In early 2000, Congress issued a mandate that the USDA must provide workers with Web-based courseware or classroom-based learning to support the USDA's initiatives. Although farmers were instantly interested in the Web-based option, they found that it did not produce the ease of use or benefits they experienced in the classroom, such as collaborating with classmates and discussions with teachers and other industry experts.

The USDA addressed this issue in June 2000, by evaluating multiple Learning Management Systems (LMS) and selecting mGen Enterprise as the platform to deliver web based training and communications materials to 110,000 USDA employees, and, eventually, public/private sector clients across the U.S. mGen Enterprise's scaling architecture, its ability to handle various types of multimedia and its ease of use were key reasons for the selection. The initial pilot phase of the program was delivered to the USDA in Washington DC in June 2000 and in February 2001 mGen received an upgrade contract to expand the system.

Since the initial deployment the USDA has experienced a substantial ROI due to the fact that they no longer have to outsource much of the development of HTML based courseware. The mGen Production Suite (Producer, Quiz and Test) enables USDA personnel to produce HTML content internally without requiring any previous programming knowledge. The money saved allows the USDA to provide additional courses and content, which ensures that the farmers receive the specific training they need.

At the present time, mGen Enterprise is being used to train USDA personnel and a select group of farmers around the country. The USDA's vision of the program for the next five years is to deliver training and communications material on demand to its offices nationwide and to each farmer's home via the Internet.

" The mGen staff have been incredible. They have been true partners in implementing the USDA Online University and have incorporated many suggestions I have made for product enhancements. The mGen staff has also been extremely responsive. On one occasion, I needed help on the administration of the product and they flew a support team in within 24 hours."

Director