Promoting Education Excellence in Dubai, for Cadets and Beyond
Dubai Police Academy (DPA) supports thousands of learners in pursuing a quality education and fulfilling career. Central to this objective is its cadets’ program, which provides all the training required to qualify as a police officer and immediately begin working as part of the force.
In addition, DPA extends opportunities outside of the law enforcement sector. This includes accredited higher education programs, including night classes to allow flexibility for those balancing their studies with work or other responsibilities.
The Challenge
Providing a Centralized, Accessible Learning Environment for All Students
Given the broad range of students that the institution supports, DPA sought a modern, connected learning management system (LMS) to power their portfolio of programs. Of particular importance was having a learning environment that could be accessed at all times and from all devices, forming a single, centralized hub for all students as they progressed through their courses.
Speaking about the Academy’s digital transformation, 1st Lieutenant Hamad Khalil Albishri, head of technical development at DPA, said, “We understand that students’ expectations are changing, and that education must evolve in response. Having an intuitive digital learning platform that can support our diverse range of programs was our key priority.”
The Solution
A Pioneering Adoption of Blackboard
Following a market review, DPA chose to pursue a partnership with Anthology and implement the Blackboard® LMS. Having a cloud-based platform enables the institution to scale its programs, provide constant access for learners, promote innovation, and enhance engagement with digital learning materials. Further, it allows DPA’s instructors access to Blackboard’s suite of market-leading AI capabilities, which provide inspiration and efficiency for the crucial tasks of course creation, assessment development, and grading.
This makes DPA the first law enforcement institution in the region to launch a SaaS deployment of Blackboard, reflecting their ambition to be at the forefront of learning innovation.
We’re proud to be leading the sector by adopting the latest in education technology. As AI becomes a crucial component of teaching and learning, we’re delighted to work with Anthology to realize its potential in an exciting and ethical way.”
1st Lieutenant Hamad Khalil Albishri, Head of Technical Development, Dubai Police Academy
Insights Delivered
An Enhanced Experience for Both Students and Instructors
Adopting Blackboard has brought a range of benefits for DPA’s students. It provides the centralized environment that DPA’s leadership envisaged, and learners are delighted to have easy and instant access to all materials. They enjoy the diverse range of activity types offered within the LMS, including recent additions like the AI Conversation, as well as having all their graded tasks and feedback readily available in a common location.
For instructors, they have found it far easier to distribute content at scale, with the AI tools mentioned above streamlining the creation of important tasks and documents. Blackboard supports a range of group tasks and assessments, which DPA’s instructors apply regularly to promote collaboration and teamwork—skills that are imperative in the law enforcement sector. Lastly, core administrative tasks such as reporting and managing the academic calendar are now far less time consuming.
The result is an impressive increase in student engagement. Access to the LMS is now ubiquitous across both student and instructor populations, with the LMS providing a centralized learning hub for all DPA’s courses. The volume of assessable work submitted via the LMS is now more than eight times higher, while discussion involvement has increased by 41% and total content views have more than doubled.
Commenting on these outcomes, 1st Lt. Albishri said, “The improvements we’ve seen reflect a genuine shift in engagement. Learners are more connected, and educators are empowered with better tools to deliver effective and interactive teaching.”
Epilogue
Anthology would like to thank 1st Lt. Albishri and team for their time in sharing their experiences with us, and for their work on behalf of learners. We are excited to continue our partnership with DPA to bring enhanced teaching and learning experiences to students and instructors alike.
Want to learn more? Check out all that Blackboard has to offer today.
