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Learn SaaS release 3900.104.0
Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3900.104.0
Release to Test/Stage: Tuesday, 5 November 2024 | Release to Production: Thursday, 7 November 2024
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
For full feature details, please review the corresponding notes for the Learn 3900.104.0 version included below on this page. Details can be found on Anthology Global Support.
Latest release: 3900.104.0-rel.36+1656a6c to Production servers to take place on 28 November 2024.
For more information on updates and bug fixes, please visit Anthology Global Support.
November 2024 – 3900.104 Release
The November 2024 - 3900.104 release is robust with features in 8 areas:
- Instructional design;
- Tests and assignments;
- Communication and collaboration;
- Learner progression and personalized experience;
- Integrations;
- Learn core and security;
- Mobile app; and
- Upgrade to Ultra
These improvements impact instructors, students, observers, and administrators. Some features do require administrative action.
Instructors:
- Role play option for AI Conversations
- Video Studio improvements
- Improvement to resizing blocks in Documents
- Empty state indicator for Documents
- Print Tests with questions from Question Pools and other improvements
Instructors and Students:
Students:
Instructors and Administrators:
- Brightspace conversion: quiz pools and quiz sections
- Batch edit: usability improvement
- Download option for student activity log
Observers:
Administrators:
- Enhanced course grades public REST API – Exceptions (Student Attempts)
- New course completion setting in Administrator Panel
All users:
Instructional Design
Role play option for AI Conversation– 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: AI Conversation
We expanded our AI Conversation feature to include a role play option. Role play can enhance learning by providing active learning opportunities. Role play also encourages critical thinking. It also provides an opportunity for students to apply knowledge in a simulated environment.
For example, a student could role play a doctor by speaking to a patient, played by the AI persona. In this scenario, a student gains practical experience in a safe environment for experimentation.
Instructors customize the AI persona by giving it a name and image. Instructors also define the AI persona's personality traits and select the complexity of the responses.
Instructors should always preview an AI conversation before releasing the activity to students. AI tools can hallucinate and introduce bias. It is important to ensure that instructions are clear and that the AI persona responds in an expected and appropriate way.
We also introduced a stepped setup. This approach makes it easier for instructors to select the type of conversation and define the topic, student role, and AI persona.
Image 1. Select the conversation type
Image 2. Describe the conversation and define the student’s role
Image 3. Set up the AI persona
For administrators: For more information on how to enable AI Conversation, visit our page for AI Design Assistant and Unsplash Configuration. AI Conversation must be on before you can select the Role play option. Note that toggling AI Conversation off after deployment stops AI Conversation services. Therefore, any AI Conversation activities visible to students will not operate as expected.
Video Studio: Viewing controls for captions and transcription – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, students
Related Topic: Video Studio (instructor page), Video Studio (student page), Video Studio (administrator page)
In Video Studio, users can control the display of captions and transcription.
Control captions display
Video Studio makes recordings more accessible by automatically displaying captions. To accommodate diverse learner preferences, individual users turn captions on or off. For example, a student can close the auto-generated captions if they do not want to view them. To turn off captions, select the captions button next to the progress bar at the bottom of the video.
Image 1. Option to enable captions
Control transcript display
Video Studio also automatically generates a transcript for created or uploaded recordings. As with captions, students can control the display of the transcript.
To view the transcript, select the transcript button next to the progress bar at the bottom of the video.
Image 2. Display control for transcript
Students can view the transcript in-line and in full screen in Documents when videos are displayed three and four columns wide. When videos are one to two columns wide, the transcript displays in full screen.
For Administrators: Video Studio is a premium solution. We are offering customers a free trial until June 30, 2025. This trial provides access to the full version of Video Studio. Video Studio is set to OFF as a default in test/stage environments. If you want to enable it in your institution’s production environment, you can do that for free until the end of June 2025. In the Administrator Panel, select Configure in The Ultra Experience is Here! module. Select Enable creating/uploading videos using Video Studio. Beyond this date, your institution will have to purchase Video Studio to continue using it.
Video Studio improvements – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topics: Video Studio (admin page), Video Studio (instructor page)
We have enhanced Video Studio to improve the user experience for instructors. Instructors can now:
Edit video title
Instructors can edit the title of an audio/video recording or uploaded file after it is saved to the Document.
While editing the document, the instructor can select the pencil icon from the top left of the video block.
Image 1. Video title edit option
After the instructor selects the pencil icon, the previously uploaded video displays in the Upload Video screen.
Image 2. Field to edit video title
Device selection
With Video Studio, instructors can select the device used to record video and audio. By selecting the dropdown menu options for camera, mic, and screen, an instructor can choose from any connected devices on their computer.
Image 3. Select device
Retry a failed video upload
If an instructor uploads a file in Video Studio and the upload fails, they can select Retry upload at the top right corner of the screen or Retry next to the Upload process bar.
Image 4. Retry options if upload fails
For Administrators: Video Studio is a premium solution. We are offering customers a free trial until June 30, 2025. This trial provides access to the full version of Video Studio. Video Studio is set to OFF as a default in test/stage environments. If you want to enable it in your institution’s production environment, you can do that for free until the end of June 2025. In the Administrator Panel, select Configure in The Ultra Experience is Here! module. Select Enable creating/uploading videos using Video Studio. Beyond this date, your institution will have to purchase Video Studio to continue using it.
Improvement to Resizing Blocks in Documents – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Create Documents
To help with resizing blocks that are vertically tall, we modified the resize handle. Now, instructors can resize a block by selecting the vertical edge of a block. It is not necessary to place the mouse directly over the handle.
Image 1. Resize handle in a Document
For administrators: A configuration option is on the Ultra Experience Management page in the Administrator Panel: “Enable support for customizing Ultra document layouts.” The default state is on.
Empty State Indicator for Documents – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Create Documents
We added an empty state indicator to content blocks in Documents. If a content block is empty, text displays to tell instructors to select the block to add content. The empty state indicator doesn’t display outside of the edit mode.
For administrators: A configuration option is on the Ultra Experience Management page in the Administrator Panel: “Enable support for customizing Ultra document layouts.” The default state is on.
Skip Link to Course Information – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: All users
Related Topic: Accessibility Overview
We added a second skip link to the Course Content page. In addition to the current skip link to tab directly into course items, users can now press the Tab key again to skip to course information. If users don’t use either skip link, they will tab into the course features.
Image 1. Skip link on Course Content page
For administrators: There are no configurations needed.
Tests & Assignments
Print Tests with questions from Question Pools and other improvements – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topic: Question Pools
Instructors can now print tests that include questions from Question Pools. We also combined the answer key and the corresponding test. This ensures that users always have an answer key that matches the test. We generate the answer key and print it ahead of the test. We also labeled the Answer Key to ensure awareness.
The system generates a different version of the answer key and test each time a test is printed when the test:
- Randomizes questions or answer options
- Includes Question Pools
- Instructors can use the print option to save the answer key and test as a PDF.
Image 1. Printing a test
For administrators: There are no configurations needed.
Improved performance for assignment file submissions – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Students
Related Topic: Submit Assignments
Working on assignments can be a stressful experience for students. When submitting their work, students need assurance that their files have been successfully attached, received, and stored by Blackboard. They also need to be informed if there is an issue with their submission.
In this release, we've made architectural improvements to mitigate against file corruption and to ensure files are correctly attached during uploads. These updates include:
- Managing Multiple File Uploads: To prevent issues when uploading multiple files, students will now be required to wait for the first upload to completely before attaching additional files.
- File Size Limit Notification: A modal will display a message if a file exceeds the permitted size limit.
- Corrupted File Alerts: In the unlikely event of a student attempts to submit a corrupted file, a modal will notify them of the issue, and the system will alert the instructor.
For administrators: There are no configurations needed.
Communication & Collaboration
Indentations Added to Discussions – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Related Topic: Discussions
To better distinguish between responses and replies, we added indentation.
Image 1. Indented discussion replies
We removed the delete option for the discussion topic. Instructors can edit discussion topics as needed.
Image 2. Edit option for Discussion Topic
We're improving the usability and appearance of discussions. Areas of focus include navigation, clearer calls to action, updating UI elements, terminology updates, and others. We’ll release small changes in several releases to benefit users as soon as we can make them available.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learner Progression & Personalized Experience
Observer Access to Documents and Uploaded Files and Media– 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Observers
Related Topic: Observer Role
Observers who mentor students need to access course content to understand what topics a student is learning. Observers can now access uploaded files and media and Documents in their students’ courses.
Observers are limited to the same file permissions that instructors have set for students: view and download, download only, and view only.
Progress tracking must be on for observers to access course content through the Progress tab.
For administrators: Institutions can choose whether observers have access to course content. Access controls are in the Ultra Experience Management area of the Administrator panel.
