Blackboard Update - New Text Editor Interface

On Thursday, November 5, Blackboard automatically pushed an upgrade to all SaaS (cloud-based) instances of Blackboard Learn, including the system used at UHCL.

Unfortunately, the documentation provided to us by Blackboard regarding the upgrade failed to specify the nature of the significant adjustments to Blackboard's text editor. As a result, we have received multiple inquiries from faculty over the weekend regarding how to complete essential tasks using the new interface. We have prepared a series of short video demonstrations to address those questions. Please feel free to use the following links for information about one or more of these topics:

• Providing Audio and/or Video Feedback When Grading
• Embedding Echo360 Videos
• Including a Document with an Announcement
• Adding images to test questions 
• New Copy/Paste Formatting Prompt
• Adding YouTube/Khan Academy Embedded Videos

Two other reported issues have been forwarded to Blackboard support for investigation and resolution:

• Video created using embed code from UHCL’s streaming server badly formatted
• Unable to Return Photoshop (PSD) Files to Students in Grading Feedback - Blackboard has identified this issue as a "software defect" that will be resolved on a later update; however, there is no ETA from Blackboard as to when it will be fixed.

If you encounter an issue in the updated system that is not addressed in this article, please contact the Support Center to report the problem. Our team will investigate and either create a video/document to demonstrate the new process, or we'll open a help ticket with Blackboard to report the issue as a potential bug in the update.

Removal and Deletion of 2017 Semester Offerings

As originally announced in our March 15, 2020 newsletter, our team will remove all 2017 Blackboard semester offerings during the week of May 3, 2021. In order to reduce the size of our Blackboard database (and to avoid incurring additional storage space costs from Blackboard), we retain three calendar years plus the current year at any given time, so it is now time to say goodbye to 2017 shells. Course shells to be deleted are only those that have SP17, SU17, and FA17 in their CourseID. We have already restored faculty access to their 2017 semester offerings so that you can review those courses and decide whether or not you want to retain an offline copy for your records. Faculty who would like to retain copies of their 2017 courses may use either the Archive or Export option in Blackboard to do so. The difference between the archive and export process, as provided by Blackboard, is as follows:

• The archive course feature creates a frozen snapshot or permanent record of your course. An archive includes all the content, course statistics, users, and course interactions, such as blog posts, discussions, attendance data, and grades.
• The export course feature creates a ZIP file of your course content that you can import to create a new course. Unlike the archive course feature, the export course feature doesn't include any users or user interactions with the course.

Please note that neither process results in a version of your course contents that you can access or use outside of Blackboard. You may import a Blackboard export file to load old contents into a new blank semester shell. To access an archived file, you would need to work with our Learning Technology Administrators (LTAs) to temporarily restore a shell from that file to access materials or data. UCT will not be retaining any copies of 2017 course shells, so please make plans to export or archive courses that you want to save before Monday, May 3, 2021.