Start-of-Semester Common Faculty/Staff Questions and Answers

Contributed by Jenni Willis-Opalenik, Ph.D., Director - Technology Learning Services

As an FYI for next term, here are a few significant inquiries that our team receives and some responses and reminders.

Can you please merge my Blackboard courses together (after the semester has started)?

Although it is possible to merge courses together once the semester begins, doing so is inherently a destructive effort that will delete any work or communication your students in the classes have submitted thus far. In addition, if you have already put content in the shells that will be merged, we can only copy over content from one of the existing shells, but not both. We strongly recommend that instructors submit merge requests at least a week before classes are made available to students.

We just hired a new instructor. Can you please give them access to the Blackboard shell(s) for their classes?

Instructor and student enrollments in Blackboard shells are based on multiple automated processes that run between eServices/PeopleSoft, Blackboard, and other local applications. As a result, we cannot manually add either new instructors or newly added students to credit course Blackboard shells. We also have to manual mechanism by which to expedite this automation. The automated processes begin only AFTER the hiring college/program/department enters the new faulty member as a primary instructor of record. Once the new instructor is in the schedule, they will have access to their Blackboard shell(s) within 72 hours. This same timeline applies to student enrollments after their schedule change/add is entered into eServices/PeopleSoft.

My TA keeps losing access to my class(es). How can we fix this?

It is CRITICAL that students serving as TAs do not enroll in the course(s) for which they will serve as TAs. Doing so will make it impossible for the IDT team to manually add the student's PCLAB account as a TA in the course(s). The student will need to have and use a UHCL staff computer account as a TA, instead of their student/PCLAB credentials. The TA's staff computer account should be automatically created within 48 hours of when their employment record is created or updated in eServices/PeopleSoft.

End of FA22 Reminders and Tips

Contributed by Jenni Willis-Opalenik, Ph.D., Director - OIT Technology Learning Services

With the end of the Fall 2022 term fast approaching, here are a few reminders to help faculty place a smooth finish on this term:

• Blackboard Grade Center: If you need assistance with your Blackboard Grade Center, please schedule a consultation with a member of our Instructional Design staff ASAP to avoid the last-minute rush. Contact the Support Center, either at 281-283-2828 or SupportCenter@uhcl.edu, to request an appointment. A member of the Support Center staff will create a help ticket and assign it to the IDT team. Once received, an Instructional Designer will contact you to make an appointment.
• End-of-Course Evaluations: Add the university's online course evaluation tool link to your course (for COE, CSE, and HSH). If BUS, add a link/information about the IDEA evaluation tool. NOTE: When accessing the online evaluations tool, only students will see a list of courses in which they are currently enrolled; instructors will only see online course evaluation availability dates for the current semester.
• Availability Dates:
• Regular Academic Session (15W) - 11/19/2022 12:00:00 AM - 12/3/2022 11:59 PM
• Eight Week - Second Session (8W2) - 11/26/2022 12:00:00 AM - 12/3/2022 11:59 PM
• Support Documents
• Adding or Editing a Course Evaluation Link (for COE, CSE, and HSH)
• Adding a Course Evaluation Link (for BUS only)
• FA22 Incompletes: If you have any FA22 incompletes, please notify the Support Center via email, so that we can keep those courses open or restore access for students to resolve their incompletes. Please include in your email the names and UHCL ID numbers of the students who will receive incompletes and the course rubrics and section numbers (e.g. ACCT3331.01) so the courses are left available only to those students. The Support Center can be reached via email at supportcenter@uhcl.edu.

Updated 11/30/22

AY 2021-2022: Looking Back...Looking Forward

Contributed by Jenni Willis-Opalenik, Ph.D., Director - OIT Technology Learning Services

With the SP22 semester securely in our rearview mirrors, I'm sure that many of our clients/readers are eager to begin a well-deserved summer break from the university. Now might be a very appropriate time to reflect on your classes in the past academic year and note those tips, tricks, and techniques that were most successful and those that produced less stellar results.