Download Option for Student Activity Log – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Student Activity Log
Instructors and administrators can review the Student Activity Log to troubleshoot or resolve academic disputes. We added the option to download the Student Activity Log as a CSV. All filters applied to the log also apply to the CSV. Only the first 1000 events are downloaded.
Image 1. Student Activity log with Download button
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Integrations
Enhanced course grades public REST API – Exceptions (Student Attempts) – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related Topic: Blackboard Learn APIs
We enhanced Blackboard’s public REST API for course grades to improve grading exception management for individual student assessments. Grading exceptions include:
- extending due dates,
- allowing additional attempts, and
- providing more flexible grading options.
Developers can now retrieve parameters for grading exceptions to an individual student's assessment. Developers can also set exception parameters for a user-specific start date, hide date, and other parameters. The attributes are in all the endpoints. The endpoints are:
GET -
- /learn/api/public/v1/courses/{{courseId}}/gradebook/columns/{columnId}/exceptions/users/{{userId}}
POST - This method is traditionally intended for creating resources. However, there are specific circumstances with the GET due to some technical constraints and the POST for this occasion will be used to retrieve information about the exceptions, the retrieve will be made to a gradebook column (Retrieve all students associated to that column). This is because it allows the request to include detailed parameters in the body, taking advantage of the ability to send more extensive data and without the constraints associated with GET requests url length.
- /learn/api/public/v1/courses/{{courseId}}/gradebook/columns/{columnId}/exceptions
PUT - This allows users to create or modify an exception for a student.
- /learn/api/public/v1/courses/{{courseId}}/gradebook/columns/{columnId}/exceptions/users/{{userId}}
DELETE - Deletes the exception for a student.
- /learn/api/public/v1/courses/{{courseId}}/gradebook/columns/{columnId}/exceptions/users/{{userId}}
If the option is enabled, end users can read and update the assessment's due date, additional attempts, and rescheduled due date.
The required privileges and entitlements for student exception endpoints for course grades API are:
For GET and POST:
- entitlement: course.gradebook-item.exceptions.VIEW
- privilege: Course/Organization Gradebook > Gradebook Item > Exceptions > View Item Due Date Exception
For PUT and DELETE:
- entitlement: course.gradebook-item.exceptions.MODIFY
- privilege: Course/Organization Gradebook > Gradebook Item > Exceptions > Edit Item Due Date Exception
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
New course completion setting in Administrator Panel – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related Topic: Course Terms
Administrators can now manage course completion through the Administrator Panel.
This gives administrators more control over course access that previously could only be controlled by instructors.
Image 1. The Complete option in the Availability section of the Course Settings page
For Administrators: From the Administrator Panel, select Courses in the Courses module. Choose a course, then select Edit. Under Availability, there is now an option to mark that course as complete. The Complete option in the Administrator Panel only applies to Ultra courses. Selecting Yes for an Original Course only disables notifications and may block other updates in the future for that course.
Mobile app
Blackboard mobile app rebranding – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Original Course View
Impact: All users
To reflect Anthology Inc.’s rebranding efforts, the Blackboard Learn App will now be known simply as the Blackboard App. The change aligns the app with Anthology, Inc.’s rebranding efforts. The Blackboard App has an updated:
- Splash screen
- App icon
- Name
- App description
These changes reflect Anthology’s vision, which is grounded in dedication to customer-centered innovation to inspire student success and institutional growth.
Image 1. Rebranded logos and designs for the Blackboard App
For Administrators: This feature is available for all courses. There are no configurations needed.
Upgrade to Ultra
Brightspace Conversion: Quiz Pools and Quiz Sections – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from D2L Brightspace
Quiz pools are now converted to Blackboard. When quiz sections are converted to Blackboard, quiz sections now become separate pages on tests.
Things to consider about conversion:
- Quiz sections can be nested in Brightspace, but we flatten the nesting structure during conversion. All sections are now at the same level, divided with page breaks.
- Section titles and section text are dropped during the conversion process. We create a page break between sections and questions remain in their converted section.
- The conversion process does not maintain the ordering of questions, sections, and pools. Instructors should review the structure and presentation of converted quizzes.
For administrators: There are no configurations needed.
Batch Edit: Usability Improvement – 3900.104
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Batch Edit
"Change dates to a specific date and/or time" is the most popular option used in Batch Edit to change dates in a batch, so it is now the default option. This change simplifies the process for our users and helps instructors to prepare courses for teaching and learning even faster.
Image 1. Edit Dates option in Batch Edit
For administrators: There are no configurations needed.
Learn SaaS release 3900.102.0
Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3900.102.0
Release to Test/Stage: Tuesday, 17 September 2024 | Release to Production: Thursday, 3 October 2024
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
For full feature details, please review the corresponding notes for the Learn 3900.102.0 version included below on this page. Details can be found on Anthology Global Support.
Latest release: 3900.102.0-rel.33+21f9d21 to Production servers to take place on 31 October 2024.
For more information on updates and bug fixes, please visit Anthology Global Support.
October 2024 – 3900.102 Release
The October 2024 - 3900.102 release is robust with features in 9 areas:
- Instructional design;
- Mastery learning and learner pathways;
- Tests and assignments;
- Communication and collaboration;
- Flexible grading;
- Gradebook;
- Integrations;
- Mobile; and
- Upgrade to Ultra
These improvements impact instructors, students, and administrators. Some features do require administrative action.
Instructors:
- Usability improvements for Documents
- Video Studio: Enhanced caption support for uploaded files
- Usability improvement for Knowledge Checks
- Generate question banks
- Quickly access items that need grade reconciliation
- Show unavailable students in the gradebook
- Brightspace conversion improvements
Instructors and Students:
- Award Course Badges with Achievements
- Award Open Badges Automatically with Anthology Milestone
- Enhancements to student submission review page
- Flexible Grading performance improvements
All users:
Instructional Design
Usability improvements for Documents – 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Create Documents
We made several usability improvements for Documents.
- For uploaded files, we've restored the default of View and Download in the Edit File Options.
- If there isn’t enough space when resizing blocks with keyboard navigation, the option to expand right is hidden.
- The Redo button now continues to display and function after removing an HTML block.
- The cursor function works as expected when dragging a block.
- We've restored the Content Collection option in the Insert content + in the Content block.
- For institutions that have not enabled support for the Content Designer for Documents, we've restored the option to generate a question bank directly from a Document.
For administrators: A new configuration option is on the Ultra configuration page in the Administrator Panel: “Enable support for customizing Ultra document layouts.” The default state is on.
Video Studio: Enhanced caption support for uploaded files - 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Video Studio (admin page), Video Studio (instructor page)
Video Studio gives instructors the ability to easily upload or record audio and video within Documents, creating a more engaging learning experience. We have enhanced the capabilities of Video Studio to help create a more accessible learning environment. Now Video Studio auto-generates captions for all file types.
Video Studio is a premium solution. We are offering customers a free trial until June 30, 2025. This will provide access to the full version of Video Studio as a feature flag. Video Studio is set to OFF as a default in test/stage environments. If you want to enable it in your institution’s production environment, you can do that for free until the end of June 2025. Customers will have to purchase Video Studio to continue to use it beyond this date.
For administrators: For configuration and settings, see the Administrator page for Video Studio.
Usability improvement for Knowledge Checks– 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
We modified the default for the Difficulty metric to display as "--" until there is at least one attempt. We also updated the answer instruction text for instructors to align with the instructions given in a test. It now reads "Choose one or more correct answers."
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Mastery Learning and Learner Pathways
Mastery tab in the gradebook – 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students, Administrators
Related Topic: Mastery Tab
This feature will be available on September 17, 2024.
The new Mastery tab in the Gradebook allows instructors and students to see how their activities align with institutional goals. Based on the goal performance scale set by your institution, the tab displays the mastery of each alignment.
The Mastery tab enables instructors to:
- View the level of mastery per alignment for each student.
- View how each student is performing against those alignments.
- Drill down view for individual student mastery performance.
Image 1. The instructor view of the Mastery tab
The Mastery tab enables students to:
- Access a visual display of their mastery performance.
- View specific skills and competencies that they need to master. This insight helps students understand where they should concentrate their efforts. This leads to more targeted and effective learning.
- Access their performance as it relates to each specific criterion. This allows them to identify areas for improvement and work towards mastery.
- Focus on key areas where mastery was not achieved. This fosters a growth mindset and a deeper understanding of the course content.
Image 2. Instructor view of a student’s mastery of goals
The color schema used in the Goal Performance Scale (shown in Image 5) indicates levels of mastery. Instructors can select View Scale to view the Goal Performance Scale from the Mastery tab..
Image 3. Instructor view of the Mastery tab with View Scale selected
Goals tab
Students can drill down on the Goals tab to individual content items to see how goals align with their mastery progress.
