Loren Data's SAM Daily™

FBO DAILY - FEDBIZOPPS ISSUE OF MARCH 04, 2016 FBO #5215
DOCUMENT

U -- VA Acquisition Academy Hosted Web Based Continuous Learning Environment RFI - Attachment

Notice Date

3/2/2016
 

Notice Type

Attachment
 

NAICS

511210 — Software Publishers
 

Contracting Office

Department of Veterans Affairs;VA Denver Acquisition & Logistics Center;(003A4D);555 Corporate Circle;Golden CO 80401-5621
 

ZIP Code

80401-5621
 

Solicitation Number

VA79116N0025
 

Response Due

3/9/2016
 

Archive Date

5/8/2016
 

Point of Contact

Kyle Shaffer, Contract Specialist
 

Small Business Set-Aside

N/A
 

Description

VAAA Hosted Web Based Continuous Learning Environment RFI PURPOSE: The Department of Veterans Affairs Denver Acquisition & Logistics Center (VA DALC), in support of the VA Acquisition Academy (VAAA), is seeking sources for a Hosted Web Based Continuous Learning Environment (please see details below). The purpose of this Request for Information (RFI) is to provide interested parties the opportunity to inform the VA of their capabilities to carry out the services addressed in the Statement of Objectives (SOO). The information provided in response to the RFI will assist the VA in understanding industry capabilities. THIS IS NOT A SOLICITATION FOR OFFERS AND NO CONTRACT WILL BE AWARDED FROM THIS EVENT. This announcement serves as a sources sought, request for information, issued solely for informational and planning purposes. Continuous Learning Environment (CLE) Statement of Objectives (SOO) I. BACKGROUND All Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) staff has access to the VA Learning Management System (LMS) called the Talent Management System (TMS), which provides much of the core training administration and knowledge management functionality for the agency. A platform that primarily drives registration and course delivery, the TMS is best suited as a vehicle for short self-paced trainings within the VA. The TMS, however, is not sufficiently robust to offer facilitated, interactive learning experiences. Specifically, it does not support community engagement functionalities such as learner/instructor communication, threaded discussions, collaborative editing, file sharing, screen sharing, application sharing, synchronous coaching and mentoring, and ad hoc study group creation. Consequently, the VAAA is looking to implement a hosted web based continuous learning environment to provide 24/7 access to knowledge and information and provide innovative ways to foster learning anywhere at any time. II. OBJECTIVE OR SCOPE OF EFFORT The Veterans Affairs Acquisition Academy (VAAA), which opened in 2008 in Frederick, Maryland, is the first acquisition academy in a civilian government agency created in response to the growing acquisition workforce challenge. The five professional schools - Acquisition Internship School, Federal Contracting Professional School, Federal Program/Project Management, Supply Chain Management, and Facilities Management - offer a fully integrated competency-based training curriculum to certify acquisition professionals, as well as continuing education to maintain their credentials. Annually, VAAA trains 9,900 employees and independent contractors/franchisees through classroom and online training sessions. The VAAA is looking to enhance operations with a continuous learning environment that will not only integrate with the current TMS platform, but also increase the platform capabilities to sufficiently support an environment providing access to online content and interactive features before, during, and after face to face training events. The VAAA also has as a strategic goal: the development and deployment of a continuous learning environment that will significantly enhance the existing training capabilities and enable the VAAA to train students anywhere, at any time, without the cost of travel and physical space. Based on a derived understanding of the stated goals and objectives, the VAAA requires the following services and program for a successful solution rollout, implementation, and ongoing support of this effort. The VAAA seeks a web-based continuous learning environment that is virtual and has interactive learning spaces designed to manage and increase various aspects of learning: delivery of learning materials, learner tracking, assessment and evaluation functions, and learner and trainer/facilitator communication and collaboration. A core strategic value of a web-based CLE is that it offers an environment where high interactivity among participants, facilitators, and content experts is available. Participants are able to actively reflect upon content, problem solve through facilitated discussions and team exercises, and engage in continuous peer interaction. This high degree of interactivity enables the VA to better support the transfer of newly acquired skills directly back to job performance. 1.The CLE must interoperate with several IT data systems for registration and student record accountability. All IT solutions must be in compliance with appropriate governmental IT and security policies. The VAAA is seeking a secured and standardized web service interface available for use by the VAAA's designated training support system, i.e., Talent Management System (TMS), to capture information from electronic transcripts of completed training to support auditing, quality assurance, and comprehensive analysis and reporting of acquisition training. This interface shall support regular data exchange with VA's talent management system based on standardized commercial data exchange methodologies such as SOA technologies. (IT security policies to be identified by the Information Security Officer) Objective CLE Characteristics The minimum capabilities requested are as follows: "Course delivery capabilities requested include content management, assessment, communication and collaboration tools that empower educators to create, align, and manage online learning