As you give some thought to your teaching successes and struggles, the IDT staff encourages you to include new technologies, technology adjustments, active learning strategies, and new tools in your reflection. Consider how you want your course to look, sound, and feel for you and your students in the next school year. What technologies worked for you, which may you need to adjust, and what technologies have caught your interest that you haven't yet tried? Once you have your thoughts together, please schedule an appointment with a member of OIT's Instructional Design and Technology team to discuss your AY 2022-2023 instructional technology and active learning interests. We'd love to serve as a "sounding board" for your brainstorming, talk through your ideas, and see how and where we can help you successfully put your instructional plans into practice. Until then, on behalf of our combined Technology Learning Services staff (IDT and Support Center), we wish everyone a safe and rejuvenating summer season!

2018/2019 Blackboard Course Shell Deletions Starting Soon!

Contributed by Jenni Willis-Opalenik, Ph.D., Director - OIT Technology Learning Services

OIT's Technology Learning Services team will delete 2018 and 2019 Blackboard semester offerings on Friday, May 27, 2022. In addition to this newsletter article, multiple emails from the IDT team to faculty will be sent beginning Wednesday, April 27. Periodic course deletions are needed to reduce the size of our Blackboard database (and to avoid incurring additional storage space costs from Blackboard).

Course shells to be deleted are only those that have SP18, SU18, FA18, SP19, SU19, and FA19 in their CourseIDs. Our team's Learning Technology Administrators (LTAs) will restore faculty access to their 2018 and 2019 semester offerings this week 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 2018 and 2019 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. OIT will not be retaining any copies of 2018 and 2019 course shells, so please make plans to export or archive courses that you want to save before Friday, May 27, 2022.

SP23 Blank Blackboard Shells Available - Tips and Recommendations

Contributed by Jenni Willis-Opalenik, Ph.D., Director - OIT Technology Learning Services

SP23 blank Blackboard shells are now available, and it's never too early to start planning for the next semester. With that in mind, below are some valuable resources from our team's past blog posts and newsletters and a new Crash Course video.

• Crash Course - Course Copy [5:09]
• Tech Tip: Where Are My Blackboard Courses For the New Semester?
• Blackboard Tips and Reminders for the New Semester!
• Tips for a Great Start of the New Semester

In addition to these DIY options, please contact OIT's Support Center if you would like to schedule a virtual consultation with a member of the IDT team to discuss your setup/editing needs for SP23 Blackboard shells.

Tips for a Great Start of the New Semester

It's not too early to begin preparing your SU22/FA22 Blackboard shells. For this week, I thought I would look at a few articles from past newsletters that may be useful as you get your course ready for the new semester.

Copying content from a master course or a previous semester’s course shell is one of the first things an instructor does to prepare for a new semester. There are a few mistakes we see regularly that can make this process more confusing or frustrating than it needs to be. In an earlier newsletter, I presented the article Blackboard Tip: Using the Course Copy Tool, in which I took a look at the Course Copy tool and discussed some simple tips for completing the process as smoothly as possible.

There is another tool in Blackboard that many instructors don’t even know about that can be a big help when preparing for a new semester. The Date Management tool allows instructors to update all of the date information in their courses, including due dates, adaptive release dates, and test dates. In another previous newsletter article, Blackboard Tip: Date Management Tool, I discussed the Date Management tool and how to use it to update the dates in your course each semester.

The entry point of a Blackboard course is the first page the user sees first when they open the course. When an instructor is preparing a course, they may decide they want it to open to a different page than it has in the past, particularly if they are borrowing course contents from another instructor. I wrote another newsletter article, Blackboard Tip: Changing the Entry Point of Your Course, discussing this feature, and provided instructions for resetting the entry point to your course.

Finally, in the blog post Don't Panic!, I discuss the most important tip I know: Don’t Panic! Remember, your IDT Team and the Support Center are here to help you get your courses ready and will do what it takes to make that process go as smoothly as possible. Please do not hesitate to contact us if there is anything we can do to help you.

