DoIT News

Posted by fritz at 12:45 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

SP2008 UMBC Blackboard Update

UMBC Blackboard update is provided by the Office of Information Technology for
students, faculty and staff using Blackboard at UMBC. If you have questions or
suggestions, contact John Fritz (fritz@umbc.edu or 410.455.6596) or Bob Armstrong
(rarmstro@umbc.edu or 410.455.3885). For more information about using Blackboard,
login via myUMBC or visit http://blackboard.umbc.edu.

HEADLINES

1. SP2008 Course Shells Expire on 6/15

2. SU2008 Course Shells Created on 4/30

3. OIT Publishes FA2007 Blackboard User Survey Results

4. New myUMBC Tools Show How Good Students Use Blackboard

5. UMBC Joins Two National, Online Learning Faculty Development Networks

6. Job Opening: UMBC Blackboard Graduate Assistant

7. FYI: Using Blackboard for Job Search or RFP Committees

8. FYI: OIT to Upgrade Labs to MS Office 2007 (PC) & 2008 (Mac)

9. FYI: BbWorld'08 World Conference is July15-17

Posted by fritz at 12:42 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

May 2, 2008

Job Opening: Blackboard Graduate Assistant

OIT’s Instructional Technology & New Media unit seeks a graduate assistant to provide Blackboard support to students, faculty and staff. The person will assist with routine Bb system administration functions (e.g., course & community site creation), and development of Blackboard user support procedures and documentation. Candidates will be expected to work well in a collaborative team environment and to communicate effectively with customers from a variety of academic and administrative departments.

In the past, special projects have included design and development of the following:

UMBC Blackboard Reports
UMBC Blackboard Help

The successful candidate must be self-directed and work well communicating information to technical and non-technical users. The candidate must also be able to interact with customers of all levels in a highly professional and competent manner.

Qualifications

The qualified candidate must be an officially registered UMBC graduate student with demonstrable experience providing end-user support. The candidate must have good problem-solving skills, strong analytical and organization skills, and excellent oral/written communications skills. Experience with web application development (ideally using PHP & MySQL) is preferred.

Compensation & Hours

Term (9 Month)
Closing Date: Open until filled
Compensation: TBD by Graduate School policy (typically stipend, tuition & health)
Hours:
• PT (20 hours/week) in Fall & Spring
• FT (40 hours/week) possible in Winter & Summer

Application Process | Show Me (video)

1. Login to Blackboard via myUMBC or directly at http://blackboard.umbc.edu
2. Search for and “Enroll” in the “Blackboard User Group” organization on the Bb Community tab
3. Complete the “UMBC Bb GA” application by attaching the following:

- Cover Letter (include a brief description of how you use Blackboard now)
- Resume or CV
- Unofficial PDF version of your transcript from myUMBC
- Names of three references and how they know your work
- Note: You can “save” your application and come back, but can only “submit” it once.

Send an email to blackboard@umbc.edu when you have submitted your application using the process described above, or if you need help doing so.

Posted by fritz at 12:15 PM | TrackBack

April 29, 2008

Students Provide Insight Through Fall Blackboard Survey

As we've done in the past, OIT again conducted it's Undergraduate student survey in Fall 2007 with 759 students participating. The survey was divided into several sections including general demographics, an open-ended section for students to recommend instructors that they perceive to be strong users of BlackBoard, tool usage and functionality, and suggestions for improvements.

The most original comments were received when students were asked to recommend an instructor who they viewed as a strong user of Blackboard. Respondents listed numerous faculty members with the following faculty receiving the highest number of positive comments:

• Phil Sokolove (Biology)


• Lili Cui (Physics)


• Clayton Laurie (History)


• Tara Carpenter (Chemistry)


• Eileen O’Brien (Psychology)

Students reported the most frequently used tools in Blackboard included:

• Posting Course Content (91%)


• Announcements (80%)


• E-mail (54%)


• Discussion boards (47%)

• 24/7 access to course content (78%)


• Prompt visibility of posted grades (56%)

Students provided a number of suggestions for improving Blackboard including:

• More online student help


• Mandatory usage of Blackboard for all faculty


• Improved design and functionality


• Improve performance and reliability

From this sampling of undergraduate students, it appears that Blackboard is perceived as an asset to the educational process at UMBC. Faculty that incorporated the use of Blackboard into the classroom setting received appreciation from undergraduate students. OIT needs to continue to address issues that impact usage in order to increase end-user acceptance of this online course management tool.

Complete survey results can be found online.

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Course Shells Created for Summer 2008

Today, May 1, 2008 OIT created an empty Blackboard course shell for all Summer 2008 courses listed in the UMBC Schedule of Classes with assigned instructors. Courses that don’t have assigned instructors will be created as they are added to the Schedule of Classes by the Registrar’s office. Only officially registered students should be automatically enrolled in all Bb courses. Students who have dropped will be "disabled" in the course once they have completed the process in myUMBC. Students that have been disabled will be clearly noted in the roster inside each course shell. All courses for both summer 2008 sessions will be conducted on the Blackboard production server.

Notes:

• To copy content from an old Bb course to a new course shell, click here.
  
• To request a new course shell earlier than the typical month all course shells are created before a semester starts, click here.
  
• If you no longer need an old course, please submit a request to delete it.
  

Posted by rarmstro at 8:34 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Spring 2008 Course Shells Expire on 6/15

Spring 2008 Bb course "shells" are set to expire on June 15, 2008 after grades are due. This means the course will automatically revert to being unavailable to students, but faculty will still see the course link. This will help students who frequently complain about having numerous links to old courses in Blackboard. They can request ongoing access from the instructor, who can override the duration settings manually. This may be helpful for processing incompletes, but the majority of students will not have to request to be un-enrolled from old courses.

If you don’t need your old Bb course site, please consider deleting it by completing the “Bb Course Delete” request form on the Bb Blackboard Help tab.

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FYI: BbWorld'08 World Conference is July 15-17 in Las Vegas

Registration for the BbWorld '08 conference has begun. The conference is being held in sunny Las Vegas from July 15-17, 2008 and is described as a "client-centered program built on client feedback, innovation and success."

To register for the conference, just complete the form on the Blackboard website. Several staff from OIT will be attending the conference and we look forward to seeing you there.

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March 6, 2008

New myUMBC Tools Show How Good Students Use Blackboard

OIT announces the release of two new myUMBC tools designed to show the campus community how top UMBC students use Blackboard.

Specifically, students can "Check My Blackboard Activity" to see a comparison of their own activity against an anonymous summary of other students in their classes. In addition, faculty can now run their own "Grade Distribution" and "Tool Usage" reports showing their students' Blackboard activity by any item in the Blackboard grade book (including final grade), or by overall tool usage within the course.

While the trend needs further study, initial findings suggest that students who earn higher grades tend to use Blackboard more than students earning lower grades. It is NOT the case that using Blackboard alone will produce higher grades, simply by "gaming" the system.

But if students know how their activity compares to an anonymous summary of peers, at any time during the semester, this timely and personal feedback may allow them to monitor and change their own behavior as it pertains to engaging with course concepts, materials, instructors or each other. In essence, students can now draw their own conclusions about the quantity AND quality of their Blackboard activity and the impact this may or may not have on their learning.

Since the "Check Grade" tool in Blackboard allows students to view statistical differences between their grades and the class average for any visible item in the grade book, OIT will eventually publish student reports showing activity by grade distribution as well. In the meantime, faculty who wish to can provide further insight to students, by viewing, printing and publishing (as PDF files in their Bb course site) their current or past student activity GDRs for their specific courses.

Background

A year ago, OIT began reporting on UMBC's "Most Active Blackboard Courses" based on a simple "average hits per user" approach. In this way, "rankings" don't favor large enrollment sites over smaller ones. To date, we now have reports for the Spring, Summer and Fall 2007 semesters.

After OIT announced the Fall 2007 Blackboard reports and availability of the "self service" faculty Grade Distribution Reports (GDR), 16 faculty used their GDRs, which collectively showed overall Blackboard usage was higher by students earning higher grades. The self service GDRs complemented earlier pilots with two faculty from Geography and Environmental Systems (Karin Readel and Chris Swan), which also showed higher Blackboard usage among students earning higher grades.

While there is no statistically significant difference among students earning As, Bs and Cs (numerically there is: students earning higher grades tend to use it more), there is a significant difference between this group and those students who earn Ds and Fs. So far, the pattern has held true in the courses mentioned above, and OIT is working on a way to load final grades into a table that looks at all Bb courses to see if the trend is broadly generalizable.

OIT recognizes that hits alone are no endorsement (or indictment) of course quality. But looking at and publishing user activity is one way to help faculty and students identify and consult each other about effective teaching and learning practices. By adopting an attitude of transparency about Blackboard usage, the entire UMBC community (and not just OIT system administrators) gains a "birds eye view" of how this Course Management System (CMS) is being used.

For more information, visit http://www.umbc.edu/blackboard/reports. You can also view a brief video demo of these new myUMBC tools for students and faculty.

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February 12, 2008

Blackboard Hardware Issues Affecting the System

Saturday, September 12, 2009
The Blackboard system is currently experiencing hardware problems. We are actively working with our hardware vendor to identify the cause and restore the system (updated 11:44AM 9-12-09). DoIT staff are currently restoring the blackboard servers and expect to have the system fully functional by 2:00PM today. Thank you for your patience.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted Feb. 2008
Change to Weekly Blackboard Maintenance: Fridays, 10 p.m. to 1 a.m.

Starting this Friday, February 22, OIT will change the weekly, scheduled maintenance window to Fridays from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m.

Last semester, OIT announced the need for scheduled, weekly maintenance when Blackboard could be unavailable. If OIT plans to use the new weekly maintenance window, we will post a "Down for Maintenance" notice users will see when they attempt to login.

While rare, OIT found some classes were actually held on Saturday mornings during the Fall 2007 semester. The new Friday evening maintenance window also works well because overall usage has been historically low during this time.

Note: As it did last semester, the Faculty Senate's Computer Policy Committee approved the new change in weekly Blackboard maintenance at its February 12 meeting. For more information, contact CPC Chair Ant Ozok

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January 25, 2008

Blackboard "Turnitin" Issues & Scheduled Downtime (1/26, 6-9 a.m.)

Following the planned upgrade to version 7.2 last week, OIT has discovered issues with the Turnitin "Building Block" that instructors may want to understand before using this tool.

In addition, the main Blackboard production server will be down for routine, scheduled maintenance this Saturday, January 26, from 6 to 9 a.m. This is unrelated to the Turnitin issues described in this announcement.

Basically, the Turnitin "Building Block" (or plug-in) for Blackboard we have used for several years has been going down sporadically in Bb versions 7.2 or higher. This was not publicly announced and it seems to be an issue when Blackboard is used in a multiple server configuration such as UMBC uses to guarantee redundancy and performance. We've learned that other schools have experienced similar issues.

The issue has become more complicated since Blackboard released its own plagiarism detection tool, SafeAssign, this summer. While SafeAssign is free (the Faculty Development Center currently pays for Turnitin), the key to any tool like this is the library of past submissions to compare future papers against. Clearly, Turnitn has a larger library at this point, but given its wider availability across all 3,700 colleges and universities using Blackboard, SafeAssign is bound to catch up. Also, there were early reports of "issues" when Safe Assign first shipped, but they appear to be settling down.