Image 4. Student view of details of mastery on the Goals tab
Configuring the Performance Scale (Administrators)
The performance scale is an institutional configuration. This allows for consistent aggregation across courses. It also creates consistency for students in mastery-based programs.
Administrators can configure the number of levels as well as the labels and colors for each.
Image 5. Goal Performance Scale (Administrator only)
Notes:
- Students will always see the Goals tab and instructors will always see the Mastery tab. When there are no goals aligned, the tab will be empty. The Mastery tab will display to other users depending on privileges. If their course role or system role allows them to create or view goal alignment, users will see the tab.
- Users can select the student column header on the Mastery tab to sort students by last name.
- Instructors can preview what the Goals tab will look like for students.
- The calculation method is points-based. To weigh different items, different point values should be assigned. For example, an instructor wants to weigh performance on a rubric criterion ten times greater than a matching question on a test. Therefore, the rubric row should be set to 50 points and the matching question to 5 points.
- The calculation method prioritizes more granular alignments. Priority is given to alignments on individual rubric rows or test questions, and other alignments are then ignored. When the alignments are only on the assessment itself, those alignments will apply to all the assessment’s test questions or rubric criteria.
For administrators: The Administrator panel has a new configuration option on the Ultra Experience Management page: Enable support for Mastery Tab in Gradebook. The default state is OFF. Note that if enabled, students will see the Goals tab even when goals are not aligned to content items. In addition, all instructors will see the Mastery tab. The ability to control this feature at the course level will be available in a future release.
Award Course Badges with Achievements – 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Related topic: Achievements
Achievements is a new capability for Ultra courses to help keep students motivated and congratulate them for their participation in a course. With Achievements:
- Instructors can create course badges and set criteria for students to earn the badges.
- Instructors can view which students earned a course badge.
- Students can review the requirements to earn a course badge.
- Students can view both earned and unearned course badges.
- Leaders can use achievements in Ultra organizations.
Achievements support learning in many ways:
Supports self-directed learning pathways. Instructors can give learners tasks, goals, or quests with clearly defined criteria. Learners have more flexibility in how they approach their activities; they might choose to focus on a particular area of development before moving on to another. This flexibility can replace a set sequence to personalize learning.
Engages and motivates learners. Some learners respond to extrinsic motivations. They feel accomplishment when they complete tasks. Teaching methods can use achievements to add game mechanics to a course.
Adds transparency to learning. Course badges that define the skills and competencies in a course can help students:
- Follow how they’re developing competencies.
- Understand and articulate to others what they’re learning.
With this release, there are two achievement types: course badges and Open Badges.
Create course badges
Users with privileges to manage achievements can:
- Create, publish, and delete course badges.
- Select a badge image from a badge library.
- Set performance criteria for one or more assessments in the course. With multiple performance criterion, students must meet all to earn the course badge.
- Preview how the course badge appears to students.
Image 1. Instructor view of the Achievements tab with saved course badges and the New Course Badge button
Image 2. Instructor view of the new course badge screen where you can set the title, description, badge image, and earning requirements
View recipients of achievements
On the Achievements tab, instructors can view the recipient count for each course badge. Select an achievement to review details about the recipients, including the date and time they earned the course badge. To review the settings for the badge, select Badge Settings.
Image 3. Instructor view of the Recipients tab displays course badge earners
Review achievements as a student
On the Achievements tab, students can review the details of badges and the requirements to earn them. They can also determine which badges they’ve earned, and which remain unearned. When a student earns a badge, the badge displays the date and time the badge was earned.
Image 4. Student view of the Achievements tab with details of earned and unearned course badges
Notes:
- When overall grade or a calculated column is a performance criterion, that calculation itself is not enough to earn the achievement. Students must have scores for all gradable items used for the calculation. This requirement prevents a running total issuing a badge before a student completes all tasks.
- When a gradable item has multiple attempts, it is calculated using one of the following: last attempt, first attempt, highest score, lowest score, or average of all attempts. If you need to change this setting, we recommend doing so before grading submissions. If you change it after grading, calculation updates may not award new achievements to students. If you encounter this issue, you can update student grades again for the item.
- An earned achievement isn’t revoked if an instructor changes a student’s grades.
- Custom badge images aren’t supported in this release.
- Student preview isn’t supported in this release.
- Once an achievement is published, it can’t be changed. If there is a configuration error, delete the achievement and create it again.
- Achievements from Original course view do not convert when copying or importing a course.
- Achievements can’t be copied from one Ultra course to another. We plan to support this in a future release.
- Blackboard sends out events for changes to calculated columns every 4 hours; therefore, Achievements using a calculated column will have a delay before they are awarded.
- For calculated columns, if there are contributing gradable items that are ungraded, any Achievements based on that calculated column will not be issued until all grades are posted.
Considerations for early adoption:
- The Achievements tab appears for all students, even when achievements aren’t used in the course. We plan to improve this in a future release.
- Student preview isn’t supported in this release.
- Course copy for achievements isn’t supported in this release.
- Administrators can restrict who can manage achievements and view recipients of badges. Manage privileges for Achievements in Course Role and System Role configurations.
- The Achievements management pages found in the Administrator panel main page and the Tools area are only for Original. These don’t apply to Achievements in Ultra.
For administrators: This feature is opt-in using the administrator toggle Achievements in Ultra. Enable it in the Ultra configuration page of the administration panel.
Award Open Badges Automatically with Anthology Milestone – 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students, Academic leaders
Achievements in Blackboard can be linked to Open Badges in Anthology Milestone. When linked, earned Open Badges are issued automatically to the student’s profile in Blackboard.
Anthology Milestone is a solution for managing institutional micro-credentials and badges. It can issue transferable Open Badges that offer several benefits for education, professional development, and career advancement:
- Verified and Trustworthy: Transferable Open Badges are digital credentials that are securely checked for authenticity. They prove that the skills and achievements they represent are reliable and recognized by schools and employers.
- Easy to Share: These badges can be shown on different platforms like LinkedIn, personal websites, digital resumes, and social media. This makes it easy for people to keep a consistent record of their skills and achievements, no matter where they work or study.
- Supports Lifelong Learning: Transferable Open Badges allow people to collect and show their skills over time, helping them continue learning throughout their lives.
- Personalized: Individuals can choose and organize their badges to reflect their unique skills, learning experiences, and career goals. They can manage and display their badges with a free Achievement Studio account or transfer them to another system.
- Clear and Trustworthy: The information included in Open Badges makes it clear what skills were demonstrated and how they were assessed.
- Works Across Platforms: Open Badges follow open standards, so they can be used and recognized on different systems and platforms.
- Inclusive: Open Badges can recognize a variety of skills, including those that might not be acknowledged by traditional education, like soft skills, informal learning, and community involvement.
Set up Open Badges with Achievements
An administrator must first set up the Anthology Milestone integration.
Once enabled, users with privileges to manage achievements in Blackboard can:
- Add an Open Badge to a course or organization.
- Set performance criteria required to earn the badge.
Add an Open Badge
On the Achievements tab, select Use Open Badge. Search for and select an Open Badge from Milestone. Then work with the badge like any other. For more information, see Achievements.
Image 1. Instructor view of the Achievements tab with Milestone integration enabled. The Use Open Badge button appears on the tab
Image 2. Instructor view of the Select an Open Badge screen. It displays a list of Open Badges from Milestone
Set performance criteria and preview the badge
After you select an open badge, you can set performance criteria for one or more assessments in the course. With multiple performance criterion, students must meet all to earn the Open Badge.
In the Summary section, you can preview how the Open Badge will appear to students in Blackboard.
Image 3. Instructor view of Earning Requirements where you can set the performance criteria required to earn the Open Badge and preview the how the badge appears for students
Students earning Open Badges
When students earn an Open Badge, they receive an email at the address associated with their Blackboard profile. Students can manage their earned Open Badges using an Achievement Studio account. To manage their Open Badge, the Achievement Studio account profile should include the same email address.
From Achievement Studio, students can:
- View an Open Badge
- Add it to a collection
- Download it
- Get a sharing link
For more information about student tasks in Achievement Studio, see Badges Overview.
Image 4. Student view of an Open Badge in Achievement Studio
Enable Anthology Milestone
If you license Anthology Milestone, you can integrate it into the Achievements tool in Blackboard. When using Ultra courses in Blackboard, instructors and course builders can link performance criteria to Open Badges in Milestone.
Currently, there are not distinct production and test/stage instances of Milestone. Therefore, we recommend only integrating Milestone with your production instance of Blackboard. This is to avoid accidentally issuing authentic Open Badges from a testing environment.
To set up the integration, contact Product Support for Milestone. In the request, provide the following:
- State your request to integrate Milestone with Blackboard.
- Provide the tenant ID of your production Blackboard instance.
