Online Communities are necessary to bring learners from diverse geographic locations together using the internet.  In order to build Online Communities that are valuable to learners, we used the instructional design process of Analyze, Design, Develop, Implement and Evaluate (ADDIE).  Here is a summary of an Instructional Design course through Oklahoma State University that outlines the strengths of ADDIE as an instructional design process, and the reasons why it was used to create our NASA Online Learning Communities detailed below.

For our NASA GSFC Online Communities, we've been using an open-source learning management system (LMS) hosted through Blackboard called Coursesites.  Here is an overview video of why LMS's have been a disruptive and innovative technology in learning environments.