While we have worked with Turnitin, there is no guarantee the tool will not go down if you use it inside Blackboard. Accordingly, OIT has made SafeAssign available in all courses and suggests the following options:

1. Use Turnitin Outside of Blackboard

As a campus, we haven't done this in a while, but it is possible to access Turnitin outside of Blackboard; it's just not as easy for faculty and students who may be accustomed to using it inside Blackboard.

Instructions

After the class is created online, students will need to create accounts and submit papers using your class ID. If you have questions, please contact Jack Prostko, Director, Faculty Development Center (ext. 5-1829 or prostko@umbc.edu).

2. Use SafeAssign

While we do not have a lot of experience with this tool yet, OIT has made it available. Also, faculty can upload student papers from past courses to "jump start" the rebuilding of their respective bank of papers SafeAssign can check against. For more information on how to use SafeAssign, visit www.safeassign.com.

3. Use Turnitin Inside Blackboard | More Information

OIT recommends piloting “Safe Assign” for those courses where issues would be most problematic or for faculty who do not wish to worry about Turnitin. We will keep the Turnitin service running for faculty who wish to continue using it and accept that there is some risk.

If you have questions or concerns, please add them as a comment to this announcement, which OIT will monitor, or send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

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January 14, 2008

Reminder: Blackboard Down for Upgrades 1/15 to 1/17

As announced November 30, 2007, UMBC's main Blackboard production server (http://blackboard.umbc.edu) will be down for hardware and software upgrades from Tuesday, Jan. 15 through Thursday, Jan. 17, 2008.

Note: The alternate Blackboard server being used in Winter session (http://bbss.umbc.edu) will continue to operate during the production server upgrades.

Posted by fritz at 1:30 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

December 14, 2007

OIT Publishes FA2007 Most Active Blackboard Courses Reports

OIT has again published UMBC's "Most Active Blackboard" courses reports for the Fall 2007 semester, based on an "average hits per user" approach. To learn more, visit www.umbc.edu/blackboard/reports.

Highlights include the following (based ONLY on student activity):

Most Active Graduate Course: EDUC 688 "Methodology of Teaching English as a Second or Foreign Language" taught by George Chinnery, Eunju Chen, Margaret Wilson (avg hits per student: 2,075)

Most Active Undergraduate Course: PSYC 100 "Introduction to Psychology" taught by Kelly Forys, Brian Jobe, Linda Jones (avg hits per student: 927).

Most Active Department: Information Systems (90 Blackboard courses).

Most Active Community: "Project Lead The Way" managed by Anne Spence, Mechanical Engineering (avg hits per user: 1,214).

Total Number of Blackboard Courses (including those with multiple sections): 1,074

While activity alone is not a measure of quality, OIT publishes these reports so faculty can seek each other out about what does (or doesn't ) work in using Blackboard. Toward this end, faculty may also want to try out the new "Average Hits Per User by Final Grade Distribution" "self service" report announced on November 30, 2007.

For more information about the Blackboard Reports project, contact John Fritz at 410.455.6596 or fritz@umbc.edu.

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November 29, 2007

Winter 2008 Blackboard Update

UMBC Blackboard Update is provided by the Office of Information Technology for students, faculty and staff using Blackboard at UMBC. If you have questions or suggestions, contact John Fritz (at fritz@umbc.edu or 410.455.6596) or Bob Armstrong (at rarmstro@umbc.edu or 410.455.3885). For support requests, send email to blackboard@umbc.edu. For more information about using Blackboard, visit the "Blackboard Help" tab before or after you login through myUMBC or directly at http://blackboard.umbc.edu.

HEADLINES

UMBC Blackboard Down for Upgrade Jan. 15-17, 2008

SP2008 Course Shells Created on 11/30; WT2008 Shells Created by Request

FA2007 Course Archiving & User Maintenance

FA2007 UMBC Blackboard User Survey

Call for SP2008 Pilot Courses for Bb Version 7.3

OIT Pilots New Report Showing Student Activity by Final Grade Distribution

Wimba "Voice Tools" and "Live Classroom" Now Permanent

Blog & Wiki Use in Blackboard Continues to Grow

Reserving AV Equipment for WT2008 & SP2008

FYI: Blackboard Training in January

FYI: Blackboard Awards for Exemplary Courses

FYI: SU2008 Hybrid Course Design Stipends (Course Proposal Deadline: Dec. 7)

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UMBC Blackboard Down for Upgrade January 15-17, 2008

To install the next version of Blackboard (7.2) and move the application to a new virtual, load-balanced server, UMBC’s main Blackboard server will be down Tuesday, January 15, through Thursday, January 17, 2008. This upgrade will fix some existing bugs, increase system speed and reliability, and introduce new features such as:

• Performance Dashboard tool: provides a window to monitor user’s progress and activity in the course
• Early Warning System tool: used to communicate warnings to students that a performance problem is beginning to appear

Similar to past major upgrades performed in January, all WT2008 courses will be created and run on the alternate Blackboard server at http://bbss.umbc.edu. (Here is a video that demonstrates how to set up a link between the production server and the winter server.) All communities and organizations will remain on the main production server, but not be available January 15 to 17 during the upgrade. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact John Fritz (fritz@umbc.edu or 5-6596) or Bob Armstrong (rarmstro@umbc.edu or 5-3885), or send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

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November 28, 2007

SP2008 Course Shells Created 11/30; WT2008 Shells Created by Request

On November 30, 2007, OIT created an empty Blackboard course shell for all Spring 2008 courses listed in the UMBC Schedule of Classes (SOC) with assigned instructors. Using the Auto Enrollment" process, only officially registered students will be automatically enrolled in all Bb courses as they officially register. Courses that don't have assigned instructors will be created as usual and instructors will be enrolled as they are assigned. Auto enrollment of students and instructors is done four (4) times a day.

To request creation of a WT2008 Blackboard course shell, please use the "Request A Course" link on the Blackboard Help tab before or after you login via myUMBC or directly at http://blackboard.umbc.edu. Remember: Due to the planned upgrade Jan. 15 to 17, all WT2008 courses will be run on the "alternate" Blackboard server at http://bbss.umbc.edu. When you complete the WT2008 course request above, your course will be on the alternate server.

Note: Because some students (and faculty) have mistaken enrollment in a Bb course shell as official UMBC course registration, OIT has turned off the "self enrollment" function in all Blackboard shells. Also, faculty should not manually enroll students who “say” they will officially register (sometimes they don’t). If you or your students have any questions or concerns, please send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:07 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

November 27, 2007

FA 2007 Course Archiving & User Maintenance

As we near the end of the semester, here's a checklist of tasks instructors should complete to manage Bb courses and users (help sheets are available on the Blackboard Help tab):

Make your course unavailable to students
Create a backup copy of your grade book
Send UMBC Blackboard course deletion requests

For more information or help, send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 11:00 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Fall 2007 UMBC Blackboard User Survey

OIT is always looking for feedback on how students, faculty and staff are using Blackboard and how we can improve support. You can find a link to the appropriate survey whether you are a faculty member, undergraduate student, or graduate student, by logging into Blackboard and using the link on your "MyBlackboard" page under "My Organizations". Thank you for your input and we look forward to serving you in the coming year. You can also view results of past surveys on www.umbc.edu/blackboard/reports.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:02 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Call for SP2008 Pilot Courses for Bb Version 7.3

OIT will again be piloting the latest version of Blackboard (7.3) during the spring 2008 semester. The new version introduces a "hybrid" discussion board that includes both the features introduced in 7.1 and the older features in 6.3. With 7.3, the user will have a choice of how they want to view discussion board threads and replies.

As with all Blackboard pilot semesters, OIT requires the following:

• OIT will place an announcement in your pilot course describing what you and your students need to do if you encounter a problem in the version 7.3 pilot environment. We would ask you to make this a "permanent" announcement in your course throughout the semester.
• Throughout the semester, you and your students may be asked to complete a survey about your experience with the software.
• Your course will not be compatible with the regular production server until it is migrated to the version 7.3 software. Currently, OIT does not have plans to migrate all courses to version 7.3. until Winter 2009.

The pilot server will be available in mid-December. If you are interested in participating in the 7.3 pilot, please contact Bob Armstrong (ext 5-3885 or rarmstro@umbc.edu)

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OIT Pilots New Report Showing Student Activity by Final Grade Distribution

As announced earlier this year, OIT has been publishing new reports and videos about how students and faculty actually use Blackboard. Now, after piloting with two faculty from Geography and Environmental Systems, OIT is extending the pilot to all faculty who want to see their students’ activity by final grade distribution.

In three of four courses taught by Karin Readel and Chris Swan, “A” students used Blackboard more than “B” students who used it more than “C” students and so on. OIT is making these “self service” grade distribution reports available to faculty to see if there is a similar trend in their Blackboard courses.

These “self service” reports query a “replica” of the main Blackboard server that is updated weekly. Only the instructor of record can query (and view) his or her course’s student activity by grade distribution, if there is a grade book column called GRADE and the grade type is set to “text” display using only A, B, C, D or F.

Note: If you use these reports, they may be added to an anonymous, cumulative summary of all UMBC Bb courses to show student activity by final grade distribution. Unless you give OIT permission to do so, we will NOT publish your specific course’s final grade distribution in the list of most active Blackboard courses.

Future plans include developing a “Check My Activity” link faculty can enable for students that provides contextual feedback on how each student's activity compares to an anonymous summary of all other students in the course at any point during the semester. Students might also be able to “opt in” to receive email, rss or txt updates if their activity falls below a specific (or desired) level.

Reminder: The FA2007 Most Active Blackboard Courses reports will be run on Dec. 12, the day after classes end.

For more information about the UMBC Blackboard Reports project (www.umbc.edu/blackboard/reports), contact John Fritz (fritz@umbc.edu or 5-6596).

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Wimba "Voice Tools" and "Live Classroom" Now Permanent

Effective immediately, the Wimba Voice Tools and Live Classroom building blocks are a permanent part of the UMBC Blackboard course management system. Since 2005, OIT has partnered with Modern Language & Linguistics (MLL) and other organizations to pilot this “building blocks" plug-in to Blackboard.

"Voice Tools" provide faculty and students with an easy tool that can record their voices in formats such as a Voice Email, Voice "discussion" Boards, Voice Direct for live conferencing, Voice Recorder, for recording messages or assignments for students, and Voice Presentation, for posting web sites in a slide format with text and audio narration.

"Live Classroom" allows faculty to conduct "live" classes online with the use of a white board, powerpoint and website presentation system, as well as live voice and video components. The tools can be found under the course "Communications" link and as a content type on all content pages.

If you have questions or want training on how to use the tools, please visit the Wimba website. OIT also has a link to online help under the "Blackboard Help" tab.

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Blog and Wiki Use in Blackboard Continue to Grow

The Learning Objects tools in Blackboard continue to expand with the addition of more changes designed to enhance their use in course management systems. The tools that are frequently used here at UMBC include, blogs, wikis, podcasting tools and a search tool. New features include:

• Permalinks that enable links to specific pages in blogs and wikis
• A privacy link that allows the user to monitor comments
• Administrative ability to increase the size of allowed attachments
• RSS feeds from podcasts posted inside a course or community

For more information about these features, you can go directly to the Learning Objects website.