- Access the Administrator Panel.
- Navigate to Building Blocks and click the link to list Installed Building Blocks.
- In the context menu for Foundations Connector, select Settings.
- The Tenant ID is second in the list.
Notes:
- Administrators must set up the integration with Milestone.
- Open Badges can be used in Ultra courses and organizations.
- Users without an email address won’t be able to use the Open Badge picker. Students must have an email address in their Blackboard profile to receive Open Badges they earn.
- Any user with privileges to manage achievements can link to Open Badges. We plan to limit this access in a future release.
- An earned achievement isn’t revoked if an instructor changes a student’s grades.
- Deleting an achievement that’s linked to an Open Badge doesn’t delete that badge in Milestone.
- Student preview isn’t supported for earning Open Badges.
For administrators: This feature requires licensing Anthology Milestone. The integration is configured as an LTI tool. A new LTI placement type adds appropriate Open Badge tools into the Achievements tool. This placement type should not be used for other LTI tools.
You can manage the Achievements privileges in Course Role and System Role configurations. In this release, there aren’t separate privileges for users who can set up Open Badges versus course badges using Achievements. You may want to consider a limited rollout of Achievements until we address this with separate privileges in an upcoming release.
Tests & Assignments
Generate question banks - 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Question Banks
Creating questions is time consuming. Instructors now have the option to generate questions in a question bank. Generating question banks from course materials provides inspiration and saves time.
To generate a question bank, select the Auto-generate option from the + on the Question Banks page.
Image 1. Auto-generate a question bank
From the menu, instructors can select content items. These content items provide context for the questions. Instructors can further refine the questions they ask by entering a description of the learning objectives or topic.
Image 2. The context picker for creating new questions
Instructors can select the type of question to generate, such as multiple choice or fill in the blank. The complexity of the questions can also be adjusted. Instructors choose which questions to include in the question bank.
Image 3. The Auto-Generate Question Bank page
For administrators: The option to generate questions only appears for instructors when the tool is on. Select Building Blocks from the Administrator Panel, then select Installed Tools. Locate "AI Design Assistant and Unsplash" and select Settings from the dropdown. The default state is off. You must also activate privileges. Assign the “Use AI Design Assistant” privilege for the appropriate Course Roles (for example, Instructor).
Enhancements to student submission review page – 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Students, Instructors
The student submission review page makes it easier for students to access instructor feedback on their submissions.
We made several enhancements to this page:
- When an instructor selects student preview, they can now access the student submission review page.
- Students can now access offline submissions from this page.
- Students now have a Read more option for overall and attempt feedback.
We also made general usability improvements, including additional labels and other indicators, to help students easily find the information they need.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Communication & Collaboration
Email notifications for followed discussions – 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: All users
Related Topic: Discussions
To encourage participation in discussions, we expanded notifications to include email. Emails are sent when users opt for Email me right away notifications.
Key Enhancements:
User Notification Settings: New notification options allow users to manage their emails for discussions they follow. To help with consistency, these settings align with the user's settings for their activity stream.
- Activity on my responses
- Activity on responses I have replied to
- Responses from instructors
- Responses for followed discussions
- Replies for followed discussions
Administrator Settings: New administrator controls allow institutions to set defaults for user notification settings. These are enabled by default:
- Discussion activity on the current user’s responses
- Discussion activity on responses the current user has replied to
- Discussion responses from instructors
- Discussion responses and replies for followed
Image 1. The notification settings available for the Email me right away option
Image 2. An example of an email for discussion activity
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed. However, administrators can change these notification settings to default off, always off, or always on if desired.
Quickly access items that need grade reconciliation – 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
With parallel grading, multiple people can share grading responsibilities for a course. For example, an instructor can divide up the grading tasks among teaching assistants and other graders. The designated reconciler reviews all grades and feedback to determine the final grade.
A Needs reconciling section now appears on the gradebook Overview tab. In this section, reconcilers can easily access all items ready for reconciliation.
Image 1. The reconciler's view of the Needs reconciling section on the gradebook Overview tab
This section is hidden when the grader has no items for reconciliation.
Graders can select Reconcile now to open the Submissions tab for the item. They can review grades and feedback from others before determining the final grade.
The Gradebook tab displays an exclamation point when there are items to reconcile or post.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Show unavailable students in the gradebook – 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Instructors may have students in their courses whose access to Blackboard is temporarily restricted. For example, if a student has a payment pending, an administrator can set the student’s user account as unavailable until the hold is lifted.
In direct response to user feedback, we’ve made changes to how unavailable students appear in the gradebook. Now unavailable students appear in the gradebook for their enrolled courses, but their avatar has a strikethrough to indicate the unavailable status.
Image 1. Instructor view of the gradebook showing an unavailable student
To completely hide unavailable students from their gradebooks, instructors can use the Students Visibility setting introduced in the last release.
When the hide unenrolled students from the gradebook option is turned on, unavailable and unenrolled students are hidden from these gradebook areas:
- Grades page
- Students page
- Calculation student list
- Gradable items student list
- Submission tab for an assessment
- Group Submissions tab for an assessment
- Student Activity tab for an assessment
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Flexible Grading
Flexible Grading performance improvements – 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Students, Instructors
We made several adjustments to improve the performance of Flexible Grading. Users will experience faster loading when:
- Scrolling in the Student list (instructors)
- Posting all grades (instructors)
- Viewing the rubric (instructors and students)
For larger classes with more than 2000 enrollments, the Flexible Grading page loads 25% faster!
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Mobile
Email notifications for followed discussions – 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: All users
Instructors and students sometimes need to pay special attention to one or more discussions or threads in a course. Users can now easily follow specific discussions to receive email updates on new contributions. Institutions can set notification defaults for discussion activity and responses for followed discussions. This feature makes it easier for users to monitor and engage with class discussions from the Blackboard Mobile App.
For Administrators: You can configure this feature in the Administrator Panel by selecting Notification settings and enabling/disabling your institution’s preferences.
Upgrade to Ultra
Brightspace Conversion Improvements - 3900.102
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View and/or Original Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Migrate from D2L Brightspace
Question Library and Sections
We further refined the conversion of courses from Brightspace. The question library and sections in Brightspace now convert to question banks. This enhancement is important for converting quizzes that include question pools and sections.
Important notes:
- The question library and sections will be flattened. Nested question banks are not supported in Blackboard.
- Any sections without questions will not convert to question banks.
Gradebook Columns
Numeric, selectbox, text, and pass/fail grade Items in Brightspace are now preserved when converting a Brightspace course to Blackboard. Formula and calculated grade Items are not preserved and are dropped from the gradebook. Instructors should check if their formula or calculated grade items can be rebuilt in Blackboard’s calculated column. For more information, see Calculate Grades.
For Administrators: These features and improvements are available for all Ultra and Original courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learn SaaS release 3900.100.0
Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3900.100.0
Release to Test/Stage: Tuesday, 13 August 2024 | Release to Production: Thursday, 5 September 2024
Original Experience, Ultra Experience
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
For full feature details, please review the corresponding notes for the Learn 3900.100.0 version included below on this page. Details can be found Behind the Blackboard.
Latest release: 3900.100.0-rel.38+07d2c83 to Production servers to take place on 26 September 2024.
For more information on updates and bug fixes, please visit Behind the Blackboard.
September 2024 – 3900.100 Release
The September 2024 - 3900.100 release is robust with features in 7 areas:
- Instructional design;
- Tests and assignments;
- Flexible grading;
- Gradebook;
- Learner progression and personalized experience;
- Learn core and security; and
- Upgrade to Ultra
These improvements impact instructors, students, and administrators. Some features do require administrative action.
Instructors:
- Student Activity Log
- View items that need grading and posting in the new Overview tab
- View late submissions that need grading
Instructors and Students:
- Content Designer: Knowledge Check in enhanced Documents
- AI Conversation
- Wiris upgrade and benefits
- Exclude attempt when grading
Students:
- Review instructor feedback on the student submission review page
- Access assignment feedback hidden by release conditions
Administrators:
Instructors and Administrators:
All users:
Instructional Design
Content Designer: Knowledge Check in Documents – 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Students
Related Topic: Create Documents
The Content Designer for Documents now includes a Knowledge Check block. The Knowledge Check enhances the learning experience. Knowledge checks allow students to engage with content and receive immediate feedback. Instructors are also empowered with valuable insights to tailor their teaching strategies.
Key Features:
- Question Types: Multiple choice and multiple answer questions
- Feedback: Pre-populated correct and incorrect answer feedback, which instructors can edit
- Student Interaction: Students can select an answer and submit it. They receive immediate feedback on whether their answer is correct or incorrect. Knowledge checks allow unlimited attempts.
