Category Archives: Blackboard

Changes to Blackboard Submission Receipts will not be Implemented

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In a prior blog post, we announced that Blackboard was deprecating support for the Receipting Building Block, which we use to customise the receipts students receive when submitting work to a Blackboard Assignment. This would have resulted in changes to the email receipt that students receive after submission.

Following further discussions with Blackboard, we are pleased to announce that these changes will no longer be implemented, meaning that: 

  • Students: will continue to receive a detailed email receipt including a link that they can use to download a copy of their submitted document(s).  
  • Administration Staff:  will continue to be able to review submission receipts stored for within the content system of a given course. 

The default wording on student receipts will continue to be: 

Your submission has been received. We have recorded the following details: 

Submission ID: ID NUMBER 

User: STUDENT NAME 

Student ID: STUDENT NUMBER 

Assignment: NAME OF SUBMITTED DOCUMENT(S) 

Course: NAME OF COURSE 

Date of Submission: SUBMISSION DATE AND TIME 

This submission contained the following attached files: 

LINK TO FILES AND SIZE OF FILES 

Please retain this email receipt. Do not reply to this email. If you have any queries about your submission, please contact your school. 

 

 

Blackboard maintenance, 12 December, 1 am – 2 am

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Blackboard has a scheduled Amazon Web Services maintenance window on Tuesday, 12 December, starting at 1 am GMT, with a duration of 1 hour. During this window, there is a possibility the Blackboard home page may be unavailable and users may see a “503 Service Temporary Unavailable” error message.

If you have any questions, please email digital-education@bristol.ac.uk.

Changes to Blackboard Submission Receipts

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Blackboard is deprecating support for the Receipting Building Block, which we use to customise the receipt students receive when submitting work to a Blackboard Assignment, at the end of 2023. This will lead to two changes in the submission receipts that are important to note.

For students

  • Currently, the email receipt includes a link that students can use to download a copy of their submitted document(s).
  • From 2024, this link will not exist, and students will only be able to download a copy of their submitted document(s) if the submission point is available to them.

For administration staff

  • Currently, submission receipts are stored for review within the content system of a given course.
  • From 2024, submission receipts will be stored within the Grade Centre’s “Reports” function.

The default wording from 2024 will be:

Your submission has been received and we have recorded the following details.
[These include Confirmation ID, Course Title, Course ID, Assignment Name, Date and Time of Submission, File name(s) and size(s).]
Please retain this receipt. If you have any queries about your submission, please contact your school.

Eesysoft/Impact course reports updated

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We are pleased to announce that the Eesysoft/Impact course reports have now been updated and are available to use.

You can access course reports for a Blackboard course by going to the ‘Course Tools’ menu within the course and selecting ‘Impact course reports 1.3’.

 

 

 

Further details on course reports can be found in our guide to ‘Checking and improving student engagement‘.

Upcoming Eesysoft/Impact update

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On Monday 27 November there will be an update coming to the way that we access ‘EesySoft course reports’.  This is due to changes made by the supplier that have temporarily caused loss of the function.

Once the update occurs, you will be able to access course reports for a Blackboard course by going to the ‘Course Tools’ menu within the course and selecting ‘Impact course reports 1.3’.

 

 

 

Further details on course reports can be found in our guide to ‘Checking and improving student engagement‘.

We apologise for any inconvenience that you are currently experiencing.

 

New feature: Blackboard Assignments can use SafeAssign similarity tool

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We are pleased to announce that SafeAssign, Blackboard’s originality checking tool, is now available for use in all courses using Blackboard Assignments.

The Digital Education Office has provided guidance on enabling this tool within Blackboard Assignments, which can be accessed as part of our supplementary resources for staff.

If you have any questions, please contact digital-education@bristol.ac.uk.

Upcoming McGraw Hill LTI upgrade

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Changes to the way you access McGraw Hill content.
Due to McGraw Hill upgrading the integration between Blackboard and their content we will be upgrading to LTI Advantage in the week commmencing 6th Nov. There will be a slight change to the way you have to set up and access the McGraw Hill content within your course.

Currently there are a couple of ways to add/enable content from McGraw Hill, but this will be changing to a single link which will be visible via the Build Content menu.

McGraw Hill LTIA link example

With the upgrading of the integration come the following:

  • Users will be able to access the tool from the Build Content menu rather than the Partner Content menu or Tools menu. Users will no longer have to create an account as this will be automatic for new users.
  • Consistent LMS integration functionality for McGraw Hill Connect®, which includes single sign-on (SSO), assignment-level linking, and gradebook sync (no more manual syncing!)
  • Easier setup for both students and faculty
  • Improved Connect grade sync functionality with re-sync at student and assignment level and automatic ‘0’ after due date
  • Meets industry-wide standards and roadmap for easier updates to stay current with the latest technology

Current users will be aided in pairing McGraw Hill content by representatives from McGraw Hill, who  will provide documentation for students accessing Connect from Blackboard.

Teams for Teaching – Archiving Unit Teams

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As Preparation for the new academic year your unit Teams for 2022 will be archived on 31st August. This means that although the unit Teams and their SharPoint folders will still exist and be accessible, they will be set to be ‘read-only’. If you wish your unit Team to remain editable you can easily unarchive it if you are a Team owner. Please see instructions on how to do this here

2023/24 Blackboard “parent” courses available

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The annual “rollover” of Blackboard courses has been completed, and the 2023/24 Blackboard courses are available to access now, including “parent” courses.

The courses are copies of the previous year’s courses, where those exist, including any template. New units, or units that have had a change of unit code, will be generated as copies of the school’s template, or as a generic template if your school does not have its own template. Copied courses will need to be refreshed for the new academic year.

If you have any questions or concerns, please email digital-education@bristol.ac.uk.