Note: for a good example how to use a wiki inside Blackboard, see History Professor Anne Rubin’s student group project: “Child Labor in the American South” which was presented at the Oct. 2 Maryland Blackboard Users Group (MDBUG) conference.

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Reserving AV Equipment for WT2008 & SP2008

If you plan to use presentation technology in your Winter or Spring 2008 face-to-face classes, please submit an equipment request by December 19, 2007. Requests can be submitted using a web form or by calling AV services at ext. 5-2461. Remember: all equipment requests are subject to availability and are not considered confirmed until you receive an email reply confirming your request.

For future reference: All faculty can determine which rooms have specific A/V equipment permanently installed by using the "Find Tech Classrooms" link under the "Class Tech Links" on the myBlackboard tab. However, when scheduling a room assignment from Academic Services (through your department scheduling coordinator), it's best to ask for specific room attributes (including technology) rather than asking for a specific room. Because of demand, you may not get the specific room you want, however, Academic Services tries to provide a similar room if they know what you want. If you have questions or concerns, please contact AV Services (ext. 5-2461 or avservices@umbc.edu).

Note: AV Services will be open from 8:30 AM to 4 PM during FA2007 finals week, December 13-19, 2007. All requests for equipment during this period must be submitted at least 48 hours in advance using the online request form. The AV office will be open for returns only on December 20,2007. Please call in advance (ext. 5-2461). The International Media Center will be open during the following hours:
December 12, 13, 17, 18 (9 AM to 9 PM) December 14, 19 (9 AM to 4
PM) December 16 (1 PM to 6 PM) December 20-21 (Closed)
If you have questions, please contact Joan Costello in the Media Center (ext. 5-
2464 or jcoste1@umbc.edu).

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FYI: Blackboard Training in January

A number of Blackboard-related workshops will be offered in January, 2008, including the following:

Getting started with Blackboard

Tuesday, January 8 - This 90 minute hands-on workshop will get you started using Blackboard at UMBC. The workshop will cover how to access your course, basic course design, posting a syllabus, adding content, and managing users in your course. (Please bring an electronic copy of your syllabus if you have one.) Prerequisites: Active UMBC account

Blackboard Wikis and Blogs

Thursday, January 10 - All UMBC Blackboard courses and communities have access to interactive community publishing tools such as blogs (diary-like journals any user can create) and wikis (a communal web site anyone can add to and edit). This one hour hands-on workshop will give participants a chance to try out blogs and wikis for themselves, and show how others are currently using them in UMBC Blackboard courses and communities. Click here for an example from a previous workshop.

Note: This workshop assumes at least a basic understanding of the instructor's or leader's role and function inside a Blackboard course or community.

You can register for these Blackboard sessions by going to the Blackboard training page.

Jack Prostko, Director, Faculty Development Center, will again be offering an orientation session for new part-time faculty on January 22 and 26, 2008. (All part-time faculty who have not previously attended are also welcome to come.)

PT Faculty Orientation (Tue., Jan. 22, 5:30 to 8 p.m., UC312)

This session will focus will focus on establishing your myUMBC account, getting a class list, computer support, Blackboard, using the library, administrative issues such as parking, payroll and benefits, teaching and academic issues and teaching resources.

Teaching and Learning Workshop (Sat., Jan. 26, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., International Media Center (IMC)

9 a.m. Continental breakfast

9:30 a.m. Teaching and learning techniques, course goals, assignments, tests, and promoting academic integrity.

12:30 Lunch will be provided to registered participants

1 p.m. OIT will provide a hands-on introduction to Blackboard for those that have myUMBC accounts.

These sessions are sponsored by the Office of the Provost and the Faculty Development Center. To register, see the Faculty Development training page.

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FYI: Blackboard Awards for Exemplary Courses and Projects

Each year, Blackboard.com is looking for those who "develop technologically rich and pedagogically sound courses". These courses are highlighted to "help faculty use e-learning technology more effectively". The program has been very successful in years past and has presented effective courses from many disciplines.

The deadline for submissions is January 21, 2008. For more information and the appropriate submission forms, go to the Blackboard Greenhouse Program website.

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November 25, 2007

FYI: SU2008 Hybrid Course Design Stipends (Course Proposal Deadline: Dec. 7)

The Office of Summer, Winter & Special Programs (OSWSP) invites proposals from any UMBC faculty member for $1,500 "course development" funding to redesign current face-to-face (F2F) UMBC courses for online or hybrid (part online, part F2F) delivery in summer session 2008. Instructional design and technology support are also provided by the UMBC Faculty Development Center (FDC) and the Office of Informational Technology (OIT). To begin the process, complete the online course proposal by Dec. 7. For more information, including deadlines for required "deliverables" and training workshops, visit www.umbc.edu/oit/hybrid.

Posted by rarmstro at 11:36 AM | TrackBack

October 16, 2007

GES Faculty Show and Tell How and Why They Use Blackboard

Karin Readel

Chris Swan

In addition, OIT has published pilot reports for some of Readel's and Swan's recent courses showing student activity by final grade distribution:

While this kind of individual course report is not yet available (faculty can do it manually), OIT intends to provide this service to faculty who wish to view it privately (or eventually post it inside a Bb course for future students to monitor and benchmark their own activity).

OIT will also be publishing a similar, public report that summarizes student activity and tool use by grade distribution in the top 25, 50, 75 and 100 percentile ranges of all UMBC Blackboard courses. The goal is to see what difference, if any, exists in student grade distribution across a range of Bb courses and activity levels.

After watching Readel and Swan show how they use Blackboard in their actual course sites, faculty may want to check out why they do so in two new "Q & A" video interviews on UMBC's iTunesU service (for more information about UMBC on iTunes, see http://itunes.umbc.edu).

OIT plans to publish more "Show & Tell" (how) and "Q & A" (why) videos from faculty teaching active Blackboard courses in other disciplines, but if you or a colleague has an effective practice or insight you'd be willing to share, send email to fritz@umbc.edu. Please include a short description of the pedagogical problem that is solved or the new learning opportunity that is created in using Blackboard.

Note: To protect the work and identity of students who may appear in the "Show & Tell" videos, only UMBC faculty can access them with their myUMBC userid & password. These videos are intended for collegial, professional development only, so all faculty are reminded that any medium containing identifiable student academic information constitutes an "educational record" that is protected by the Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA).

Posted by fritz at 4:10 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 15, 2007

OIT Staff Present Blackboard Reporting Project at MDBUG Conference

OIT staff members John Fritz, director of Instructional Technology & New Media (ITNM), and Jeffrey Berman (an ITNM graduate assistant) presented the UMBC "Most Active Blackboard Courses" Reports project at the Maryland Blackboard Users Group (MDBUG) conference on Tuesday, October 2, at the UMBC Technology Center.

Proceedings are not yet available on the conference website, but you can watch Fritz and Berman's presentation, "Why and How UMBC Publishes Its Most Active Blackboard Courses Reports," on the Blackboard reports site (Fritz handles the "why" and Berman explains the "how").

Other UMBC presenters included:

Anne Rubin (History): "Child Labor in the American South: Using a Bb Wiki for Historical Research"

Matthias Gobbert (Math/Stats): "Screen Capture of Mathematics with Voice Over using a Tablet Laptop"

Katie Morris (Social Work): "Social Work & Technology: An Unlikely Pair?"

Bev Bickel & Adriana Val (MLL): "Multiple Voices from Online EFL Teacher Education"

Posted by fritz at 1:45 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 13, 2007

Weekly Blackboard Maintenance Begins Sat., 9/15 (6-9 a.m.)

Starting this Saturday, September 15, the Office of Information Technology (OIT) is implementing weekly Blackboard maintenance on Saturdays from 6 to 9 a.m. While OIT may not always use all or part of these weekly maintenance "windows," Blackboard users should plan accordingly.

Since 1999, UMBC has used Blackboard which now supports more than 1,000 courses and 350 organizations every semester, making it one of the largest, most mission-critical technology services on campus. However, there is no good time when OIT can perform necessary patches, upgrades or even simple reboots because the academic semesters all overlap (except the third week in August, which is too close to the start of Fall).

OIT will continue to implement major upgrades in January, when the small number of winter courses can be run on a separate Bb server. But we need regular weekly maintenance and think the 6 to 9 a.m. window on Saturdays minimizes disruption to users while giving OIT staff access to the system to maintain it.

For the next month, OIT will post system-wide Blackboard maintenance "reminders" on Thursdays, develop a generic "Blackboard is Down for Maintenance" message for anyone who logs in when Blackboard is down, and continue to note any changes to the system.

Long term, we think regular maintenance will help improve Blackboard's performance, and appreciate the campus community's support and patience as we move forward.

Posted by fritz at 8:51 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

SU2007 Blackboard Reports Now Include Tool Usage

OIT has published the Summer 2007 "Most Active Blackboard Courses" reports for all categories of usage (e.g., all courses, graduate courses, undergraduate courses, communities, etc.).

In addition, we have published the specific "tool usage" metrics for the top 50 courses in all categories. Future plans include providing this for all courses.

Reminder: Course activity alone is not a measure or endorsement of quality. These reports are merely provided as a way for faculty to seek each other out about what works (or doesn't) in using Blackboard.

Posted by fritz at 1:39 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

August 28, 2007

Blackboard Will Be Down 9/1 (9 p.m.) to 9/2 (9 a.m.)

To extend a fix of recent "database connection" errors that have increased during the busy days leading to the start of semester today, the Office of Information Technology (OIT) needs to take Blackboard down from 9 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 1, to 9 a.m. Sunday, Sept. 2.

Working with Blackboard, OIT has developed a short-term fix to the "database connection" errors, but needs extended downtime with no user access to address an underlying issue with the production database. No content has been lost, nor is it expected. But the production database that runs Blackboard needs to be "cleaned up" so performance does not degrade throughout the semester, when the user load will only increase. We are also continuing to work with Blackboard to identify existing processes that may be contributing to the problem.

Currently, we believe overall performance is stable. If we find otherwise, we will post an update on the OIT News site at http://www.umbc.edu/oit/news which you can also subscribe to by RSS feed or view in myUMBC. If you encounter system performance problems, please send email to helpdesk@umbc.edu.

We understand this is a busy time of year, and appreciate your patience as we address these system issues to maintain acceptable performance during the semester.

Posted by fritz at 2:18 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

August 18, 2007

Storage Failure Results in Blackboard and Additional System Outages

On Tuesday, September 18th at approximately 5pm there was a failure in our campus file storage system that caused Blackboard and other Windows services to be unavailable until 8pm. This storage outage impacted a number of other campus services in addition to Blackboard, such as:

Blackboard Pilot Server (OIT)
Content DM (Library)
Illiad (Library)
Reslife Server (ORL)
Coldfusion (CPS)
iStrategy (PeopleSoft)
Counseling Services Scheduler

This error was the result of a storage hardware failure, which combined with a software error, caused the storage system to go offline. This error was completely independent of Blackboard and the Windows services noted but nonetheless resulted in them being unavailable. We apologize for any impact this had on courses and other campus business.

OIT fully understands that these systems, especially Blackboard, are a critical campus resource and we are reviewing this incident to make certain this does not happen again. We have included additional details below for those that are interested.