- Metrics: Instructors can access detailed metrics including:
- Number of students participating
- Total number of attempts
- Average number of attempts to reach the correct answer
- Maximum number of attempts to reach the correct answer
- Level of difficulty metric
- Percentage of students selecting each answer option
Image 1. Instructor view - Knowledge Check creation
After saving the Knowledge Check, instructors may resize and move it as desired within the document.
Image 2. Animation of student experience interacting with Knowledge Check
Image 3. Instructor view of Knowledge Check metrics
Grading for Knowledge Checks isn't supported at this time. There are also no notifications specific to Knowledge Checks.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. You must enable the option on the Ultra Experience Management page in the Administrator Panel. It's called "Enable support for customizing Ultra document layouts." This setting is on by default. You can toggle this option on or off. If you turn off this option, it may affect content created with or changed by enhanced options. Note that this option will be available until December 2024. At that time, we will remove the option. Enhanced Documents will be the default.
Content Designer: Video Studio in Documents – 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students, Administrators
Related Topic: Video Studio (admin page), Video Studio (instructor page)
Video Studio is a premium solution. We are offering customers a free trial until June 30, 2025. This will provide access to the full version of Video Studio as a feature flag. Video Studio is set to OFF as a default in test/stage environments. If you want to enable it in your institution’s production environment, you can do that for free until the end of June 2025. Customers will have to purchase Video Studio to continue to use it beyond this date.
Instructors have recording capabilities in Announcements and Feedback features. Now they have the ability to upload or record audio and video within Documents. The lightweight, deeply integrated Video Studio solution promotes a more engaging learning experience.
When creating a Document, a new block option is available to create audio and video files from a camera, audio recording, or from screen recordings. Additionally, it is possible to upload audio and video files.
Image 1. New Audio/Video block in a Document
Image 2. Recording and uploading options available in Audio/Video block for a Document
When a user starts recording, there is a 3 second countdown before the recording begins. Users can pause, resume, retake, or end the recording as needed.
Image 3. Start recording process
After a user ends the recording, the uploading process begins. During this time, the user can preview the result and edit the title. Users can select Save to add the audio or video into a Document. After saving the video, auto captioning for videos is available.
Image 4. Add video details, preview, and save options
Image 5. Automatic captioning for videos is available
For administrators: These new video capabilities require a license for Video Studio. Also, the "Enable support for customizing Ultra document layouts." setting on the Ultra Experience Management page in the Administrator Panel must be on. The videos created using Video Studio will not count towards your existing storage entitlement. The following existing privileges are used for the Video Studio solution:
- Course/Organization (Content Areas) > Create Materials: To create videos. Includes all operations like save, finish, check Video upload Status. Not needed for playback.
- Course/Organization (Content Areas) > Delete Materials: To delete videos.
Course Content Page Enhancements– 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: All users
User experience (UX) plays a vital role in student engagement and learning. We're committed to continuous improvement of the Blackboard Ultra course view. It's important to us that we meet the needs of our users—both educators and students. We're excited to deliver several changes to improve the Course Content page. Client feedback is at the center of the changes we’ve made.
The improvements include:
- Greater visual depth
- Improved page structure
- Differentiation among course elements
- An enhanced presentation of top-level and nested content
Greater Visual Depth and Content Page Structure
Creating a more appealing and engaging interface has been a key theme in client feedback. To support this, we've created greater visual depth to the Course Content page. This provides a more enjoyable and inviting experience for end users.
The new design incorporates:
- Subtle gradients and softer edges
- A more cohesive color palette with inviting, warmer tones
- More intuitive navigation, which reduces cognitive load and increases focus on the content
Image 1. Instructor view: Course Content page visual depth improvements
Image 2. Student view: Course Content page visual depth improvements
Content presentation enhancements
We've improved the differentiation among learning modules, folders, and content items. Currently, users sometimes find it challenging to distinguish among these elements. This can lead to confusion and inefficiency in navigating course materials.
Image 3. Instructor view: Content item presentation for a Learning Module
Image 4. Instructor view: Content item presentation for a Folder
Image 5. Student view: Content item presentation for a Learning Module
Image 6. Student view: Content item presentation for a Folder
These improvements create a more organized and improved user experience.
To learn more about the visual style changes and to access supporting resources, visit the community blog post here.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
AI Conversation – 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: All users
Related Topic: AI Conversation
It's tough to have 1:1 conversations with every student, especially in large courses. Some instructors are asking students to use AI services for topic-related activities to help. But, with many services and limited instructor visibility, results can vary.
To better serve instructors who want to use AI with students, we're launching a new activity called AI Conversation. This is a Socratic questioning exercise guided by AI. AI Conversation lets students explore their thoughts on a topic.
There are two elements to the activity:
- AI Conversation
- This lets students think critically about the topic that the instructor designs.
- Reflection question
- This asks the student to share their thoughts on the activity. The reflection question also lets the student flag any bias or errors from the AI as part of our Trustworthy AI Approach. Reflection helps students understand the responsible use of AI services.
Instructors have the following configuration options:
- A topic for the AI Conversation
- An AI persona including a name, avatar (can be uploaded or generated), and personality trait
- Complexity level of responses
- Edit the reflection question, guiding the student on how best to reflect on this activity
On submission, the instructor can review the AI conversation transcript and the student's reflection. The AI Conversation is a formative assessment by default, but you’re not restricted to this option.
Image 1. Instructor setting up a topic, AI Persona, and Reflection question
Image 2. Instructor previewing the AI Conversation before making it visible to students
Image 3. A Student participating in the AI Conversation
Image 4. Instructor view of a submitted AI Conversation and reflection question
For administrators: In the building block, ‘AI Design Assistant and Unsplash,' a new option called ‘AI Chat Conversation’ is available. The default state is 'off.' When this feature is ‘on,’ the privilege needs to be assigned to course roles as necessary, such as Instructor. The privilege that needs assigning is ‘Use AI Design Assistant.' When that role creates an AI Conversation in a course that’s visible to students, students will be able to complete the activity. Note that toggling this feature to ‘off’ after deployment will stop the AI Conversation services. Therefore, any AI conversation activities visible to students will not operate as expected.
Tests & Assignments
Review instructor feedback on the student submission review page - 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Students
Assessment feedback gives students insights into their strengths and weaknesses. It also helps them refine their skills and knowledge.
We are introducing a new student-facing submission review page for assignments. The new page makes all instructor feedback on a submission more accessible. We are planning to add this same feature for tests in a future release.
Students can access the new assignment submission review page from these locations:
- The gradebook feedback button for the assignment.
- The small panel that displays when students access an assignment from the Course Content page.
If a student submits multiple attempts, they can review each on the submission review page. By default, the student sees the appropriate graded attempt. The instructor defines which attempt to grade in the assignment's final grade calculation setting.
The new assignment submission review page displays the following information and feedback formats:
- Assessment content
- Student submission with inline feedback
- Submission timestamp
- Submission receipt
- Final grade and calculation model
- Attempt grade and feedback
- Override grade and feedback (if applicable)
- Optimized display of rubrics information and criterion feedback
Image 1. The feedback button lets students access the new assignment review page from their gradebook
Image 2. Students can access the new assignment submission review page by selecting the "3 submitted" link and the "Your Grade" label on the assignment’s settings panel
Image 3: Student view of the assignment submission review page, displaying the inline feedback, attempt feedback, and rubric information
Image 4: Student view of the assignment submission review page; in this example, the instructor has overridden the final grade and provided override feedback; the inline feedback and rubric information are also visible
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Access assignment feedback hidden by release conditions - 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Students
Students must access feedback on past submissions. Feedback review is vital for their academic growth. Now students can access all feedback on their submission, even if the assignment is hidden by a release condition. We are planning to ensure that students have access to all feedback on tests, discussions and journals in future releases.
Image 1. Instructor view of release conditions settings with a date/time release condition combined with the Hide state
Image 2. Student gradebook view of an assignment hidden by a release condition; the ‘Content isn't available’ label indicates the student can’t make further submissions
Image 3: Student view of the assignment submission review page for the hidden assignment; all instructor feedback is displayed
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Flexible grading
Exclude attempt when grading – 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Allowing students to submit multiple attempts for an assessment can help them stay on track. It can improve the quality of the assessment and boost student success.
However, there are some circumstances where an attempt doesn’t need to be graded. For example, the student may have submitted the wrong file, or their submission may be incomplete or an outlier.
We added a new option to help instructors remove submissions from the grading workflow without having to delete them. When grading a student, you can now select Exclude Attempt to remove it from the Needs Grading workflow.
If an attempt is excluded, the Excluded label appears above the attempt grade and in the attempt selector. If you need to remove the attempt exclusion, select from the menu.
Grade calculations ignore excluded attempts. Students aren’t automatically granted an additional attempt if an attempt is excluded. You can grant additional attempts to the student via the exception's workflow.