resources for coursework. "Traditional online course management functionality in the form of course creation, user self enrollment or supervisor enrollment, as well as test creation, question pools, assignment creation and collection tools, and a comprehensive data warehouse environment. "Course Evaluation and Survey Manager that allows the instructor or course designer to create a survey for evaluation and opinion polls. Surveys should be able to be timed, reused and modified. "An automated certificate creation capability (that can be tied to the completion of a final course evaluation or survey), including the ability to send certificates to users via email upon course completion. "Provide a community collaboration environment that provides space for information sharing and dissemination and role based content delivery. "Provide detailed reports providing information on course and system utilization, user demographics, total number of users enrolled and unique users, courses taken/ course completions, user performance, as well as the ability for the VAAA to access the central data repository and generate additional reports. "Provides a range of native synchronous and asynchronous communication and collaboration tools for learners, instructors, and administrators, as well as the capability to add third-party collaboration tools. Collaboration tools are used to engage learners, create and share information within diverse communities of interest across courses, and develop new ways to provide support for non-traditional learners, such as mentoring and coaching opportunities. Asynchronous communication tools will include: ?Email?Messaging ?Discussion Forums?Announcements ?Tasks?Calendar ?File Exchange and Sharing ?Blogs, Journals, and Wikis Synchronous communication tools will include: ?Chat?Virtual Classroom ? Instant Messaging The CLE should provide a robust real-time web-conferencing/virtual classroom solution that includes the following: "Ability to create live training sessions with recording capability for archive and later playback/viewing "24/7 end-user technical support "On-site and on-line training "Designated implementation consultation "All managed hosting services "Access to all online resources, training materials, and user guides "Network optimization consultation services: Designed to develop an efficient technical implementation of products to provide the most effective infrastructure to maximize the performance of the CLE CLE Managed Hosting Services The VAAA is looking for enhance secure storage capabilities in an order of magnitude of two (2) terabytes to store course content developed for an online Learning Management System (LMS). Based on a derived understanding of the stated goals and objectives, the VAAA requires the following services and program for a successful solution rollout, implementation, and ongoing support of this effort. The VAAA seeks web-based storage capability of the file types depicted in the following table capable of a transferring the various file types into a Shareable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM) 2004 compliance for eventual upload to a LMS. ExtensionFile TypeAssociated Program or Application.aamMultimediaAuthorware Plug-in www.macromedia.com.aiffAudioAudio program.asfMultimediaWindows Media Player www.microsoft.com.auAudioRealPlayer www.realaudio.com.aviVideoWindows Media Player (not Mac-compatible!).docDocumentMicrosoft Word or other word processor.eaAudioJava enabled Web Browser.ev,.ev2VideoJava enabled Web Browser.exeProgram--NA--.gifGIF ImageGraphics program or web browser.html,.htmWeb PageHTML editor or web browser.jpg,.jpeg,.jifJPEG ImageGraphics program or web browser.mpg,.mpegVideoWindows Media Player or RealPlayer.movVideoQuicktime Player.pdfDocumentAdobe Acrobat www.adobe.com.pngPNG ImageGraphics program or web browser.ppt,.ppsSlide ShowPowerPoint & PowerPoint Player.qtMovieQuicktime Player www.apple.com.raRealAudioRealPlayer www.realaudio.com.rmRealVideoRealPlayer www.realaudio.com.rtfRich TextWordPad, BBedit or word processor.swaAudioShockwave Plug-in www.macromedia.com.swvMultimediaShockwave Plug-in www.macromedia.com.swfMultimediaShockwave Flash Plug-in www.macromedia.com.tif,.tiffTIFF ImageGraphics program.txtPlain TextText or HTML editor, word processor.wavAudioAudio program.wpdDocumentWordPerfect or other word processor.xlsSpreadsheetMicrosoft Excel or other spreadsheet app. The web-based storage system must interoperate with several IT data systems including LMS that are SCORM 2004 compliant. Managed Hosting Services Infrastructure, deployment, and day-to-day operation and maintenance of the physical hardware and other supporting IT components required for the managed hosting services for online course content development for the VAAA is the full responsibility of the Contractor Managed Hosting Service. In addition, the provider maintains responsibility for supporting application administrators, as well as managing application and infrastructure security, redundant data backup, system and application upgrades and maintenance, application tuning, and all other aspects of a complete enterprise management solution. VAAA requesting information on feasible solutions an enterprise level solution for Managed Hosting Services of the scope and depth described in this document. CLE Student Services Support Functioning as an extension of the VAAA first tier end user help desk, Students Services consultants will provide remote 24/7 system support in regards to the CLE. During the initial implementation year and for each exercised option year (up to four), Student Services Support should provide full and ongoing system support services, including front end user technical assistance, troubleshooting, and issue escalation. The support solution will answer any end user questions related to the features and functions of the technology and address routine CLE-associated technical issues. Student Services should allow existing