Details
Over the summer OIT installed a new redundant file storage system that is housed in two separate facilities. This redundant file system is used for critical services, such as blackboard, and insures that in a disaster such as a fire or flood we will have the data associated with service available and be able to restore service in the other facility within a few hours. Earlier this week a hardware failure occurred on one of the fiber optic links that connects the two facilities. In replacing the failed hardware component the system should automatically fail over to an alternate fiber optic link and remain up. This time, when the component was replaced a software error caused the file storage system to go offline.

We are working with our storage vendor to fully understand how this occurred and will adjust our procedures to make certain that this kind of error does not happen again. We are committed to providing a robust set of services that you can depend on.

Posted by mikec at 10:14 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

August 17, 2007

Blackboard Down 0n 8/18 to Apply Patches

Blackboard will be down and unavailable to users from 6am to noon on Saturday, August 18, 2007. OIT is applying patches that are needed to keep the current version of the application up-to-date.

Thank you for your patience and if you have any questions or concerns, please contact Bob Armstrong at 410.455.3885 or rarmstro@umbc.edu or send an email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 11:54 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

August 6, 2007

Blackboard Update - Fall 2007

UMBC Blackboard update is provided by the Office of Information Technology for students, faculty and staff using Blackboard at UMBC. If you have questions or suggestions, contact John Fritz (at fritz@umbc.edu or 410.455.6596) or Bob Armstrong (at rarmstro@umbc.edu or 410.455.3885). For more information about using Blackboard, visit http://blackboard.umbc.edu.

HEADLINES

1. Fall 2007 Blackboard Course Shells Have Been Created

2. Audience Response "Clickers" on Campus

3. New Report Lists Most Active Blackboard Courses and Communities

4. OIT Seeks Faculty to Pilot New Version of Blackboard

5. Blackboard Training Workshops

6. 8/22 Hybrid Training Workshop

7. Reminder: Classroom Technology Requests Deadline 8/17 for Mobile Carts

8. FYI: Call for Presentations: 10/2 MDBUG Conf. @ UMBC Tech Center

Posted by berman1 at 10:07 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Call for Presentations: 10/2 MDBUG Conf. @ UMBC Tech Center

The Maryland Blackboard Users Group (MDBUG) is now accepting presentation proposals for its first-ever conference on Tuesday, October 2, 2007, at the UMBC Technology Center (proposal deadline is Friday, September 7). This is a great, local opportunity to meet other Blackboard users and share effective practices.

To propose a presentation, you MUST use the attached form and submit it on the MDBUG "Connections" site at http://communities.blackboard.com (a free Blackboard "connections" userid is required to login, find and "self-enroll" in the MDBUG site). In addition to traditional lecture, workshop and panel presentation formats, the MDBUG conference will also offer a "Five Minutes of Fame" slot, modeled after the popular format at the annual New Media Consortium conference.

The MDBUG was formed in March 2007, and has 80 members from more than 30 public and private institutions in Maryland who are using or supporting Blackboard on their respective campuses. In addition to the space on Blackboard's own "Connections" site (which always runs the latest version of the Bb software), the MDBUG also maintains a member email listserve (see https://lists.umbc.edu/lists/info/mdbug for more information).

For more information about MDBUG or to consult on a conference proposal idea, contact John Fritz at 410.455.6596 or fritz@umbc.edu or Ellen Borkowski at 301.405.2922 or eyb@umd.edu.

Posted by fritz at 6:17 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

August 3, 2007

Fall 2007 Blackboard Course Shells Have Been Created

OIT has created empty Blackboard course shells for all Fall 2007 courses listed in the UMBC Schedule of Classes with assigned instructors. Courses that don’t have assigned instructors will be created as they are added to the Schedule of Classes by the Registrar’s office. Only officially registered students will be automatically enrolled in all Bb courses.

Note: Because some students (and faculty) have mistakenly enrolled in a Bb course shell as official UMBC course registration, OIT has turned off the “self enrollment” function in all new Blackboard shells.

Posted by rarmstro at 11:54 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

OIT Seeks Faculty to Pilot New Version of Blackboard

OIT is looking for faculty that would be willing to pilot the new 7.2 version of Blackboard. Participants will be asked to give OIT feedback on how the system is working and to keep us informed of any issues that arise.

The 7.2 version contains several new features that add to the functionality currently available in Blackboard.

• Student early warning system to monitor student performance
• Comments section in gradebook that allows faculty to give individual feedback on assignments
• The option to send an email to students when new announcements are posted.

As in past UMBC Bb pilot programs, faculty who want to use the most recent version should consider the following:

• OIT will place an announcement in your pilot course describing what you and your students need to do if you encounter a problem in the version 7.2 pilot environment. We would ask you to make this a “permanent” announcement in your course throughout the semester.
• Throughout the semester, you and your students may be asked to complete a survey about your experience with the software.
• Your course will not be compatible with the regular production server until it is migrated to the version 7.2 software. Currently, OIT plans to migrate all courses to version 7.2 in January 2008.
The pilot server can be found at http://bb-pilot.umbc.edu.

If you are interested in participating, please contact Bob Armstrong (ext 5-3885 or rarmstro@umbc.edu)

Posted by rarmstro at 10:38 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Blackboard Training Workshops

OIT has added a variety of Blackboard workshops to the training schedule including:

* Getting Started in Blackboard (Aug. 8)
* Creating Assessments and Managing the Gradebook (Aug. 10)
* Building Interactivity with Communication Tools (Aug. 16)
* Getting Started in Blackboard (Aug. 22)
* How to Use Blogs & Wikis in Bb (Sept. 26)

Please visit www.umbc.edu/training for more information and to register.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:35 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Reminder: Classroom Technology Requests Deadline 8/17 for Mobile Carts

If you plan to use technology in your Fall 2007 face-to-face classes, please submit an equipment request by August 17, 2007. Requests can be submitted using a web form or by calling AV services at ext. 5-2461. After completing and submitting the form, remember that all equipment requests are subject to availability and are not considered confirmed until you receive a return email.

For future reference: All faculty can determine which rooms have specific A/V equipment by using the "Find Tech Classrooms" link under the "Class Tech Links" mentioned on the myBlackboard tab. However, when scheduling a room assignment from Academic Services (through your department scheduling coordinator), it's best to ask for specific room attributes (including technology) rather than asking for a specific room. Because of demand, you may not get the specific room you want, however, Academic Services will try to provide a similar room if they know what you want.

Posted by rarmstro at 9:49 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

May 1, 2007

SP2007 UMBC Bb Update: Most Active Courses, User Survey

UMBC Blackboard update is provided by the Office of Information Technology for students, faculty and staff using Blackboard at UMBC. If you have questions or suggestions, contact John Fritz (at fritz@umbc.edu or 410.455.6596) or Bob Armstrong (at rarmstro@umbc.edu or 410.455.3885). For more information about using Blackboard, login via myUMBC or visit http://blackboard.umbc.edu.

HEADLINES

1. New Report Lists Most Active Blackboard Courses and Communities

2. UMBC Blackboard User Survey Now Available

3. How to Add Non-UMBC Users to a Bb Course or Community

4. Solution to Blackboard Login "Redirecting" Problem

5. OIT Downtime Notices (Including Blackboard) Available on Blog

6. "Scholar" Tab Added to Blackboard

7. Reminder: Make SP2007 Courses Unavailable or Delete Students

8. Reminder: SP2007 Course Shells Expire on 6/15

9. Class Technology Request Deadlines: SU2007 (5/18), FA2007 (8/1 for lab software; 8/17 for Mobile AV Carts)

10. FYI: Goucher to Host 5/30 TLT Conference

11. FYI: UMBC Launches Maryland Blackboard Users Group

12. FYI: BbWorld'07 World Conference is July 10-12 in Boston

13. FYI: 5/16 Hybrid Course Design Workshop "Information Session"

Posted by fritz at 4:22 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 29, 2007

New Report Lists Most Active Blackboard Courses and Communities

Today, OIT is publishing a new set of reports that, for the first time, identifies the Top 50 most active Blackboard courses and communities by a simple “average hits per user” methodology. While there is no implication of “quality” based on activity alone—after all, students could be struggling to find directions for an assignment—these new reports rank activity across all Blackboard courses (e.g., undergraduate, graduate, by discipline) and by all users (e.g., faculty, students). As such, they allow faculty and students to network with one another about what works or doesn’t work in using technology in teaching and learning. The new Blackboard reports are available on the MyBlackboard tab and directly at http://www.umbc.edu/oit/newmedia/blackboard/stats (login required).

If you have any questions, contact John Fritz at 5-6596 or fritz@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 1:00 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 28, 2007

UMBC Blackboard User Survey Now Available

Today, OIT is announcing a new survey for all UMBC Blackboard users, available on the MyBlackboard tab “Announcements” or in every course and community. Please take a few minutes to help us help you. The anonymous survey will end one week from today, May 8, and results will be available the following day on the Blackboard Reports page. If you have any questions or difficulty answering the survey, contact Bob Armstrong at rarmstro@umbc.edu or ext. 5-3885.

Posted by rarmstro at 1:03 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 27, 2007

How to Add Non-UMBC Users to a Bb Course or Community

Have you ever needed to add users from outside UMBC into your Blackboard course or community? OIT has developed an easy way to create temporary user accounts so that guest lecturers and fellow researchers can log directly into Blackboard with their own account. The accounts can be created for 6 month access or one year.

If you needs accounts created, please send an email to blackboard@umbc.edu and a staff member will contact you.

Posted by rarmstro at 9:53 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 26, 2007

Solution to Blackboard Login "Redirecting" Problem

Sometimes Blackboard/myUMBC users have experienced a "looping" problem where the browser will continue to "redirect" in an attempt to open myUMBC or Blackboard. This is caused by anomolies in the custom authentication scripts written for the two applications. OIT is researching possible alternatives to the current custom login system for implementation in the future. For the time being; the solution is to close your browser and open a fresh one to continue using the applications.

Should you have questions or concerns, please send an email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 9:54 AM | Comments (10) | TrackBack

April 25, 2007

OIT Downtime Notices (Including Blackboard) Available on Blog

From time to time, OIT needs to update Blackboard with patches and fixes that generally take less then an hour to accomplish. These patches are minor fixes and updates to the Blackboard software and are designed to keep users up to date with the newest functionality. These updates function much the same way as the Windows updates that you occasionally see on your home computer.

In order to keep you informed, OIT will be posting the downtime associated with the updates on the OIT News Blog. If you have questions or concerns, or would like to subscribe to the OIT News blog by RSS feed, please feel free to contact us at blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 9:52 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 24, 2007

"Scholar" Tab Added to Blackboard

As part of their new "Blackboard Beyond" Initiative, Blackboard has developed a new service called "Scholar".

Scholar is a social bookmarking service that can be found (beginning 5/29/07) under the new "Scholar" tab in Blackboard and is available to everyone with a myUMBC account. The idea of the service is to give users a place to look at resources bookmarked by others, as well as, allow users to contribute their own bookmarks. Topics that are already online include most major disciplines in higher education.

