Reminder: Blackboard Scholar Service and Support to be Discontinued
Blackboard notified us this Fall that they will cease offering and supporting Scholar™, which is a social bookmarking service integrated with our Blackboard Learn™ platform. Scholar will be removed from our Blackboard system on January 12, 2012 at 7:30a.m.
For instructors that have added Scholar Streams as content items in any of your Blackboard courses or Organizations, please be aware that those Streams will no longer function after 7:30a.m. on January 12, 2012. You should remove these content items from your courses.
If you were/are using Scholar you can export your bookmarks for use elsewhere (i.e. another social bookmarking service like “Delicious”, http://www.delicious.com). The exporting process is documented in the Technology Services AskIT Knowledge Base article Migrate Scholar Bookmarks into a Browser or Another Social Bookmarking Service.
Additional Information about Blackboard’s decision to cease support for Scholar
“Client feedback indicated social bookmarking was too narrow of a social activity and difficult to integrate in instructional practices. Based on the low usage of Scholar, we feel our focus and development resources are better spent on other key areas. Blackboard is fully committed to social learning and is working on several development projects that will improve the close connection and integration of social learning and the classroom. Enabling Blackboard students and faculty to connect with each other through Blackboard Learn and through other social media applications remains a key component of the Blackboard vision.”