Instructure, the technology company serving the academic market through its Canvas learning management system (LMS), today opened its APAC Headquarters at Tank Stream Labs in Sydney, Australia. In response to growing demand for Canvas from Australian educators in both K-12 and higher education, Instructure has also made a number of strategic appointments including Julian Ridden as Open Education Evangelist and Troy Martin as Director of APAC.
Canvas is the user-friendly alternative to archaic LMS’s, allowing teachers and lecturers to swiftly and easily integrate a vast education marketplace of third-party apps and multimedia features into their course content. The cloud-based platform allows educators to build creative multimedia “mashups” using tools like Vimeo and YouTube. It also gives students the choice to receive personally tailored course alerts through text, Twitter or Facebook, and facilitates “learning-on-the-move” through smartphone apps.
“We are committed to modern education in Australia, and want to partner with institutions that want to bring their teaching and learning into 21st Century,” said Troy Martin, Director of APAC at Canvas by Instructure. “Our rapidly growing team will support existing customers as well as reach out to more schools, universities, TAFES and RTOs across Australia.”
Instructure today services 25 educational institutions in Australia who have deployed the open source, cloud-based LMS. Most noteworthy, Newington College in Sydney has been using Canvas since 2011 and the easy to use LMS continues to exceed their expectations:
“One of the greatest challenges with deploying any technology across an organisation is getting people to use it,” said Sean Corcoran, Head of Teaching and Learning at Newington College. “Canvas is so user friendly that the entire school community has really embraced the unique learning tool. Since its implementation, Canvas has dramatically improved the richness of teaching and learning at our school.”
Canvas runs on a multi-tenant, native cloud architecture, which by the end of 2014 will be hosted in Australia on industry-leading Amazon Web Services, with a 99.9 percent uptime guarantee. Canvas provides institutions peace of mind, knowing their information is accessible, safe and secure.
“Australia is crying out for an alternative to the existing LMS platforms. Canvas is the product of technologists building a solution for educators,” said, Julian Ridden, Open Education Evangelist in Australia at Canvas by Instructure. “This sets it head and shoulders above the outdated LMSs being used by the majority of education facilities across the country. The new generation of digital native students need a revolutionary product – Canvas is the solution.”
Founded in Salt Lake City, Utah, Instructure entered the LMS market in 2011. Since its inception, Canvas has grown exponentially, adding 450 employees in the last three years, and providing education software to more than 12 million users worldwide. The entrance into Australia and wider APAC region builds upon success in the U.S. and U.K., where institutions launched Canvas as an alternative to the decade-old technology offered by traditional LMS providers. In North America, Instructure has signed contracts with more than 900 higher ed and K-12 institutions.
ABOUT INSTRUCTURE
Instructure, Inc. developed the Canvas learning management system to make teaching and learning easier for everyone, everywhere. Canvas empowers learning in every context with open, usable SaaS technologies. And through Canvas Network, Instructure provides a cloud platform where teachers, learners, and institutions worldwide can connect and chart their own course for personal growth, professional development, and academic inquiry.
Copyright (c) 2014, Instructure, Inc. All rights reserved. Instructure, Canvas and their respective logos are registered trademarks or trademarks of Instructure, Inc. in the United States and/or other countries. Other brands and names may be claimed as the property of others.
Contacts
Australian media contact
Hotwire PR, Kya de Rome and Eleanor Sampson
canvasaus@hotwirepr.com
+02-8985-7294
Canvas by Instructure
Devin Knighton
+1-801-722-8187 | devin@instructure.com
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