To find out more, click on the link to Blackboard.com. If you have questions or concerns, please contact Bob Armstrong at rarmstro@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 9:58 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 23, 2007

Reminder: Make Courses Unavailable or Delete Students

As we near the end of the semester, here's a checklist of tasks instructors may want to keep in mind (help sheets are available on the Blackboard Help tab):

Make your course unavailable to students
Create a backup copy of your course (and gradebook)
Archive or request to have old Bb course deleted

For more information or help, send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 12:56 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 22, 2007

Reminder: Spring 2007 Course Shells Expire on 6/15

The Spring 2007 auto-created Bb course "shells" are set to expire on June 15, 2007 after grades are due. This means the course will automatically revert to being unavailable to students, but faculty will still see the course link. This will help students who frequently complain about having numerous links to old courses in Blackboard. They can request ongoing access from the instructor, who can override the duration settings manually. This may be helpful for processing incompletes, but the majority of students will not have to request to be un-enrolled from old courses.

If you have any questions or concerns, you can send an email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 9:00 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 21, 2007

Class Technology Request Deadlines: SU2007 (5/18), FA2007 (8/1 for lab software; 8/17 for Mobile Carts)

If you plan on using technology in your Summer 2007 face-to-face classes, please submit an AV request by May 18, 2007. For the Fall semester, please submit requests by August 17, 2007. Requests can be submitted using a web form or by calling AV services at ext. 5-3885. After completing and submitting the form, remember that all equipment requests are subject to availability and are not considered confirmed until you receive a return email.

For future reference: All faculty can determine which rooms have specific A/V equipment by using the "Find Tech Classrooms" link under the "Class Tech Links" mentioned on the myBlackboard tab. However, when scheduling a room assignment from Academic Services (through your department scheduling coordinator) it's best to ask for specific room attributes (including technology) rather than ask for a specific room. Because of demand, you may not get the specific room you want, but Academic Services tries to provide a similar room, if they know what you want.

If you want to schedule a computer lab, please review the reservation process on the OIT web site. Note: If you need to have specialized software installed on all workstations in a computer lab, the deadline to do so is August 1, 2007, for use in the Fall 2007 software. OIT needs this lead time to test, install and incorporate the your software into a base lab “image” or copy that is used to manage all OIT labs. Visit http://www.umbc.edu/oit/classroomtechnology/labs for more information.

Posted by rarmstro at 9:46 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 19, 2007

FYI: Goucher to Host 5/30 TLT Conference

Like to see what other universities are doing with technology and teaching? Visit the Goucher College CTLT Annual Conference on May 30th. The theme for the conference is “Learning Styles: From Theory to Practice” and will focus on learning styles in higher education.

The newly established Maryland Blackboard Users Group will be meeting directly after the conference.

Posted by rarmstro at 9:55 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 18, 2007

UMBC Launches Maryland Blackboard Users Group

Ever wonder who else is using Blackboard in Maryland? Well, now you can by joining the Maryland Blackboard Users Group (MDBUG) listserv. The list was designed to facilitate communication between and among public or private Maryland educational institutions using Blackboard.

The MDBUG will be meeting after the Goucher CTLT Conference on May 30th (you do NOT need to register for Goucher’s conference to attend). Also, you may want to “save the date” for MDBUG “User Conference” is scheduled for Thursday, October 4 at the UMBC Technology Center (details TBA on the MDBUG listserve and the Fall 2007 UMBC Blackboard Update). For more information on the MDBUG, visit https://lists.umbc.edu/lists/info/mdbug.

Posted by rarmstro at 9:56 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 17, 2007

FYI: BbWorld '07 Conference Registration has Begun

Registration for the BbWorld '07 conference has begun. The conference is being held in Boston from July 10-12, 2007 and is the first time Blackboard and the newly acquired WebCT will be presented at the same time.

To register for the conference, just complete the form on the Blackboard website. Several staff from OIT will be attending the conference and we look forward to seeing you there.

Posted by rarmstro at 9:56 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 2, 2007

OIT Discontinues Disabling Students in Blackboard Courses

Beginning with the Spring 2007 semester, OIT instituted a new procedure that, in addition to enrolling officially registered students in Blackboard course sites, also disables or removes access from students who officially dropped a course in myUMBC. After discovering some conflicts with the Student Information System (SIS), OIT has decided to turn off the drop/disable Blackboard access feature for the Spring 2007 semester.

As a result, faculty are encouraged to monitor their Blackboard course rosters to ensure that only officially registered students are included. To do so, compare your official course registration using the "Show Class List for a Specific Course" under "Faculty Options" on the myUMBC Academics tab. You can view the Blackboard course roster by going to the course Control Panel -> "List/Modify Users" -> "Search" and you will see the list.

If you have any questions or need assistance, please send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 11:05 AM

January 18, 2007

"What's New" Module in Blackboard Turned Off

OIT has attributed recent performance problems in Blackboard to the "What's New" module on the myBlackboard page. The module updates users on content that has been added to their Blackboard courses and has to search for new content each time the user logs in. This search process can substantially affect system performance.

After consultation with Blackboard.com, OIT has decided to turn off the module. We apologize for any concerns or inconvenience this may cause.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact John Fritz at ext. 5-6596 or fritz@umbc.edu; or Bob Armstrong at 5-3885 or rarmstro@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:34 AM

December 1, 2006

Blackboard Update - Winter 2007

UMBC Blackboard update is provided by the Office of Information Technology for students, faculty and staff using Blackboard at UMBC. If you have questions or suggestions, contact John Fritz (at fritz@umbc.edu or 410.455.6596) or Bob Armstrong (at rarmstro@umbc.edu or 410.455.3885). For more information about using Blackboard, visit http://blackboard.umbc.edu.

1. Reminder: End of Semester Checklist

2. Fall 2006 Courses Expire on 1/15

3. Spring 2007 Course Shells Created on 11/30

4. Auto Course Enrollment Now Includes Add AND Drop Changes

5. Blackboard Down for Upgrade 1/12-13 & 1/19-20

6. Winter 2007 Courses to Operate on Alternate Server

7. Reminder: Courses Prior to Fall 2002 Moved to Archive Server

8. Reminder: Instructional Technology Faculty Survey

9. Reminder: Reserving Mobile AV Equipment for Spring 2007

10. New Discussion Board in Version 7.1

11. Learning Objects' Blackboard Wiki and Blog Tool Update

12. FYI: Summer '07 "Hybrid/Online" Courses RFP (Due: 12/8)

13. FYI: USM Sponsors Exploration of QualityMatters Rubric (or checklist) for Quality Online Learning

Posted by berman1 at 11:28 AM

Reminder: End of Semester Checklist

As we near the end of the semester, here's a checklist of tasks instructors should keep in mind (help sheets are available on the Blackboard Help tab):

Make your course unavailable to students
Create a backup copy of your gradebook
Send UMBC Blackboard course deletion requests

While past courses are available online in Blackboard, OIT recommends creating a backup of your Blackboard course gradebook, if you use it. It's also smart to make your course unavailable to students after the semester ends, so it doesn't show up in their list of courses in future semesters--a frequent complaint of students. Exceptions might include keeping the course open to process incompletes, or as a courtesy to students who request to have ongoing access.

If you have created a backup copy of your course gradebook (online or on your own computer) consider having all older versions of the course deleted if you no longer have use for them. However, keeping your most recent version so you can "copy forward" content into subsequent course shells can save you a lot of work down the road. To permanently remove the course, use the online form on the Blackboard Help tab. When the request has been received, we will send you an email to confirm your request.

For more information or help, send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 11:03 AM

Spring 2007 Course Shells Created on 11/30

On November 30, 2006, OIT created an empty Blackboard course shell for all Spring 2007 courses listed in the UMBC Schedule of Classes (SOC)with assigned instructors. Using the "Auto Enrollment" OIT process, only officially registered students will be automatically enrolled in all Bb courses as they officially register.

Courses that don’t have assigned instructors will be created as they are added to the Schedule of Classes by the Registrar’s office. If a course has been added to the SOC and does NOT have an instructor, a default "Staff" instructor will be assigned, so the course shell can be created in Blackboard and auto-enrollment from myUMBC enabled.

If a "real" instructor is later assigned to the SOC (and thus the Blackboard course shell), he or she can "modify" the role of the "staff" instructor to any role below the peer status of an instructor (control panel -> list/modify users), and then remove the "Staff" user from the course (control panel -> remove users). Technically, Blackboard will not allow any user to remove a "peer" user in the system, but the change role status works.

Alternately, faculty can request to have the "staff" instructor removed by sending email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Note: Because some students (and faculty) have mistaken enrollment in a Bb course shell as official UMBC course registration, OIT has turned off the “self enrollment” function in all new Blackboard shells.

Posted by rarmstro at 11:02 AM

Auto Course Enrollment Now Includes Add AND Drop Changes

Since Fall 2004, OIT has employed an "auto enroll" script that automatically enrolls all students into a companion Blackboard course site AFTER they have officially enrolled in the course through myUMBC. However, if a student later dropped the course in myUMBC, he or she was not removed from the Blackboard course site. This lead to some confusion for students and faculty. Starting in Spring 2007, students who offically drop a course in myUMBC, will be dropped from the corresponding Blackboard course site. In actual fact, they will not be removed because Blackboard does not support an event driven batch remove process. Instead they will no longer have access and they will not see the course in their list of Blackboard courses.

Instructors will still see the students in their Blackboard course under "List/Modify Users" and the gradebook, but students will have a red circle & slash icon next to their name indicating their access has been disabled. Instructor can remove these students if they wish, especially after the add/drop deadline has passed. But at this time, OIT does not support a system-wide process for removal of students. We can only support disabling course access for students who officially drop. If the student later adds the course again, our usual auto-enrollment process will add them. For more information, see the Blackboard help sheet on "Enrollment".

If you have questions or concerns, you can contact Bob Armstrong at ext. 5-3885, or send an email to rarmstro@umbc.edu or blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 11:01 AM

Fall 2006 Courses Expire on 1/15

As announced earlier in the semester, Summer 2006 auto-created Bb course "shells" are set to expire on September 20, 2006 after grades are due. This means the course will automatically revert to being unavailable to students, but faculty will still see the course link. This will help students who frequently complain about having numerous links to old courses in Blackboard. They can request ongoing access from the instructor, who can override the duration settings manually. This may be helpful for processing incompletes, but the majority of students will not have to request to be un-enrolled from old courses.

Remember: students can’t un-enroll from Bb courses themselves. If you don’t need your old Bb course site, please consider deleting it by completing the “Bb Course Delete” request form on the Bb Blackboard Help tab.

Tip: Students and instructors can use the pencil tool in “ My Courses” to hide announcements and course links on the myBlackboard tab.

Posted by rarmstro at 11:00 AM

Blackboard Down for Upgrade 1/12-13 & 1/19-20

On Friday, January 12, 2007 & Friday January 19, 2007, the main Blackboard production server will be down so we can install the newest version (7.1) of Blackboard software and move the application to a new load balanced server. This version update will introduce several new features, fix some existing bugs, and increase system speed and reliability.

This upgrade will correct issues and introduce revisions in the following areas:

• Correct problem with emailing large numbers of users
• Introduce new Discussion Board
• Provide for better administrative support

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact John Fritz (fritz@umbc.edu or 5-6596) or Bob Armstrong (rarmstro@umbc.edu or 5-3885), or send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:59 AM

Winter 2007 Courses to Operate on Alternate Server

Because of the January 12 and 19 hardware and software upgrade when the production version of Blackboard will be down--and to recover a much needed window in the academic year when OIT can apply and test upgrades--all Winter 2007 Blackboard courses will be operating on an alternate Blackboard server called http://bbss.umbc.edu with the new version 7.1 installed. They will stay on this server throughout the Winter semester.

