End of Semester Email to Blackboard Faculty – Spring 2019
Greetings Blackboard Faculty,
We hope your Spring is going well! Here are some reminders of events, Blackboard system updates, and procedures that we’d like you to be aware of while you’re finishing out the Spring 2019 term!
Blackboard – What to expect over the next year
Blackboard Upgrade, May 14th, 2019, starting at 8PM – More information about what features will be in the next Blackboard Learn upgrade can be found in What’s New?
Blackboard Migration to SaaS – Planned for December 19th, 2019. This will mostly be a back-end (infrastructure) change and will include the introduction of the 2016 theme.
Respondus Monitor – Trial Opportunity! – Open to all instructors. Trial period is May 1st, 2019 – July 31st, 2019. If you are interested in participating in the trial taking place from May 1st through July 31st, please send an email to consultls@vcu.edu. We will add you to the trial and send out an invite.
VCU CTLE / Learning Systems Partnership – TEA Sessions
Kaltura Mediaspace Basics
Date: Thursday, April 18, 12-1pm
Location: ALC room 4100
Description: Learn all about how to manage your video in Kaltura MediaSpace! Learn how to perform all the fundamental tasks needed to deliver instructional video content to your students; make simple edits to videos without leaving Kaltura. Add closed captioning, create channels and playlists, add clever thumbnails, and much more!
Register Here
Using Rubrics for Assessment in Blackboard
Date: Tuesday April 30th, 2019, 12:30-1:30pm
Location: ALC 4100
Description: Have you heard about grading rubrics, but want to know more? Do you use rubrics for your students’ assignments, but do you know how to embed the rubric into Blackboard? You can share the rubric with students (or not) and then use in-line grading to score the rubric directly inside of Blackboard. This workshop will be hands-on, so bring your own device, and we’ll build a rubric together and grade an assignment using the in-line grading tool in a sandbox course.
Register Here
LMS Test Drive Sessions
Learning Systems and Online@VCU are partnering to host LMS Test Drive sessions. We want to hear feedback from Blackboard Faculty on two different modern LMS platforms; Blackboard Ultra and Instructure Canvas
Times and Locations
- Monday, April 15th in Cabell B41 from 8:00 AM – 4:00 PM, Monroe Park Campus
- Tuesday, April 16th in Sanger B1-020 from 8:00 AM – 4:00 PM, MCV Campus
- Wednesday, April 24th in Cabell B41 from 8:00 AM – 4:00 PM, Monroe Park Campus
- Thursday, April 25th in Sanger B1-020 from 12:30 PM – 4:30 PM, MCV Campus
Reminders
Blackboard Course Retention – In order to maintain system integrity and efficiency, Bb courses and user accounts are archived, deleted and/or made unavailable on a regular basis throughout the year. This maintenance is based on State and VCU-defined procedures and guidelines. Notices will be posted in the Learning Systems Announcements blog prior to any course archiving or deletions.
Note: Spring 2019 Courses will be set to “unavailable” status after June 3rd, 2019. Instructors will still have access to their courses, but students will not. Click here for instructions on how to make your course available to students if needed.
Final Grades and Downloading the Blackboard Grade Center
- Bb’s Grade Center is NOT the official source for grades. Grade sheets are available on faculty eServices. Final grades are due by noon on Tuesday, May 14th, 2019.
- Downloading the Bb Grade Center can be done at any time, but we strongly recommend faculty download the Grade Center in their Bb courses at the end of the semester, to retain the most accurate data for future grade references. Click here for download instructions.
Thank you,
VCU Learning Systems
Categories Bb News, Bb9 upgrade, Blackboard Downtime, Blackboard Notice, Faculty, Private