2000-12-20). "Harvesting Fragments of Time". McGrawHill Ryerson. (Team Researcher) (Led by McGraw-Hill to design a model around "mobile learning" device distribution for students.)
  • Gilfus, Stephen (2002-09-15) "Release of Bb SCORM Player". Blackboard Inc.. (SCORM 1.2 Player in collaboration with the National Defense University, ADL Co-Labs, and the DOD)
  • Ganis, Frank; Gilfus, Stephen (2009-04-10) "Social Learning" Buzz Masks Deeper Dimensions". Gilfus Education Group (One issue with today’s offerings for social software in education is that they are being presented as “social learning” solutions, but they are not being designed, packaged or integrated with the greater concepts of social learning theory in mind.)

Presentations

Industry References

References

  1. ↑ http://www.news.cornell.edu/Chronicle/97/10.16.97/Web_company.html
  2. ↑
  3. ↑ "Benchmarking Blackboard– From Champions To Transformers"
  4. ↑ "Educational Technology Framework"
  5. ↑
  6. ↑ "Pearson's Course Compass"
  7. ↑ Blackboard's K12 strategy
  8. ↑ "Gilfus Education Group"
  9. ↑ "Entrepreneurship@Cornell"
  10. ↑ "Weil, Dewey Advise on $1.6B Education Deal"

External links

See also

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