OIT will create requested course shells for Winter 2007 Bb courses on http://bbss.umbc.edu and move Winter 2007 courses currently on the production server during the afternoon of Tuesday, December 19 and will email all affected professors when the process is complete. We will also be posting notices inside the production server of Blackboard alerting Winter 2007 students that their courses are on a different server. We will also provide a direct link to that server where they should find their courses.

Note: Because Winter 2007 courses will be on a separate server, they will NOT be auto-created with empty course "shells" as is the case with Spring 2007 courses. Winter 2007 courses will be created upon request by faculty using the course request form on the Blackboard Help Tab. In addition, Winter 2007 courses will NOT be "auto-enrolled." Faculty can either enroll students one-at-a-time, allow students to "self-enroll" or contact OIT for a one-time "batch-enroll" of their course rosters (faculty can then augment the course roster by enrolling or deleting students manually). To request a one-time batch enroll of your Winter 2005 course, send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:58 AM

Reminder: Courses Prior to Fall 2002 Moved to Archive Server

As announced on May 17th, 2006, all courses older then one year are gradually being moved from the production server to an alternate archive called http://archive.umbc.edu, where they can be accessed. As of the date of this update, OIT has copied all of the courses prior to Fall 2002. After the 7.1 upgrade in January, OIT will likely delete archived courses from the main production server by the end of the Spring 2007 semester. If you have a course in Blackboard that was created prior to Fall 2002, you can access it by going to http://archive.umbc.edu. Remember that courses copied to the archive server can not be used for conducting classes as students will NOT have access to the archive server. The archived courses should serve as a place to retrieve course content and data from past courses and not a place to conduct classes.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Bob Armstrong at ext. 5-3885 or rarmstro@umbc.edu, or send an email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:56 AM

Reminder: Instructional Technology Faculty Survey

The Blackboard faculty survey that was first introduced prior to the beginning of the Fall semester is still available for faculty to complete. Your participation is appreciated and the feedback will allow OIT to better serve your audio-visual needs.

To access the anonymous 15-question survey, simply log into Blackboard. If you are a faculty member, look for a link to the Instructional Technology community under "My Organizations". Click on the community link and you will see a link to the survey on the announcements page. Your input is important to us and we appreciate your time in completing the survey. If you have any questions, contact Steve Anderson at sanderso@umbc.edu or 410.455.3680.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:55 AM

Reminder: Reserving Mobile AV Equipment for Spring 2007

If you plan on using technology in your Spring 2007 face-to-face classes, please submit an AV request by January 24, 2007. Requests can be submitted using a web form. After completing and submitting the form, remember that all equipment requests are subject to availability and are not considered confirmed until you receive a return email.

For future reference: All faculty can determine which rooms have specific A/V equipment by using the "Find Tech Classrooms" link under the "Class Tech Links" mentioned on the myBlackboard tab. However, when scheduling a room assignment from Academic Services (through your department scheduling coordinator) it's best to ask for specific room attributes (including technology) rather than ask for a specific room. Because of demand, you may not get the specific room you want, but Academic Services tries to provide a similar room, if they know what you want.

Classroom Technology can be reached at 410.455.2461 or by sending an email to avservices@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:54 AM

New Discussion Board in Version 7.1

The biggest change in the new version of Blackboard that will be available in Spring 2007, is the redesigned discussion board. The discussion board tool, found under communications in each Blackboard course shell, has been redesigned to allow faculty to "grade" student discussion board posts, a new subscription option for individual threads, better administration tools, and a new peer review/rating option where students can rate the posts of others. It also has a different "look" in the way that it displays user posts.

OIT has developed some flash movies that you can view to better understand the changes that have been incorporated into the new version. You can view the movies by going to here for creating a new forum and here for managing threads.

If you have questions or concerns, you can contact Bob Armstrong at ext. 5-3885, or send an email to rarmstro@umbc.edu or blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:53 AM

Learning Objects' Blackboard Wiki and Blog Tool Update

OIT will be installing the newest version of the Learning Objects wiki and blog tools in Blackboard. The new version includes several new upgrades:

- Improved site navigation for easier movement between user pages
- Site search function in the wikis
- Filters for searching blog entries
- A calendar feature in the blogs for seeing most recent posts

OIT has developed some training videos that highlight the new design and the new features. The video for wikis can be seen here and the blog for the blogs can be seen here. Additional help can be found by clicking on the "?" that can be found once you open the application.

If you have questions or concerns, please contact Bob Armstrong at ext. 5-3885 or rarmstro@umbc.edu or send an email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:52 AM

November 8, 2006

Learning Objects: Wikis and Blogs on 11/15

Looking for a way to engage your students and foster active learning and collaboration in your Blackboard course? Come and listen to Peter Shipley and Hal Herzog from Learning Objects, makers of the wiki and blog tools that are incorporated into your Blackboard courses. They will be demonstrating real world examples of how these tools are being used by universities across the nation and showing us the new versions that make the process even easier. There will be plenty of time for questions at the end.

You can sign up by going to http://www.umbc.edu/training. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Bob Armstrong at ext.5-3885 or rarmstro@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 1:55 PM

November 6, 2006

11/17 USM Overview of "QualityMatters" Assessment of Online/Hybrid Course Design

The University System of Maryland (USM) is sponsoring a Nov. 17 half-day "Overview" workshop at Towson Univ. on the "QualityMatters" rubric (or "checklist") of best practices for evaluating online or hybrid course design. The deadline for online registration is 11/16, and will be followed by "hands-on" workshops in January and March. Seating is limited, but many participating USM schools (including UMBC) plan to host on-campus, video conference "viewing sites" for most, if not all of workshop activities. For more information about QualityMatters or the related USM sessions, please visit: http://www.usmd.edu/usm/onlinelearning.

FYI: UMBC will be using a "self review" version of the "QualityMatters" rubric for the Summer 2007 Alternate Delivery Program (RFP deadline: 12/8/06). Specifically, the QM rubric will be a required final deliverable for the $1,500 "course redesign" award OR as the proposal form for the new $1,000 "peer mentor" award. For more information, see http://www.umbc.edu/oit/hybrid.

Posted by fritz at 11:02 PM

Summer '07 "Hybrid/Online" Courses RFP (Due: 12/8)

The Office of Summer, Winter & Special Programs (OSWSP) invites proposals from UMBC full and part-time faculty to develop online or hybrid courses to be offered during the 2007 Summer Session. This "Alternate Delivery Program" (ADP) includes $1,500 "course redesign" OR $1,000 "peer mentoring" funding as well as support from the UMBC Faculty Development Center (FDC) and Office of Information Technology (OIT).

APPLICATION DEADLINE: Friday, December 8, 2006
AWARD NOTIFICATION: Monday, December 18, 2006

For more information, including ADP requirements, proposal procedures, a list of past participants and a related 11/28 "information session," please visit www.umbc.edu/ssfaculty/adp or www.umbc.edu/oit/hybrid.

Posted by fritz at 10:49 PM

August 3, 2006

Blackboard Update - Fall 2006

UMBC Blackboard update is provided by the Office of Information Technology for students, faculty and staff using Blackboard at UMBC. If you have questions or suggestions, contact John Fritz (at fritz@umbc.edu or 410.455.6596) or Bob Armstrong (at rarmstro@umbc.edu or 410.455.3885). For more information about using Blackboard, visit http://blackboard.umbc.edu.

1. FA2006 Course Shells Created on 8/3 & "Self Enrollment" Turned Off

2. Reminder: Faculty Must Turn On Course Shells for Students to See Them

3. Tip: Students Can "Hide" Old Courses on MyBlackboard Tab

4. Blackboard Course Archiving to Begin 8/7

5. OIT Units Merge to Become Instructional Technology & New Media

6. Instructional Technology Faculty Survey

7. Reserving V Equipment for Fall 2006

8. Summer 2006 Courses Expire on 9/20

9. Problem Sending Bulk Emails in Blackboard

10. FYI: 9/15 Educause Learning Initiative "Webinar" on Assessment

11. FYI: Upcoming Blackboard Workshops

12. FYI: Welcome to Jeffrey Berman

Posted by berman1 at 10:57 AM

August 2, 2006

Fall 2006 Course Shells Created on 8/3 & “Self Enrollment” Turned Off

Today, August 3, 2006, OIT created an empty Blackboard course shell for all Fall 2006 courses listed in the UMBC Schedule of Classes with assigned instructors. Courses that don’t have assigned instructors will be created as they are added to the Schedule of Classes by the Registrar’s office. Only officially registered students will be automatically enrolled in all Bb courses.

Note: Because some students (and faculty) have mistaken enrollment in a Bb course shell as official UMBC course registration, OIT has turned off the “self enrollment” function in all new Blackboard shells.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:34 PM

August 1, 2006

Reminder: Faculty Must Turn Course Sites On for Students to See Them

Any faculty member who wants to use Blackboard simply needs to log in via myUMBC or http://blackboard.umbc.edu and make his or her course “available” (control panel - Settings - Availability - Y/N). Detailed instructions are available on the Blackboard Help tab. If you do not wish to use Blackboard, do nothing. By default, all UMBC Blackboard course "shells" remain "unavailable" to students until the instructor of record makes his or her course available.

Reminder: An online instructor manual and student user manual are available inside every Blackboard course and on the Blackboard Help Tab.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:05 PM

July 31, 2006

Tip: Students Can “Hide” Old Courses on MyBlackboard Tab

Many students complain they remain enrolled in old Bb courses that take up space on their “My Courses” section of the MyBlackboard Tab. By clicking on the “pencil” icon, they can hide old courses. Better yet, Faculty should remove students from their old courses or make the course sites unavailable. Students can NOT un-enroll themselves from a Bb course site.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:12 PM

July 29, 2006

Blackboard Course Archiving to Begin 8/7

As announced on May 17, 2006, OIT will begin to archive old courses that have been taking up space on the Blackboard production server. Following discussions with the Faculty Senate’s Computer Policy Committee (CPC) and the University’s IT Steering Committee (ITSC), all courses older then one academic year will gradually be archived and moved from the main production server to an archive server. This process will begin with our oldest courses from 2000 and 2001, starting on August 7, 2006. As a result, archiving should make current courses run faster and aide the normal backup process carried out each day and for planned upgrades. Archived courses will continue to be available to faculty for retrieving content, but will not be available for use by students. For more information, see the white paper OIT developed to describe the problem and the archiving procedure.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:45 PM

July 27, 2006

Instructional Technology Faculty Survey

To better understand in-class, faculty use of technology, OIT has created a Blackboard community containing all campus faculty and an anonymous 15-question survey that should take no more than 10 minutes to complete. To access the survey, simply log into Blackboard and, if you are a faculty member, look for a link to the Instructional Technology community under "My Organizations". Click on the community link and you will see a link to the survey on the announcements page. Your input is important to us and we appreciate your time in completing the survey. If you have any questions, contact Steve Anderson at sanderso@umbc.edu or 410.455.3680.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:25 PM

July 26, 2006

Reserving AV Equipment for Fall 2006

If you plan on using technology in your Fall 2006 face-to-face classes, please submit an AV request by August 21, 2006. Requests can be submitted using a web form. After completing and submitting the form, remember that all equipment requests are subject to availability and are not considered confirmed until you receive a return email. Classroom Technology can be reached at 410.455.2461 or by sending an email to avservices@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:07 PM

July 25, 2006

Summer 2006 Courses Expire on 9/20

As announced earlier in the semester, Summer 2006 auto-created Bb course "shells" are set to expire on September 20, 2006 after grades are due. This means the course will automatically revert to being unavailable to students, but faculty will still see the course link. This will help students who frequently complain about having numerous links to old courses in Blackboard. They can request ongoing access from the instructor, who can override the duration settings manually. This may be helpful for processing incompletes, but the majority of students will not have to request to be un-enrolled from old courses.