You can exclude any submitted attempt by a student. If you exclude an attempt when the student has no remaining attempts, you receive a warning that their final grade can’t be calculated.
When students review their submissions, a banner notification appears on excluded attempts.
Image 1. Instructor view of the Exclude attempt menu option
Image 2. Instructor view of the Exclude label above the grade and in the attempt selector
Image 3. Warning that a student has no remaining attempts and the final grade can't be calculated
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
View items that need grading and posting in the new Overview tab – 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
To help instructors stay on top of their grading workload, we added an indicator to the Gradebook tab to let you know when there are new submissions to grade. The indicator displays the number that needs grading. If the count goes higher than 99, it displays as 99+.
We also added a new gradebook Overview tab to improve task orientation and grading efficiency. This tab contains two sections: Needs Grading and Needs Posting.
Needs Grading section
If you face a substantial grading workload, the Needs Grading section is a useful tool for prioritizing your tasks. It allows you to see all items ready for grading and a count of the total number of outstanding grading tasks in your course.
This section displays up to five items at a time, ordered by the oldest ungraded submission. For an item, select Grade now to quickly access the submissions you need to grade. If your course has more than five items that need grading, you can use the buttons at the bottom of section to navigate through all pending tasks.
Needs Posting section
The Needs Posting section increases accessibility of assessments with grades that need posting. For an item, select Post now to its grade If there are more than five items that need posting, you can use the buttons at the bottom of section to navigate through the pending tasks.
Image 1. Instructor view of the new Needs Grading count on the Gradebook tab and the Needs Grading section on the new Overview page
Image 2. Instructor view of the new gradebook Overview page where the Needs Grading and Needs posting sections appear
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
View late submissions that need grading – 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
When enabled, the Automatic Zeros gradebook setting gives a zero score to students who haven’t made a submission by the due date.
To help instructors to find and grade late assessment submissions, they are now indicated as Needs Grading on the Grades and Gradable Items gradebook pages.
Image 1. Instructor view of the updated Gradable Items page; the status the assignment now displays 1 to grade for a late submission that needs grading
Image 2. Instructor view of the updated Grades page; the column status displays 0 Graded | 0 Posted and a New Submission label indicating the late submission that needs grading
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learner Progression & Personalized Experience
Student Activity Log – 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Student Activity Log
Instructors often need to review student activity. Student activity helps inform decisions in academic disputes and aids in troubleshooting. You can also analyze the course participation of students at risk.
Instructors can use student participation to support financial aid decisions. For example, requests for tuition fee reimbursements if a student hasn't participated in a course. Course participation records can also help with awarding scholarships.
Now the Student Overview page has a student activity log. Instructors and other higher roles can use the report to check what a particular student did in a course.
Image 1. Student activity log report located in the student overview page
The Activity log can be filtered by event type and can look to the past 140 days. Any information older than that won’t be stored in this report. The log can take up to 20 minutes to update from the last time a student performs an action.
The following events can be found in the report:
- Course Access
- Assessment Started
- Assessment Draft saved
- Assessment Submitted
- Assessment Auto-submitted
- Discussion Access
- Discussion Draft saved
- Discussion Edit
- Discussion Reply
- Discussion Response
- Document Access
- Journal Access
- LTI Item Access
- SCORM item Access
For administrators: A new privilege is available to control role-based access to the student activity log report. Go to Manage Privileges, choose the role you want to add the privilege to, and then select "Course/Organization > Student/Participant > Activity Log."
Integrations
Wiris Upgrade and Benefits – 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
We’ve upgraded the Wiris engine and equation editor to the latest versions to improve performance. Version 8.10.2 of the engine and version 7.23 of the editor improves rendering of subscript and superscript formulas. This upgrade provides a better experience for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics courses.
Image 1. Before the Wiris upgrade
Image 2. After the improvement
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra and Original courses. There are no configurations needed.
Group Attempts Grading Management via Public REST API – 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related Topic: Blackboard APIs
Group assignments are a crucial component of collaborative learning in Blackboard. Group assignments enable students to work together on projects and submit their collective efforts for evaluation. Effective management and grading of these group submissions are vital for accurately assessing group performance and providing meaningful feedback. Previously, we introduced CRUD operations for managing group assignment attempts. Now we have provided enhanced capability of the Group attempts endpoints to include comprehensive grading functionalities.
- Score. The numeric grade assigned to a group’s submission.
- Notes. Additional notes that an instructor can include regarding the group’s performance or submission details.
- Feedback. Detailed feedback provided to the group, helping students understand their performance and areas for improvement.
This update ensures that instructors can efficiently grade group submissions directly through the public API, enhancing the overall workflow for managing group assessments in Blackboard.
For administrators: The required privileges for Group attempts endpoints can be validated for each endpoint in the API documentation.
Learn Core & Security
Calendar Event Management – 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: All users
Institutions can now control which users can create events in the Base Navigation Calendar with a new system-level entitlement Calendar>Create Personal event. This update gives institutions greater control over calendar event creation within their learning environment.
If the Calendar>Create Personal event entitlement is not granted:
- Users can’t create personal events in the Base Navigation Calendar.
- Calendar tool is hidden in Base Navigation if users have no existing events in their calendars and lack this entitlement. Users don’t have permission to import Calendar events from external files (Settings).
When users possess the privilege of the Calendar>Create Personal event entitlement:
- Users can create personal events using the Base Navigation Calendar.
- The add calendar option is displayed.
- The Calendar tool appears in Base Navigation.
- Users can import Calendar events from external files (Settings).
For administrators: This feature is available for all System role users including None. There are no configurations needed.
Upgrade to Ultra
Brightspace Conversion Improvements - 3900.100
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience and/or Original Experience
Ultra Course View and/or Original Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from D2L Brightspace
- Embedded Multimedia for Assignments and Discussions
- Embedded Multimedia via Media Library Now Supported
- Arithmetic and Significant Figures Question Types
Embedded Multimedia for Assignments and Discussions
We’ve updated the conversion process from Brightspace to Blackboard for Assignments and Discussions. Images embedded in Assignments and Discussions will now convert. Instructors will no longer need to reupload images or multimedia after converting from Brightspace
Embedded Multimedia via Media Library Now Supported
Previously, multimedia added to the Rich Content Editor in Brightspace using the Media Library did not convert properly. Images and multimedia would fail to load, requiring users to reupload them after converting their courses. This issue has been resolved, and multimedia added from the Media Library will convert.
Arithmetic and Significant Figures Question Types
We’ve improved the way we convert Arithmetic and Significant Figure Questions from Brightspace to Blackboard. We preserve more information related to the questions and questions can now be edited to resolve issues that can't be resolved during conversion.
When converting Arithmetic and Significant Figure Question Types from Brightspace to Blackboard, it's important to carefully review all converted questions to ensure accuracy and functionality. Equations constructed using plain text in Brightspace may not accurately transfer to Blackboard, leading to potential errors or formatting issues. These discrepancies can impact the clarity and correctness of the questions, which affects the assessment's validity.
We advise instructors to thoroughly examine each converted question and verify the accuracy of the equations. In some cases, it may be necessary to rebuild the equations partially or entirely to align with Blackboard's formatting and calculation standards. Ensuring the precision of these questions is essential before making the test available to students. Taking the time to review and correct any issues will help maintain the integrity of the assessment and provide a fair testing experience for all students.
For administrators: These features and improvements are available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learn SaaS release 3900.98.0
Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3900.98.0
Release to Test/Stage: Tuesday, 16 July 2024 | Release to Production: Thursday, 8 August 2024
Original Experience, Ultra Experience
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
For full feature details, please review the corresponding notes for the Learn 3900.98.0 version included below on this page. Details can be found Behind the Blackboard.
Latest release: 3900.98.0-rel.37+68cbd0f to Production servers to take place on 22 August 2024.
For more information on updates and bug fixes, please visit Behind the Blackboard.
August 2024 – 3900.98 Release
The August 2024 - 3900.98 release is robust with features in 8 areas:
- Instructional design;
- Mastery learning & learning pathways;
- Tests and assignments;
- Communication and collaboration;
- Flexible grading;
- Gradebook;
- Learn core and security;
- Integrations; and
- Upgrade to Ultra
These improvements impact instructors, students, and administrators. Some features do require administrative action.