VAAA staff members to focus on the complex functions such as course design with instructors, hands on instructor training, reporting and problem management, while Student Services focuses on the routine CLE system requests and troubleshooting. By enabling 24/7 multi-modal interactions CLE Student Services can move the needle on key support metrics, allowing the VAAA staff to spend more time focused on strategy: oIncrease self help ratios oIncrease consistency of learner/trainee experience oDecrease cost per user interaction oDecrease user confusion about where to find answers Incident Management Incident management system capabilities would provide management of service inquiries from inception to resolution as well as escalate inquiries between CLE Student Services and the VAAA. The system will provide shared insight into the status of open service requests, inbound and outbound communications, and real-time information on escalations between teams. The shared incident management system requirements are: "Distributed rights, roles, domains, privileges "Incident tracking and resolution across multiple channels "Strategic architecture for creating reporting fields and issue types "Identify appropriate service levels by issue type "Routing, dispatching, and escalation policies and procedures "Reporting database for generating real time support dashboard metrics "Customer satisfaction and monitoring "Criteria for launching surveys and access to reports Knowledge Management The Knowledge Management System (KMS) requirements are: "Online knowledge base, live chat, toll free number, self-help, auto-upload capabilities-one knowledge base serves all constituents "Distributed rights, roles, domains, privileges "Internal Knowledgebase architecture, processes, and procedures The knowledge base should be an ideal environment for posting important announcements that will affect the user experience including policy changes, key deadlines, and system outages. Users can select the most convenient forms of communication to resolve their issue, including email, chat, phone, or self help. Members of the Student Services team will track the most frequently asked questions and identify opportunities for proactive outreach to the VAAA user community. CLE Consulting and Training The consulting services and programs are designed to support the VAAA throughout the full technology lifecycle, from vision to implementation to performance. During an initial year of consulting and training, CLE Consultants will deliver instruction to VAAA system administrators, instructors, and support staff in the essential features and functions of the platform technology. Training will build the requisite skills in online course design, online instruction methodology, and pilot program management. Upon take-over of operations, CLE Consulting will provide full and ongoing support services for a period of five years. CLE Consulting will work with the VAAA to develop a realistic plan to implement the CLE solution and position the system in the overall enterprise environment. "Identify stakeholders and their needs as it relates to the CLE implementation "Identify and mitigate implementation risks "Establish course migration requirements, including needs and priorities "Create a strategic implementation road map "Review existing policies and craft administrative guidelines for the CLE environment shared with multiple stakeholders "Establish a comprehensive understanding of system implications, security, integration, features, and functions "Define governance and change management rules of managing the CLE system "Develop a detailed project plan that incorporates the specific tasks and dependencies comprising the work streams and phases of the implementation In addition, Training Consultants will deliver initial training on the teaching and learning and the administrative aspects of the platform ensuring VA staff are trained on the core capabilities of the CLE solution. INFORMATION REQUESTED: The VAAA is requesting responders provide a capabilities statement describing their system and how it addresses the components listed in the SOO above. Please prepare a written response to the following questions and submit those to Kyle Shaffer by COB Wednesday, March 9, 2016. VA is issuing this Sources Sought RFI to determine: oCorporate Capabilities and Experience oTechnologies employed and Methodologies In addition to a capabilities statement, interested parties shall provide answers to the following questions in their response: 1.What do you see as a possible timeline to successfully deploy this system from award to go live? 2.What additional information would you need to know from VA to develop an approach for go live? 3.Do you currently possess the resources and capabilities to successfully implement a Hosted Web Based Continuous Learning Environment solution? 4.What experience do you have in successfully deploying a Hosted Web Based Continuous Learning Environment? 5.What is the socio-economic status of your company? 6.Is your company a GSA Schedule holder? Questions concerning this RFI may be submitted to Kyle.Shaffer@va.gov.
 

Web Link

FBO.gov Permalink
(https://www.fbo.gov/spg/VA/VADDC791/VADDC791/VA79116N0025/listing.html)
 

Document(s)

Attachment
 

File Name: VA791-16-N-0025 VA791-16-N-0025_1.docx (https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=2591481&FileName=VA791-16-N-0025-000.docx)

Link: https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=2591481&FileName=VA791-16-N-0025-000.docx

 

Note: If links are broken, refer to Point of Contact above or contact the FBO Help Desk at 877-472-3779.
 

Place of Performance

Address: VA Acquisition Academy;7485 New Horizon Way;Frederick, MD

Zip Code: 21703-8388
 

Record

SN04036944-W 20160304/160302234850-cf7475ea9a6538289c64a567bbd6c28e (fbodaily.com)
 

Source

FedBizOpps Link to This Notice
(may not be valid after Archive Date)

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