SP23 Critical Reminders from OIT's Technology Learning Services Team

Course Merges and Content Copies

If you are teaching courses in SP23 that you would like merged into one course shell in Blackboard, don't forget to fill out the Course/Section Merge Request form no later than Wednesday, January 12, 2023, so that your courses will be merged before students gain access to them on Sunday, January 15, 2023.  Note for 8W2 classes ONLY: You will have until Wednesday, May 15 to get your merge requests in for 8W2 so that we can process them before those courses go live at 12:00 am on May 18, 2023.

Once your courses have been merged, you will be able to copy contents from your existing courses into your newly merged course.  Information about other preparatory measures for the next semester's courses is available on our team's blog post, Blackboard Tips and Reminders for the New Semester.

IMPORTANT! If the section number for any of your classes is changed or canceled, or if a section is added that you need to have merged with these sections, please email the Support Center ASAP so that we can resolve any issues arising from those changes before students gain access.

If you have any questions, please contact the Support Center at either 281-283-2828 or supportcenter@uhcl.edu, and a member of our team will be in touch to assist.

Add TA to Blackboard Course

TA adds are not time-sensitive like course merges and can be done anytime via our "Request Adding TAs to Courses" online form. Please carefully select which role you would like your TA to have in the course when filling out the form. Additionally, if your TA has an active Staff account, regardless of their role, it will be used to add them to your course. This is done to keep work done as a TA separate from work done as a Student as much as possible. The exception is TAs who are doing their job for course credit. If your TA is getting credit for their TA work, please note this on the form to add them via their Student account if they also have an active Staff account. Note for BUS TAs: Per the Dean of the College of Business, all TAs in BUS courses may only be given the role of Student. We will only add TAs to any BUS course with the role of Student, regardless of what is marked on the form.

For the Fastest Assistance, Contact the Support Center!

OIT's Instructional Design and Technology (IDT) team works closely with OIT's Support Center. These two units work closely to ensure that faculty, staff, and students can access timely and helpful support regarding IT-related issues. The members of the IDT staff have formed excellent relationships with many of our faculty/staff clients, and we know that some of you contact your designated ID (or another member of the IDT team) directly by email or telephone for assistance. Although we love hearing from you, the IDT team encourages users to rely on the Support Center for your point of first contact. Especially during our most business times of the year, going through the Support Center offers several benefits over directly contacting individual team members:

• Your question isn't sitting in a team member's email, waiting until their workload permits them to review their emails;
• Your email or voicemail is less likely to be "lost" in the crush of communications, especially around the start of each term; and
• If an individual staff member is incapacitated or otherwise unavailable, an inquiry that goes to the Support Center ends up in the IDT team's help ticketing queue, where it will be seen and can be assigned to another available member of our staff.

Contact the Support Center by email at SupportCenter@uhcl.edu or telephone at (281) 283-2828.

Why are All of My Enrolled Students Not in My Blackboard Course?

At the start of every semester, there may be cases in which your roster of students in E-Services doesn't match the roster in your Blackboard course. The following information may help explain those discrepancies. As students add, drop, and change courses just before and just after the start of a new term, there can be a 2-3 day delay between when they submit a schedule change and when that change is reflected in Blackboard.  For example, students who add a course on Friday may not yet have access to the Blackboard shell for that class on Sunday, but they will likely see the course appear on Monday. Without getting too technical, schedule changes in PeopleSoft have to be processed locally and then each day's changes are updated overnight with UH Central/Main. Only after that update completes will the job be executed that eventually adds the student to or removes them from specific Blackboard classes.

FA22 Faculty Welcome and IT-Related Updates

Welcome, or welcome back, to another exciting academic year at the University of Houston - Clear Lake. On behalf of the Instructional Design and Technology (IDT) team and our OIT colleagues in the Support Center, Tech Services, Academic Computing, and Academic Labs, we are posting this information to provide all faculty and staff critical IT-related information and updates to keep in mind as you make technology preparations to support your teaching in the new semester.

Support Center/Computer Lab Locations and Hours

The Support Center's walk-up support is available at our Bayou 1312 (Mini Support Center) location. Although currently open Monday-Friday, 8:00 AM-5:30PM, beginning Monday, August 22, 2022, the Support Center hours will be as follows:

Monday-Thursday: 8:00 AM-7:30 PM

Friday: 8:00 AM-5:30 PM

Saturday: 10:00 AM-3:00 PM

Sunday: Closed

Faculty, staff, and students can also submit questions and technical issues to the Support Center by telephone (281.283.2828) and via email (SupportCenter@uhcl.edu). 

