LMS for Higher Education — Self-Hostable, Open-Source, FERPA-Ready
A learning management system built for universities and colleges that have outgrown Canvas pricing or Blackboard rigidity. SCORM/xAPI, LTI 1.3, Shibboleth federated SSO, native integration with admissions, fees, and library, and a path off per-active-learner billing models. LGPLv3 Community Edition. Enterprise from $19 per staff user.
A higher education LMS delivers course content, assessments, grades, and analytics for university and college learners — typically integrated with the SIS, library, and identity provider. OpenEduCat is an open-source, self-hostable LMS for higher education with native admissions, fees, library, and hostel modules; Shibboleth and SAML SSO; LTI 1.3 for Turnitin and Proctorio; and an LGPLv3 license that eliminates per-active-learner billing.
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Course Catalog & Section Management
Term-based course catalog with section CRNs, prerequisites, credit-hour weighting, and section-cap enforcement. Catalog publishes to the public-facing course schedule for prospective students; section enrollment ties into the SIS without CSV middleware.
LTI 1.3 — Turnitin, Proctorio, Kaltura, H5P
LTI 1.3 Advantage with Names and Roles, Deep Linking, and Assignment and Grade Services. Plug in Turnitin for plagiarism, Proctorio or Honorlock for proctoring, Kaltura for video, H5P for interactive content, and Cengage/Pearson for publisher courseware. Tool launch from the course page; grades return automatically.
Shibboleth & SAML 2.0 Federation
Federated SSO via Shibboleth (InCommon, eduGAIN, AAF) or SAML 2.0 directly to Azure AD, Okta, Google Workspace, or Ping. One faculty or student login covers LMS, library, parking, Wi-Fi, and any other federated service the university operates.
Native ERP Integration — Admissions, Fees, Library
The LMS shares the same database as openeducat_admission, openeducat_fees, openeducat_library, and openeducat_hostel. A new admit auto-enrolls in their first-term courses; fee holds block grade visibility per institutional policy; library reading lists attach to course pages. No CSV exports between systems.
OneRoster & Ed-Fi Sync
OneRoster 1.2 and Ed-Fi sync push roster, enrollment, and grade data to district or system reporting endpoints. Multi-campus university systems (Texas, California, NSW, Russell Group equivalents) reconcile group-level data without nightly batch jobs.
Accreditation Outcome Mapping
Course outcomes map to program outcomes which map to accreditor outcomes (ABET, AACSB, EQUIS, NAAC, NBA, regional accreditors). Faculty assess outcomes per assignment; the system rolls up program-level attainment data for accreditor self-studies. Six-year accreditation cycles compress prep work from months to weeks.
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Canvas invoices climb 12-18% per year per active learner; Blackboard contract renewals demand multi-year lock-in; Moodle is technically capable but visually dated and lacks ERP integration. The dean wants federation, native ERP, and an exit ramp from per-learner pricing.
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OpenEduCat self-hosts on the university PostgreSQL cluster behind the VPN. Shibboleth federates the existing identity, LTI 1.3 plugs in Turnitin and Proctorio, and admissions-fees-library all share the same database. License spend drops to zero; operating cost is hosting plus one DevOps engineer.
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Smaller institutions cannot absorb $40K-150K/yr LMS contracts on flat enrollment, but cannot self-host Moodle without IT capacity. They need a low-budget, low-ops LMS with grade-and-go simplicity.
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Community Edition runs on a $40-80/mo VPS with Docker. Faculty UX is comparable to Canvas; admin overhead is low. Implementation partner handles initial setup; ongoing operations require one part-time IT staffer. Annual cost falls below $10K all-in.
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A 12-campus university system runs 4 different LMS platforms (legacy Blackboard, two Canvas tenants, one Moodle install). Group reporting needs nightly CSV reconciliation; SSO is partial; license spend totals $1M+ across redundant contracts.
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One install in multi-company mode covers all 12 campuses. Each campus runs its own course catalog and grading policy; system-level dashboards roll up enrollment, completion, and outcome attainment in real time. Per-active-learner billing disappears. Paid Enterprise seats cover only staff, not learners.
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How does this compare to Canvas LMS for a 15,000-student university?
Canvas is a strong product with a polished UX. The trade-off is per-active-learner billing (typically $15-25 per active student per year, with annual increases), SaaS-only deployment, and integration with university ERP only via LTI middleware. OpenEduCat is open-source under LGPLv3 with no per-active-learner cost, self-hostable for FERPA data residency, and shares the same database as admissions, fees, library, and hostel. Universities that prioritize data ownership and ERP unification migrate; universities that need pure best-of-breed LMS UX often stay with Canvas.
Does it handle ABET, AACSB, NAAC, and similar accreditation reporting?
Yes. Course-level outcomes map to program outcomes which roll up to accreditor outcomes. Faculty assess outcomes per assignment using rubrics; the system aggregates program-level attainment data per cohort per year. Self-study reports for ABET, AACSB, EQUIS, AMBA, NAAC, NBA, and regional accreditors export from real assessment data — not reconstructed spreadsheets. Universities running their accreditation self-study on OpenEduCat report 50-70% reduction in prep time per cycle.
Will Shibboleth federation work with our existing identity?
Yes. Shibboleth federation via InCommon (US), eduGAIN (international), AAF (Australia), or your campus IdP works out of the box. SAML 2.0 directly to Azure AD, Okta, Google Workspace, or Ping is also supported. Federated login covers the LMS plus library, parking, Wi-Fi, and any other federated service. SSO is not paywalled to Enterprise — it ships in Community Edition.
Is it FERPA compliant for US universities?
FERPA compliance is a function of how you deploy. Self-hosted on US infrastructure with role-based access, audit logs, and directory-information controls satisfies FERPA cleanly — the institution remains the data controller. Many SaaS LMS vendors require third-party data-sharing agreements that complicate FERPA at the edges. Self-hosted OpenEduCat eliminates that vector. EU universities deploy in EU regions for GDPR; UK universities align with UK GDPR and JISC frameworks.
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A learning management system sized for elementary, middle, and high schools — standards-aligned gradebook, parent portal visibility from kindergarten through grade 12, COPPA defaults for under-13 students, and clean handoff from Google Classroom or Microsoft Teams. Free Community Edition for budget-tight districts.
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A university-grade open-source LMS for institutions that want to own their learning data, federate with their existing identity, and integrate course delivery with admissions, fees, library, and research records — without per-active-learner billing or vendor roadmap dependence. LGPLv3 source on GitHub. Migration paths from Moodle, Canvas, and Blackboard documented.
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