Use of User Tour, Contact Form, and Accessibility Plugins in Enhancing a Moodle-Based Virtual Conference Experience

Abstract

Academic conferences have been conducted in an online or hybrid setup ever since the onset of the pandemic. Various virtual platforms have arised to address this need but most of them are costly and offer varying features. The use of Moodle as a virtual conference platform is now being explored worldwide. The University of the Philippines Open University has used Moodle together with user tour function and plugins such as contact support and accessibility for its semi-annual National Conference on Open and Distance eLearning this 2022. The purpose of integrating these features is to enhance a Moodle-based virtual conference experience. A survey was conducted at the end of the conference to measure the effectiveness of using these features. Results showed that using user tour, contact support and accessibility plugins significantly enhanced the Moodle-based virtual conference experience of the participants. The use of these Moodle features can also still be improved in the future as suggested by the participants.