Remember: students can’t un-enroll from Bb courses themselves. If you don’t need your students to see old Bb course sites from any past semester, please consider making them "unavailable". If you are finished with a course and don't need the content, student submissions or gradebook, consider deleting it by completing the “Bb Course Delete” request form on the Bb Blackboard Help tab.

Hot Tip: Students and instructors can use the pencil tool in “ My Courses” to hide announcements and course links.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:23 PM

July 24, 2006

Problem Sending Bulk Emails in Blackboard

OIT has identified a problem with sending bulk emails to more then 100 users through courses/communities in Blackboard. The problem appears to allow a user to send an email to more then 100 users, but in reality, the emails are not being successfully sent through the system. This is because OIT has recently enabled a personal email setting that restricts any UMBC user from sending email to more than 100 users. Also, Blackboard recently changed its own email delivery system by eliminating a setting that “chunked” bulk emails to mini-distributions of 25 users or less.

After consulting with Blackboard, OIT could eliminate the 100+ personal email filter (which does help fight internally generated spam), or wait to upgrade to the latest version of Blackboard, which will allow us to manually set the mini-distribution “chunks” to a number below OIT’s maximum personal email distribution setting. In keeping with past practice, OIT will upgrade during the winter semester, to ensure the least amount of interruption and unforeseen issues during the fall and spring semesters.

In the meantime, instructors and community managers can workaround this problem by using the “Advanced Group Management” tool, to divide large Bb sites into groups smaller then 100 users and email to those groups independently. You can accomplish this by following the directions on the advanced group management help sheet.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and we expect to resolve the issue during the winter session when we do our normal major upgrades. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Bob Armstrong (rarmstro@umbc.edu or 5-3885) or John Fritz (fritz@umbc.edu or 5-6596), or send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:31 PM

July 22, 2006

FYI: Upcoming Blackboard Workshops

The following Blackboard workshops will be offered during the month of August. To sign up, just go to http://www.umbc.edu/training and click on "Blackboard" to see the workshops.

Getting Started with Blackboard

This 90 minute hands-on workshop will get you started using Blackboard at UMBC. The workshop will cover how to access your course, basic course design, posting a syllabus, adding content, and managing users in your course. (Please bring an electronic copy of your syllabus if you have one.)

Prerequisites:

1. Active UMBC account

Interactivity with Blackboard Communication Tools

This 90 minute hands-on workshop will introduce you to the various communication tools in Blackboard and discuss how they can be effectively used. Topics we will cover include how to create discussion boards, use of the "Assignments" feature, effective ways to use groups, Turnitin, and email. (Please bring an electronic copy of your syllabus if you have one.)

Prerequisites:

1. Basic knowledge of Blackboard
2. Active Blackboard course/community

If you have any questions, or can't make the training and need some Blackboard help, please send an email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 3:33 PM

July 21, 2006

FYI: Welcome to Jeffrey Berman

Join OIT in welcoming Jeffrey Berman as our new graduate assistant. Jeffrey has just completed his BS in Information Systems here at UMBC and he is continuing on in the IS master's program with an emphasis in human centered computing. He has worked as a TA in Karin Readel's Science 100 classes for the last three years. Jeffrey will be working on Blackboard support and special projects.

You can contact Jeffrey at berman1@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:59 AM

May 18, 2006

Blackboard Update - Spring 2006

UMBC Blackboard update is provided by the Office of Information Technology for students, faculty and staff using Blackboard at UMBC. If you have questions or suggestions, contact John Fritz (at fritz@umbc.edu or 410.455.6596) or Bob Armstrong (at rarmstro@umbc.edu or 410.455.3885). For more information about using Blackboard, visit http://blackboard.umbc.edu.

1. Reminder: End of Semester Checklist

2. Spring 2006 Courses Expire on 6/15

3. Summer 2006 Course Shells Created on 5/18

4. Digital Drop Box to be Discontinued on 6/30

5. OIT Seeks Faculty Volunteers for Bb Version 7.1 Summer Pilot

6. Alternate Delivery Program Winter 2007 RFPs (deadline 5/19) <

7. Wimba Tools Pilot Extended One Year; Live Classroom Ends December 2006

8. Growth of Blackboard Research Communities

9. Bb Courses Older than One Year to be Archived this Summer

10. FYI: Goucher Technology Conferences

Posted by berman1 at 10:05 AM

May 17, 2006

Blackboard Courses Older than One Year to be Archived this Summer

Currently, we have over 8,000 courses and 270 communities that are stored on the Blackboard production server. Most of those courses are older then one year, and many date back as far as Fall 2000. As a result of this growth, during the summer, OIT will be archiving all courses older then one year. The courses will be placed on a seperate server and gradually removed from the production server. Doing this will accomplish several things:

1. It will reduce the load on the production server and could improve performance during peak use times.

2. It will reduce the number of courses that appear on the "myBlackboard" tab of students, and faculty.

3. It will reduce the amount of time it takes OIT to complete a course backup. Again helping to reduce stress on the system cpu and overall system performance.

All of the archived courses will be available to faculty but not to students and content from these courses can continue to be copied into existing or future courses.

OIT has developed a white paper that outlines the entire process in detail. Please feel free to review it for more information.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact John Fritz at fritz@umbc.edu, or Bob Armstrong at rarmstro@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 10:35 AM

May 5, 2006

FYI: 5/25 Goucher Technology Conference

Like to see what other universities are doing with technology and teaching? Visit the Goucher College CTLT Annual Conference on May 15th. The theme for the conference is “Group Dynamics and Collaborative Learning” and will focus on group dynamics and collaborative learning.

Posted by rarmstro at 8:53 AM

May 2, 2006

Growth of Blackboard Research Communities

Blackboard communities have traditionally been used as communication and document storage tools for campus organizations and departments, as well as being a convenient venue for campus elections and surveys. Over the last year or so communities have also become an easy to manage place to post research materials and serve as communication hubs for those involved in campus research. Examples of very successful research communities include the Lameness Project managed by Uri Tasch, professor, Mechanical Engineering and the Ecological Research Lab which is managed by Chris Swan, assistant professor, GES.

If you are interested in having a space for your research, please contact Bob Armstrong (rarmstro@umbc.edu or 5-3885) or John Fritz (fritz@umbc.edu or 5-6596), or send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

FYI: Armstrong and Fritz presented "Using Blackboard for Collaborative Research" at the 2006 Blackboard Users Conference in March, 2006.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:44 PM

Reminder: End of Semester Checklist

As we near the end of the semester, here's a checklist of tasks instructors may want to keep in mind (help sheets are available on the Blackboard Help tab):

Make your course unavailable to students
Create a backup copy of your course (and gradebook)
Send UMBC Blackboard course deletion requests

While past courses are available online in Blackboard, OIT recommends creating a backup copy, too. It's also smart to make your course unavailable to students after the semester ends, so it doesn't show up in their list of courses in future semesters--a big complaint of students. Exceptions might include keeping the course open to process incompletes, or as a courtesy to students who request to have ongoing access.

If you have created a backup copy of your course (online or on your own computer) consider having all older versions of the course deleted. You can then create your future course from your backup or the most recent version online. This way, you always "copy forward" the most recent version, and can get rid of past versions that are just taking up space--and probably still appear in past students' course lists. To permanently remove the course from your list, use the online form on the Blackboard Help tab. When the request has been received, we will send you an email to confirm your request.

For more information or help, send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:43 PM

Digital Drop Box will be Discontinued 6/30

As OIT announced on February 10, 2006, and November 28, 2005, the Assignments feature in Blackboard is a tool that was designed to replace the Digital Drop Box by allowing the instructor to create individual assignments for each student submission, rather than have all of the submissions for the course submitted into one place. This allows for easier document management—no more need to delete Digital Drop Box files one at a time—and no more confusion by students about whether they've POSTED an assignment to their drop box, or SUBMITTED it to the instructor's drop box. The Assignment function even creates a column in the Gradebook for easier management of grades.

With the upgrade to version 6.3 we are terminating the use of the Digital Drop Box on June 30th, following the spring 2006 semester, and will focus exclusively on the Assignments feature.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact John Fritz (fritz@umbc.edu or 5-6596) or Bob Armstrong (rarmstro@umbc.edu or 5-3885), or send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:36 PM

Wimba Tools Pilot Extended One Year; Live Classroom Ends December 2006

The Wimba “Voice Tools” will continue to be available for use in Blackboard. The “Live Classroom” pilot, however, will be discontinued in December 2006.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact John Fritz (fritz@umbc.edu or 5-6596) or Bob Armstrong (rarmstro@umbc.edu or 5-3885), or send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:29 PM

OIT Seeks Faculty Volunteers for Bb Version 7.1 Summer Pilot

OIT has installed the latest version of Blackboard (version 7.1) and is looking for faculty volunteers to pilot this system. New features in this version include the following:

1. Expanded Discussion Boards including subscriptions, grading and forum moderation
2. Assessments allowing multiple attempts can be viewed all at once

As in past UMBC Bb pilot programs, faculty who want to use the most recent version should consider the following:

• OIT will place an announcement in your pilot course describing what you and your students need to do if you encounter a problem in the version 7.1 pilot environment. We would ask you to make this a “permanent” announcement in your course throughout the semester.

• Throughout the semester, you and your students may be asked to complete a survey about your experience with the software.

• Your course will not be compatible with the regular production server until it is migrated to the version 7.1 software. Currently, OIT plans to migrate all courses to version 7.1 in January 2007, but may considering doing so for fall 2006 if we get acceptable results during a substantive pilot program this summer.

The pilot server can be found at http://bb-pilot.umbc.edu.

If you have any questions or concerns, or just want to explore the new version, please contact John Fritz (fritz@umbc.edu or 5-6596) or Bob Armstrong (rarmstro@umbc.edu or 5-3885), or send email to blackboard@umbc.edu and we would be happy to create you an account.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:24 PM

Spring 2006 Courses Expire on 6/15

As announced earlier in the semester, Spring 2006 auto-created Bb course "shells" are set to expire on June 15, 2006 after grades are due. This means the course will automatically revert to being unavailable to students, but faculty will still see the course link. This will help students who frequently complain about having numerous links to old courses in Blackboard. They can request ongoing access from the instructor, who can override the duration settings manually. This may be helpful for processing incompletes, but the majority of students will not have to request to be un-enrolled from old courses.

Remember: students can’t un-enroll from Bb courses themselves. If you don’t need your old Bb course site, please consider deleting it by completing the “Bb Course Delete” request form on the Bb Blackboard Help tab.