Instructors:
- Content Designer: Enhanced Documents
- Improved navigation between students in Flexible Grading
- Hide unenrolled students from the gradebook
- Status information removed from the gradebook download file
- Image Generation Improvements
Instructors and Students:
Instructors and Administrators:
- Multiple rules for release conditions
- Original Conversion Improvement: Convert Undeployed Tests to Question Banks
- Brightspace Conversion Improvement: Gradebook Categories
- Brightspace Conversion Improvement: File Uploads
- Brightspace Conversion Improvement: Discussion Forums and Topics
- Brightspace Conversion Improvement: Quiz Timer Settings
- Brightspace Conversion Improvement: Embedded Equations
- Moodle Conversion Improvement: Embedded Images
Administrators
- Enhanced Attendance Public REST API with Timestamp Data
- Enhanced Group Assignments Management via REST API
- Building Block Content to LTI Link Migration Tool: Change in support status
All users:
Instructional Design
Content Designer: Enhanced Documents – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Create Documents
Content design is key to creating an engaging course that supports learner needs. The Document feature is a useful option for creating and presenting a variety of visual elements. We have made significant enhancements to Documents to provide new and robust options for content design. Instructors will be delighted that all enhancements work beautifully using a mouse, trackpad, or the keyboard. All enhancements are mobile friendly for instructors and students.
We've removed the option to generate questions from Documents. Generating questions from within a test using the context picker in the AI Design Assistant is the preferred method.
Image 1. Enhanced Document with diverse content laid out in rows and columns
Image 2. Empty Document with block options
Instructors can now design Documents by selecting from a variety of block types.
- Content block
Add content via the content editor. - HTML block
Add content via HTML or CSS in the Document.
An administrator must configure an alternate domain for the HTML block to appear. Learn more about setting up an alternate domain.
- File upload block
Browse for files on the local machine to upload to the Document.
Note: Administrators can define the maximum size of a file that users can upload. - Cloud upload block
Login to a cloud service and select a file to add into the Document. - Content Collection block
Browse the Content Collection and select a file to add to the Document. - Convert a file block
Browse for files on the local machine. Once selected, the system converts the file into the Document format. Supported file types include PDF, PowerPoint (ppt, pptx, pps), and Word (doc, docx, odt).
In this release, the option to convert a file is only available in the main authoring space. In the Add Content panel (the + menu), the option to convert a file doesn’t appear. We'll correct this in an upcoming release.
Instructors can also open the left panel by selecting the + and choosing the desired block.
Image 3. Empty Document with the blocks panel opened
Document menu bar
To provide greater efficiency when designing content, we added a menu bar to Documents. The menu bar remains in view as the instructor scrolls the Document to view, add, or edit content. The menu bar contains the Edit option when in the view state. After selecting Edit, the menu bar displays the following options:
- Edit
- Add Blocks
- Undo/Redo
- Cancel
- Save
Image 4. Add blocks from the left panel or select the purple + to add a block as a row
Resizing and moving blocks
Instructors can create appealing layouts by resizing and dragging/dropping blocks into columns and rows.
- Each row includes a menu with options to move or delete the block.
- Each block includes a menu with options to edit, move, or resize, or delete the block.
Image 5. Move, expand, and shrink options via keyboard controls
New LTI placements via the Content Market option in the content editor aren't yet supported in enhanced Documents. Pre-existing placements continue to function as expected. We are working to add this feature. We will update you soon.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. A new configuration option is on the Ultra configuration page in the Administrator Panel: “Enable support for customizing Ultra document layouts.” The default state is on. This option will be available until December 2024. At that time, we will remove the configuration option and enhanced Documents will be default.
The 3900.98 release will begin updating on production sites on Thursday, Aug. 8 in the US morning as usual. The Content Designer: Documents option will not appear as configuration setting for administrators in the Administrator Panel and enhanced Documents will not be available in courses. We will enable the Content Designer: Documents feature on Monday, Aug. 12 at 9 am ET. At this time, the administrator setting will display in the configuration options and will be ON by default, but administrators can toggle it off.
This option can be toggled on or off. Be mindful of potential impacts to content created with or modified by enhanced options if you turn this option off.
Image Generation Improvements – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topic: Add Files, Images, Audio, and Video
Images enhance comprehension and engagement with course content. To help, we introduced the ability for instructors to generate images using the AI Design Assistant.
We are updating the technology in the image generation process from DALL-E 2 to DALL-E 3. This update allows instructors to generate higher quality, higher resolution images in the following workflows:
- Learning Module images
- Document images
- Announcement images
- Assessment question images
- Journal prompts images
Image 1: Generated image using DALL-E 3 in a Document
For administrators: The "Generate images" options only appear for instructors when each tool is on. Select Building Blocks from the Administrator Panel, then select Installed Tools. Locate "AI Design Assistant and Unsplash" and select Settings from the dropdown. The default state is off. You must also activate privileges. Assign the Use AI Design Assistant privilege for the appropriate Course Roles (for example, Instructor).
Mastery Learning & Learning Pathways
Multiple rules for release conditions – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Administrators
Related Topic: Content Release Conditions
Instructors need to release course content based on performance criteria to sequence students on learning paths correctly. Sometimes they also need to release content to different groups using different criteria. For example, graduate students may be required to perform additional activities or perform at a higher level than other students. To support this needed flexibility, instructors can now create multiple rules for release conditions.
You can create rules for release conditions based on these criteria: date, time, and grade range performance criteria. You can also create rules for specific individual learners, groups, or for all members.
Image 1. Release Conditions page
This release also improves copying content from Original courses. Rules and criteria now copy from Original adaptive release settings. The supported criterion types are date, time, grade range, and memberships (individual or groups). Only supported criteria types are copied from Original to Ultra courses. These criteria types are removed automatically during a copy:
- Attempt for a gradable item (student submitted the assignment or test)
- Student marked an item reviewed
As before, we recommend reviewing settings after copying content from Original courses.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed. For Test/Stage environments, availability will be on July 24.
Tests & Assignments
Improvements to creating assignments – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Related Topic: Create and Edit Assignments
Instructors need robust, easy to use tools when creating their assessments.
To create a better experience, the new Assignment page includes these improvements:
- A new Instructions box where instructors can use the full content editor to craft assignment instructions.
- There are no options to add questions to an assignment.
- The Settings panel now includes only options relevant to assignments.
- Blank attempts are no longer created when students view assignment instructions. The system only creates an attempt when students add content to the file drop zone / content editor. Note: Group or timed and proctored assignments continue to create attempts when students view the instructions.
Assignments created before this release will continue to create blank attempts when students view the instructions. We'll address this issue in a future release.
The New Test page remains unchanged. Instructors can access all the same question types and settings options. Attempts are still automatically created when students view the test questions.
Image 1. Instructor view of the New Assignment page with the new Instructions box
Image 2. Instructor view of adding instructions to an assignment
Image 3. Students view of the new Assignment Information panel and the View Instructions option
Image 4. Student view of the assignment instructions
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Anonymous student responses for Forms – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Related Topic: Forms
Anonymous responses in forms encourage honest and candid feedback from students and help participants feel safe and secure knowing their identities are protected. Anonymity leads to more genuine responses that convey the respondents' true opinions and experiences. Additionally, it increases participation rates and the overall quality of the results.
Instructors can now collect anonymous submissions in Forms. The new Anonymous submissions option appears in the Grading & Submissions section of Form Settings.
Image 1. Anonymous submissions option
When you select Anonymous submissions, these settings are enabled by default:
- Due date
- Prohibit late submissions
- Prohibit new attempts after due date
- Complete/incomplete is selected as the grading schema for non-graded forms
- When grading, the submission earns the points assigned; you can’t edit or override the points earned
Additional important details to note:
- Anonymous forms cannot be administered to groups.
- Class conversations are not supported when Anonymous submissions is selected.
- To ensure anonymity, student activity, exceptions, exemptions and accommodations are not supported.
- To ensure anonymity, student progress/statistics are not captured.
- Modifications to form questions and settings are not permitted if the form has submissions and the due date has passed.
From the Submissions tab for a form, you can view an anonymized list of students participants along with this information and options:
- Student submission status
- Grading status and grade – At submission, the grading status is set to Complete and the grade is marked (for example., 5/5)
- Post -- Graded forms post automatically
- Download all – You can download all form submissions
To view responses, select an anonymous student from the list. You can enter overall feedback for their submission.
From the Gradebook, before the due date for an anonymous form, "Anonymous" appears in the cell for each student. After the due date, the cells display:
- For ungraded forms, the text "Submitted" or "Not submitted"
- For graded forms, the grade
From the Grades tab, you can select Download Gradebook to download responses to forms with anonymous submissions.
When converting Original courses containing surveys to Ultra courses, surveys convert to anonymous forms by default.
We've taken care to ensure students know when their submission to a form is anonymous. The Anonymous icon and label appears on:
- the Content Page
- the Form panel where they start the attempt and view their submission
- the Details & Information section that appears while responding to the form
Image 2. Student view – Anonymous label and icon for a form
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Communication & Collaboration
Ability to ‘Follow’ Discussions for Enhanced Engagement – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: All users
Related Topic: Discussions
Discussions are an important part of the course experience, allowing for easy collaboration between all course members. The ability to engage and re-engage with discussions ensures that collaboration is active and lively. Users can re-engage when they know there are new posts by following the discussion.