Faculty experiencing technical issues during an on-campus class can still call the Support Center and, when prompted, press the button/number for classroom tech issues. Those calls will be routed to one of the Open Computer Labs, and a staff member from Academic Computing and Academic Labs will assist you. SSCB 2201 Open Lab hours for the FA22 semester are as follows:

Monday-Thursday: 7:30 AM-10:30 PM

Friday-Saturday: 8:00 AM-5:00 PM

Sunday: Closed

Please visit the Open Labs webpage for information about other Computer Lab locations and operating hours.

Important Document/Blog Post Links

• Start-of-Semester Reminders [blog] - Students will have access to FA22 15W and 8W1 Blackboard shells on Saturday, August 20. In this blog post, we offer some recommendations for tasks to complete before your students jump into their courses.
• Faculty Support Resources, including Classroom (Academic Computing) and Computer Lab Support [blog] - Learn how to get help with classroom technology issues, teaching and open computer labs, 24/7 software access for students, and general OIT questions.
• Classroom Point-Tilt-Zoom (PTZ) Cameras (a.k.a., Rally cams) and Recording/Live Streaming Lecture Options [blog]
• New Semester Recommend Updates for Personal Devices [blog]
• Student Checklist for Online Technology Readiness [document] - Originally created for UHCL students, this reference is also an excellent resource for faculty.
• Online Blackboard Training for Students [blog]
• End of Course Survey Availability Dates (Login Required) - The FA22 evaluation dates are already posted on the Fall 2022 Academic Calendar. For instructions on how to add a course evaluation link to your Blackboard course, please review the handout, Adding or Editing a Course Evaluation Link.
• End-of-Service for Blackboard Collaborate - [blog] Please read this recently updated blog post for details.
• Zoom Recording Planned Deletions [blog] - Please review this latest information about Zoom meeting recordings and how to help the university avoid further data storage-related costs.
• Blackboard Ally - please review the materials posted under the Blackboard Ally menu on OIT's Blackboard Faculty Support webpage, starting with the short video, Introducing Blackboard Ally [3:06]

As always, if you have any questions about these resources or about instructional technology at UHCL, please contact OIT's Support Center. Your inquiry will be entered into the help ticketing system and an OIT staff member will be assigned to assist you.

OIT Support Center

Location: B1312

Email: SupportCenter@uhcl.edu

Phone: 2810283-2828

New Semester Recommend Updates for Personal Devices

OIT's Tech Services, Academic Computing, and Academic Labs will prepare all OIT-controlled classroom teaching stations, computer lab workstations, and on-campus office workstations with updates needed to begin the new academic year. Faculty and staff who still have UHCL-owned devices at home should return those to campus as soon as possible. We are only able to update those machines when they are on campus and connected to the on-campus network. Anyone using personal devices for UHCL work at home or while traveling should ensure that you install the latest versions of the following applications and tools on your non-UHCL equipment:

• Operating System
• Web Browsers (e.g., Chrome, Firefox, Edge, Safari)
• Mobile Device Operating Systems (e.g., Android, iOS)
• Zoom App
• Echo360 Universal Capture

Faculty using Respondus LockDown Browser (LDB) with their online exams should also remind students to update their copy of LDB well in advance of their first exam.

Zoom Recording Planned Deletions

As we have explained in previous semesters, the university's license for Zoom does not include unlimited cloud storage for recorded meetings. As we begin the FA21 term, UHCL has used 82% of our licensed cloud storage and we expect to see a rapid increase in recorded meetings early in the new semester. Please be aware of the following tips and reminders for recording Zoom recordings and long-term storage:

• If you plan to save recorded Zoom meetings beyond the semester in which you record them, please make sure to activate your UHCL Echo360 account and set your Zoom meetings to record to the cloud. If both these conditions are met, your Zoom recordings will be saved in the Zoom cloud (temporarily) and your Echo360 library (long-term storage).
• Beginning in FA21, the IDT team began regularly notifying faculty with recorded Zoom meetings in both locations that we intend to delete recorded sessions from the Zoom cloud since they will remain in Echo360 storage indefinitely.
• Faculty who have not activated their UHCL Echo360 account and who own recorded Zoom meetings saved in the Zoom cloud should take steps to move those from Zoom to a long-term storage solution. Our IDT team can provide instructions and training on downloading MP4 video files from Zoom to your computer, activating your Echo360 account, uploading the videos to your Echo360 library, and then deleting the recordings from Zoom. Other options are available, including downloading from Zoom and uploading to YouTube or simply downloading recordings and saving them on your own external drive. However, OIT can only provide full support for Zoom cloud-to-Echo360 video migrations.

End-of-Service for Blackboard Collaborate

UHCL currently licenses and supports several web conferencing systems for instructional and campus operation use, including Zoom, Blackboard Collaborate, and Teams meetings. To reduce costs and streamline user support for web conferencing, OIT discontinued supporting Blackboard Collaborate in February 2022. All existing Collaborate recordings were migrated to Echo360 and are available to content owners in that application. 

Previous Collaborate users are encouraged to familiarize themselves with Zoom for their web conferencing needs. As a reminder, Zoom sessions may now be integrated within Blackboard. We recommend that new Zoom users take advantage of the Zoom Daily Live Webinars described below.

Zoom Daily Live Webinars

Zoom trainers host free and interactive live-training webinars daily. Get up to speed in less than an hour. Please select the time zone that fits best for you when registering for one of the live training webinars.

Information Page (with Registration Links)

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.

Blackboard Tips and Reminders for the New Semester!

Blank course shells have been created for SP23 courses. All faculty are reminded of the following recommendations:

• Course Merge Request Deadline: If you have two or more classes that you want to merge into a single Blackboard shell, please use the online merge request form at least two weeks before classes begin. We will be unable to perform merges once students begin accessing your courses.
• Teaching Assistant Access: If you have TAs or others who will be assisting with your classes this semester, use the online Add TA to a Course request form to get things started. NOTE: Whenever possible, we use the TA's UHCL staff account credentials, rather than their student credentials. This better delineates work that they do in courses as a student from work done as a TA.
• Student Access for Incompletes: If you have given a student an incomplete for one of your courses, please notify the Support Center via email (supportcenter@uhcl.edu) to request that we either add the student to your current semester Blackboard course or extend the student's access to your previous semester Blackboard course. In your email, please include the following information:
• Names and ID numbers of the students who received an incomplete.
• The course rubric(s) (e.g., ACCT3331.01).
• Whether we should add the student to your current semester Blackboard course or extend their access to the class in which they received the incomplete.
• (If we are extending access to your previous semester Blackboard course) The date through which you would like the student(s) to have access.
• Take Your Course for a Student "Test Drive:" Use Blackboard's Student Preview to look at your course from the perspective of a student. Are all dates current for the new term? Can you see everything that your students need to access? Are your welcome message and getting started materials in a prominent location, so that students don't have to hunt and peck for critical information?
• Copying Course Contents: Faculty may use Blackboard's Course Copy feature to transfer contents from one of their own existing Blackboard shells into their SP23 shells. Faculty who need to borrow content from another instructor should email the Support Center and include an email from the content owner granting permission for us to copy their contents into your course.
• Course Updates: Clear or hide outdated and/or unused course materials, e.g., old discussion posts, announcements, old syllabi, etc. Update any assignments/assessments with availability and due dates with new dates for the current semester.
• Add Critical Help Resources for Students: If you will be using Zoom, Collaborate, or Echo360 this semester, please encourage your students to review the materials posted on our Student Blackboard Support page. We have a Student Checklist for Online Technology Readiness, as well as tool-specific handouts and videos.
• Schedule Changes: If you were originally scheduled to teach a course in SP23 that has been reassigned to another instructor, please email the Support Center and let us know the course information. A Blackboard shell for the new instructor will not be generated until your shell has been removed from the Blackboard system.
• Proctoring Information: Will you be requiring students to use a proctoring service when completing online tests/exams? If so, make sure that you provide students with links to resources about how to prepare for a proctored assessment. UHCL provides two recorded proctoring options for faculty: (1) ProctorU Review+ (with Proctored Launch), and (2) Respondus LockDown Browser and Monitor. The Student Information tab on our team's Online Proctoring Resources page has the information that students need to get ready for a successful proctoring session.