Hot Tip: Students and instructors can use the pencil tool in “ My Courses” to hide announcements and course links.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:15 PM

Summer 2006 Course Shells Created on 5/18

On May 18, 2006, OIT will create an empty Blackboard course shell for all summer 2006 courses listed in the UMBC Schedule of Classes with assigned instructors. Courses that don’t have assigned instructors will be created as courses are added to the Schedule of Classes by the Registrar’s office. Students will be automatically enrolled in all Bb courses as has been done in the past.

Any faculty member who wants to use Blackboard simply needs to login via myUMBC or http://blackboard.umbc.edu and follow the instructions on the Blackboard Help Tab. If you do not wish to use Blackboard, do nothing. By default, all UMBC Blackboard course "shells" remain unavailable to students until the instructor of record makes his or her course available. Starting this semester, we will also turn off the student “self enrollment” feature in all new Blackboard shells. This can be turned back on by instructors if so desired. Please Note that self enrolling in a Blackboard course does not constitute official registration in a UMBC course.

NOTE: An online instructor manual is available inside every Blackboard course in the course's "Control Panel" and on the Blackboard Help Tab.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact John Fritz (fritz@umbc.edu or 5-6596) or Bob Armstrong (rarmstro@umbc.edu or 5-3885), or send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 2:08 PM

April 12, 2006

Alternate Delivery (Online & Hybrid) Winter 2007 RFPs (deadline: 5/19)

The Office of Summer, Winter and Special Programs (OSWSP) is sponsoring a program to increase the number of alternate delivery courses - specifically, hybrid and online courses - offered during special sessions (winter and summer terms) in 2007.

Supported by OIT and the Faculty Development Center, the OSWSP invites proposals from UMBC full and part-time faculty to develop online or hybrid courses to be offered during the 2007 Winter Session. Course development funding, high speed Internet access, technical support, and the opportunity to participate in a faculty learning community are available through this program. The application deadline is Friday, May 19, 2006 (recipients will be notified the week of May 24, 2006). For more information, visit http://www.umbc.edu/ssfaculty/adp.

Posted by jward at 4:13 PM

March 23, 2006

Blackboard Down for Service Pack Upgrade (3/24/06)

On Friday, March 24, 2006 from 7-8am, Blackboard will be down so we can install a Blackboard service pack. This service pack will not introduce any new features but will fix various issues that have been reported by other Blackboard users.

This service pack will correct issues in the following areas:

• Login and the HTTP 404 error message
• Course and Community quota management
• Gradebook weight calculations
• Adjustments to the Copy Course feature
• Various administrative tasks not available to users

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact John Fritz (fritz@umbc.edu or 5-6596) or Bob Armstrong (rarmstro@umbc.edu or 5-3885), or send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by rarmstro at 3:05 PM

February 10, 2006

Blackboard Digital Drop Box Will Be Discontinued

Per OIT's 11/28/05 announcement, all users should no longer plan to use the Digital Drop Box (DDB), which Blackboard replaced with the assignment function in version 6.0 (UMBC is running version 6.3). The DDB was problematic for both students and faculty, and Blackboard doesn't offer or support it in version 7.0, which UMBC will migrate to in the 2006-07 academic year. For help, see the Blackboard Help tab or send email to blackboard@umbc.edu.

Posted by fritz at 9:40 AM

February 1, 2006

Bovine Benefit from Blackboard Community

Blackboard communities are great places for students and their professor to share classwork. But at UMBC, innovative people have found ways to use Blackboard’s communities to solve complicated communication problems.

Uri Tasch figured out how to help cattle farmers solve a problem they had been complaining about for 100 years. The UMBC engineering professor invented a machine that can detect lameness in cows.

The problem costs dairy farmers $10,000 a year for every 100-cow herd because lame cows produce less milk. But until the problem is detected, the cows can’t be helped and if detection comes too late, there may be no treatment that will cure the lameness. Found early, the solution is sometimes as simple as removing a stone from the cow’s hoof. And the result is a vast increase in milk production.

Tasch began the Bovine Lameness Project in 1995 with excellent results. The machine worked. He patented and licensed the technology to Bou-Matic, LLC, which sells it to farms around the world. Those farms began tracking their results.

The positive results piled up. What Tasch and his fellow researchers couldn’t figure out, though, was how to safely share the information among themselves, from their various locations, so they could track their work and collaborate.

The project depended on a relatively simple procedure: Cows walk through a machine that measures the weight exerted by each leg. Lame cows put much less pressure on one leg, and ultimately, the lameness results in lower milk production and other ailments that hurt the animal and cost the farmer money.

But to prove the concept, the measurements had to be submitted, analyzed and the results shared. Doing that proved tricky. The various researchers located all over the world needed a secure area they could easily access.

“We started through e-mail but the files became too big,” Tasch said.

So he decided to use a Blackboard Community.

He created a community and added all of the various researchers at other institutions and. It worked like a charm.

Community members throughout the world are now able to upload talks, share documents and databases, log their statistics and work on collaborative publications through the secure online community. The list includes five individuals in two departments at UMBC, four at Bou-Matic in Madison, Wisconsin, two at University of Delaware and two scientists in Israel.

“It has worked so well for me at Bou-Matic,” said Parimal Rajkondawar, project engineer. “Earlier, we used to burn CDs to exchange information and it used to take couple of days to get the results. Now we use Blackboard.

“Tasch uploads the results with instant access to me in Madison. A lot of times during company presentations, I provide data and results on Blackboard.”

Posted by jward at 3:54 PM

December 11, 2005

Blackboard Update

UMBC Blackboard update is provided by the Office of Information Technology for students, faculty and staff using Blackboard at UMBC. If you have questions or suggestions, contact John Fritz (at fritz@umbc.edu or 410.455.6596) or Bob Armstrong (at rarmstro@umbc.edu or 410.455.3885). For more information about using Blackboard, visit http://blackboard.umbc.edu.

Fall 2007

1. Fall 2007 Blackboard Course Shells Have Been Created

2. Audience Response "Clickers" on Campus

3. New Report Lists Most Active Blackboard Courses and Communities

4. OIT Seeks Faculty to Pilot New Version of Blackboard

5. Blackboard Training Workshops

6. 8/22 Hybrid Training Workshop

7. Reminder: Classroom Technology Requests Deadline 8/17 for Mobile Carts

8. FYI: Call for Presentations: 10/2 MDBUG Conf. @ UMBC Tech Center

Spring 2007

1. New Report Lists Most Active Blackboard Courses and Communities

2. UMBC Blackboard User Survey Now Available

3. How to Add Non-UMBC Users to a Bb Course or Community

4. Solution to Blackboard Login "Redirecting" Problem

5. OIT Downtime Notices (Including Blackboard) Available on Blog

6. "Scholar" Tab Added to Blackboard

7. Reminder: Make SP2007 Courses Unavailable or Delete Students

8. Reminder: SP2007 Course Shells Expire on 6/15

9. Class Technology Request Deadlines: SU2007 (5/18), FA2007 (8/1 for lab software; 8/17 for Mobile AV Carts)

10. FYI: Goucher to Host 5/30 TLT Conference

11. FYI: UMBC Launches Maryland Blackboard Users Group

12. FYI: BbWorld'07 World Conference is July 10-12 in Boston

Winter 2007

1. Reminder: End of Semester Checklist

2. Fall 2006 Courses Expire on 1/15

3. Spring 2007 Course Shells Created on 11/30

4. Auto Course Enrollment Now Includes Add AND Drop Changes

5. Blackboard Down for Upgrade 1/12-13 & 1/19-20

6. Winter 2007 Courses to Operate on Alternate Server

7. Reminder: Courses Prior to Fall 2002 Moved to Archive Server

8. Reminder: Instructional Technology Faculty Survey

9. Reminder: Reserving Mobile AV Equipment for Spring 2007

10. New Discussion Board in Version 7.1

11. Learning Objects' Blackboard Wiki and Blog Tool Update

12. FYI: Summer '07 "Hybrid/Online" Courses RFP (Due: 12/8)

13. FYI: USM Sponsors Exploration of QualityMatters Rubric (or checklist) for Quality Online Learning

Fall 2006

1. FA2006 Course Shells Created on 8/3 & "Self Enrollment" Turned Off

2. Reminder: Faculty Must Turn On Course Shells for Students to See Them

3. Tip: Students Can "Hide" Old Courses on MyBlackboard Tab

4. Blackboard Course Archiving to Begin 8/7

5. OIT Units Merge to Become Instructional Technology & New Media

6. Instructional Technology Faculty Survey

7. Reserving V Equipment for Fall 2006

8. Summer 2006 Courses Expire on 9/20

9. Problem Sending Bulk Emails in Blackboard

10. FYI: 9/15 Educause Learning Initiative "Webinar" on Assessment

11. FYI: Upcoming Blackboard Workshops

12. FYI: Welcome to Jeffrey Berman

Spring 2006

1. Reminder: End of Semester Checklist

2. Spring 2006 Courses Expire on 6/15

3. Summer 2006 Course Shells Created on 5/18

4. Digital Drop Box to be Discontinued on 6/30

5. OIT Seeks Faculty Volunteers for Bb Version 7.1 Summer Pilot

6. Alternate Delivery Program Winter 2007 RFPs (deadline 5/19) <

7. Wimba Tools Pilot Extended One Year; Live Classroom Ends December 2006

8. Growth of Blackboard Research Communities

9. Bb Courses Older than One Year to be Archived this Summer

10. FYI: Goucher Technology Conferences

Posted by berman1 at 11:40 AM

December 9, 2005

Bb 2006 User Conference Proposal Deadline Extended: 12/16/05

The 2006 Blackboard World Conference call for proposal deadline has been extended from 12/9 to 12/16. For more information, see the following:

http://blackboard.com/company/events/bbworld/

Posted by fritz at 11:25 PM

Blackboard Announces $50k Innovation Award (Deadline: 1/6/06)

Blackboard has announced it's "Greenhouse" project to "cultivate innovations in e- learning, support the organic growth of knowledge within the Blackboard(R) community and recognize exemplary campus service programs."

According to Bb's 11/29/05 press release . . .

"Three Award Programs Will Offer a Total of $50,000 to Winning Submissions"

"Applications and details on the awards are available on the Blackboard Connections Web site (http://connections.blackboard.com), a central hub where users can collaborate, share best practices and deepen their knowledge and expertise related to Blackboard.

"The deadline for submissions is January 6, 2006. Eight winners, in total, for all three awards, will be selected by February 3, 2006 and invited to attend and speak at the 8th Annual Blackboard Users Conference, Bb World, in San Diego from February 28 - March 2."

Posted by fritz at 11:20 PM

September 21, 2005

OIT Seeks New Media/Web Standards Specialist

The UMBC Office of Information Technology (OIT) seeks a New Media and Web standards specialist. The incumbant will serve as a Web developer, evangelist and consensus-builder to lead technical development of UMBC’s web presence and institutional adoption of Web standards as defined by the World Wide Web Consortium. Specific duties include: developing and supporting web applications on university and departmental web sites; leading the technical redesign of UMBC’s external Web site; leading development and implementation of scalable, device-independent Web solutions; producing or providing end-user support through online documentation or training; working with a diverse range of end-users as well as content editors, graphic designers, and systems administrators, to devise clean, standards-compliant, usable web sites; and performing other duties as assigned. More information.

Posted by fritz at 4:05 PM