For questions about preparing for the next semester, please reach out to our Instructional Design and Technology (IDT) team by contacting the Support Center. A staff member will enter your request into the help ticketing system, where it will be routed to the next available member of our team.

Course Evaluation Dates

Fall 2021 Online Course Evaluation Dates 

Session	Session Begin/End	Online Evaluations Begin/End
Regular Academic Session (1)	08/23/2021 12:00:00 AM - 12/04/2021 12:00:00 AM	11/20/2021 12:00:00 AM - 12/04/2021 11:59 PM
Eight Week - First (8W1)	08/23/2021   12:00:00 AM - 10/16/2021 12:00:00 AM	10/02/2021   12:00:00 AM - 10/09/2021 11:59 PM
Eight Week - Second (8W2)	10/18/2021   12:00:00 AM-12/11/2021 12:00:00 AM	11/27/2021   12:00:00 AM - 12/04/2021 11:59 PM

As a reminder, faculty and students can all see the evaluation dates for the current semester by login into UHCL's Online Course Evaluation system.

E-Services/PeopleSoft Support Reminder

UCT's Blackboard support staff would like to remind all instructors that our Blackboard team has no access to E-Services/PeopleSoft. Although our Instructional Designers can help you with many Blackboard and other technical issues, we are unable to provide assistance with anything related to E-Services/PeopleSoft.

Each college should have personnel trained to support this effort and they should be your first point of contact regarding E-Services/PeopleSoft questions. Please contact the Associate Dean’s office for your college for more information.

•    BUS: 281-283-3111
•    COE: 281-283-3620
•    CSE: 281-283-3715
•    HSH: 281-283-3400

The backup support for E-Services/PeopleSoft inquiries will be the Office of Academic Records (OAR)/Office of the Registrar and the Student Enrollment Center (SEC).  These offices will be your contact for technical difficulties and other related assistance as needed. You may contact the OAR at 281-283-2525 and can reach the SEC at 281-283-2722.

Options/Reminders for HTML/Flash-based Blackboard Courses

Due to a significant change in how Blackboard copies contents across courses made by Blackboard in 2013, faculty who use HTML, Adobe Presenter, Flashpaper, and similar file types that call to other associated files in order to function are reporting numerous content failures within their courses as they provision for new semesters. Specifically, Blackboard’s changes to the copy function intentionally abandon any items within the course files area that are not directly deployed/linked within the course itself. Although an HTML index file may appear to copy over, when students click on the link, the associated files to which that index file “call” may be missing, rendering the content inaccessible.

Since the start of UHCL’s transition from WebCT to Blackboard our mandatory training has included instruction on how to use Blackboard’s native features to add content and avoid the use of technologies that require associated files.   With that said, we are offering any faculty who are using HTML, Adobe Presenter, Flashpaper (and similar types of files that call to other associated files in order to function) an opportunity to address this issue.

Option 1

Please contact the Support Center and ask to create a ticket to “replace your HTML files” or “Adobe Presenter files” or “Flashpaper files”.  We will do what we can to assist with this fix.

Option 2

If faculty choose to use the non-supported files then they will need to use the following partial workaround recommended by Blackboard or accept responsibility for any issues related to missing content.

1. Instructors should, at the end of each semester, download a backup of the files area in their Blackboard course.
2. Once they have provisioned the course and are preparing to teach it again, upload the backup file into the files area of the new semester offering.
3. Use the Student Preview feature in your new semester offering and test/repair links that are broken, reconnecting them to their uploaded/replaced files from the course files area.

We want to help faculty in making sure we minimize this issue before it impacts that students.  If you have any questions regarding this information, please contact Ed Puckett (X2983) or Jenni Willis-Opalenik (X2981).