Key Enhancements:
- Follow Discussions: Users can follow select discussions and receive notifications for new contributions from peers or instructors.
- User Notification Settings: New notification options for the Activity Stream settings allow users to manage notification types for discussions:
- Activity on my responses
- Activity on responses I have replied to
- Responses from instructors
- Responses for followed discussions
- Replies for followed discussions
- Administrator Settings: New administrator controls allow institutions to set defaults for the above user settings:
- Discussion activity on the current user’s responses
- Discussion activity on responses the current user has replied to
- Discussion responses from instructors
- Discussion responses and replies for followed
The default settings for these options are all “on.”
Image 1. New ‘Follow’ option inside a discussion
Image 2. New user notification options for the Activity Stream
Image 3. Notifications being delivered to the Activity Stream
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed. Administrators can manage notification settings in the Administrator Panel.
Send a message to a group from Group Spaces – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: All users
Related Topic: Group Spaces
Communication and collaboration between group members is important. For this reason, we've expanded opportunities for group members to communicate.
Users can now send a group message from the members page of a group space. This encourages collaboration on content that they have been assigned.
Image 1. The group spaces page with the ability to message a group.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Flexible Grading
Improved navigation between students in Flexible Grading – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Grade Tests with Flexible Grading
To make the grading experience more efficient, we added Next Student and Previous Student buttons to the Students tab in Flexible Grading. Instructors can now quickly navigate between students when grading assessments.
Image 1. Instructor view of grading an assignment by student with the new Next Student and Previous Student buttons
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Gradebook
Hide unenrolled students from the gradebook – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Ultra Gradebook and Course Settings
Students can change their course schedules at the beginning of a term or semester. Institution policy determines what happens when students change classes. At some institutions, when a student drops a class their enrollment (membership) record is set to unavailable. They display in the gradebook with a strikethrough on their avatar. The instructor's gradebook can become cluttered with students who aren’t actively enrolled in the class.
Using the new Students Visibility setting, instructors now have the option to hide or show unenrolled students.
The default option is to show these students.
You can access the Students Visibility setting from two locations:
- Course settings
- Gradebook settings
If you change the Students Visibility from Course settings, it will also change in Gradebook settings, and vice versa. Also, the selected visibility setting applies to all users teaching the course.
The Students Visibility setting affects these gradebook areas:
- Grades page
- Students page
- Calculation student list
- Gradable items student list
- Submission tab for an assessment
- Student Activity tab for an assessment
Image 1. Instructor view of the Gradebook settings panel showing the new Student Visibility option set to display students who no longer have access to the course
Image 2. Instructor view of the Gradebook settings panel showing the new Student Visibility option set to hide students who no longer have access to the course
Image 3. Instructor view of the Course settings area showing the new Student Visibility option
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Users and enrollment records set to the "disabled" state will continue to be hidden in all cases. A best practice for data integrations is to use the "disabled" record state when instructors no longer have any responsibility to manage those records or should not change data associated with those students. The "unavailable" record state still allows data access and grading activities—it’s most suitable when a student shouldn’t access the course any longer, but instructors are still responsible for reporting data for the student.
Status information removed from the gradebook download file – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Work Offline with Grade Data
| Example | Before the change | After the change |
|---|---|---|
| A student submitted an attempt that was graded but not posted | Ready to Post (75) | 75 |
| A student submitted an attempt that was graded and has started a second attempt | In Progress (75) | 75 |
| A student submitted an attempt that needs grading | Needs Grading | Needs Grading |
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learn Core & Security
Assessment IP Address Filtering – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators, Instructors, Students
Related topic: Assessment IP Address Filtering, Assessment Settings (Instructor)
Assessments are sometimes administered in proctored environments to ensure academic integrity. Instructors can now restrict an assessment by location in Ultra Course View. This restriction prevents students from taking tests outside of proctored locations or taking tests on another’s behalf.
To restrict by location, select Test Settings, then Assessment Security. Finally, select your Location restriction. No restriction is the default value.
Image 1. Location restriction configuration for a test
Students are informed if a test is restricted by location before starting it. They're also informed if they are not meeting the IP address rules when starting an attempt and during the test.
Image 2. Student being informed that a test is restricted by location
Image 3. Student being informed when not meeting IP filtering rules
For administrators: The configuration for IP filtering rules in Administrator Tool Panel > Course Settings > Grading Security Settings. For the range, enter as many filters as necessary to correctly capture the part of the network used in the testing environment. We will support multiple profile configurations in a future release.
Image 4. Configuration of IP filter rules from Administrator Tool Panel
Integrations
Math formula enhancement– 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: All users
Related Topic: Math Editor
We reduced the response time in the text editor when creating a formula. With enhanced data retrieval, instructors can process formula requests more efficiently.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Enhanced Attendance Public REST API with Timestamp Data – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View and Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related Topic: Blackboard Learn APIs
Tracking and auditing attendance records are crucial for student data integrity and transparency. We have enhanced the Attendance API to include Insert Date and Update Date for marked attendance records.
These enhancements allow developers to retrieve accurate attendance data. Showing both when attendance was first marked and when it was last modified.
- Insert Date: When the attendance was first marked.
- Update Date: When the attendance was last modified.
- Modified By User ID: The user who made the insertion or modification.
The new attributes are available via the Attendance public endpoints.
For administrators: The required privileges for Attendance API remain unchanged.
Enhanced Group Assignments Management via REST API – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related Topic: Blackboard Learn APIs
Group management in Blackboard is essential for collaborative learning and efficient course administration. With the latest enhancements, users can now manage group assignment attempts with new API capabilities. These updates allow users to create, read, update, and delete group submissions. Users will find these new capabilities through the following endpoints in the Course Grade API:
- For GET and POST
- .../courses/{courseId}/gradebook/columns/{columnId}/groupAttempts
- For PATCH and DELETE
- .../courses/{courseId}/gradebook/columns/{columnId}/groupAttempts/{groupAttemptId}
This enhancement offers streamlined integration, which simplifies the management of group assignments through improved API functionalities. This makes it easier to integrate and automate processes within their systems.
For administrators: The required privileges for Group attempts endpoints can be validated for each endpoint in the API documentation.
Building Block Content to LTI Link Migration Tool: Change in support status – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Original Experience
Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Convert Building Blocks to LTI
Since its release last year, we've been enhancing the tool called Converting Building Block Content to LTI. The tool helps convert most media links created with Building Blocks to newer LTI versions of the respective tool. We built it to work with several of our media solution partners:
- Kaltura
- Panopto
- MediaSite
- Echo360
- ShareStream
This release includes some final improvements and fixes. These are the final changes we will make. The tool, Converting Building Block Content to LTI, is now considered deprecated. This means no further bugs will be addressed, and no further enhancements will be added. Administrators can continue to use this tool as-is. Product Support will assist administrators using the tool. There are no plans to remove it at this time.
The tool converts most links, but some scenarios may remain that can't be automatically converted. Any remaining links will need to be updated manually. If you encounter issues with link conversion, we recommend contacting your respective vendors directly. They may provide alternative methods or assistance for recreating these links.
We are committed to supporting you throughout this transition period. If you have any questions or need further assistance, contact our support team.
Upgade to Ultra
Original Conversion Improvement: Convert Undeployed Tests to Question Banks – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Copy Content from Other Courses
We’ve added a new configuration option within the Ultra experience settings: "Convert Undeployed Tests to Question Banks." This new option is designed to provide administrators with more control over how undeployed tests are handled during course conversions. By default, this option is not turned on and must be activated by administrators if they wish to use it.
Using the new Convert Undeployed Tests to Question Banks option in the Ultra experience settings, administrators now have more control over how undeployed tests are handled during course conversions. This provides greater flexibility and efficiency in managing undeployed tests and enables admins to choose the conversion method that best suits their institution’s needs.
Key Features and Benefits:
1. Conversion of Undeployed Tests to Question Banks:
- When turned on, this option converts all undeployed tests into question banks. This process helps to declutter both the course content page and the gradebook, making it easier for instructors to manage their course materials.
- This conversion significantly reduces the effort required to clean up courses that have been converted, as it organizes questions more effectively.
2. Removal of Random Blocks, Question Sets, and Linked Questions:
- During the conversion process, any random blocks, question sets, and linked questions included in undeployed tests will be removed. Question Banks do not support those features. This ensures that the resulting question banks preserve original questions without duplication.
Default Behavior When Option is Disabled:
- By default, this option is not turned on.
- If the "Convert Undeployed Tests to Question Banks" option remains turned off, undeployed tests will instead be converted into deployed tests within the Ultra experience and set to hidden. This default behavior preserves the original structure of the tests, including any random blocks, question sets, and linked questions.
- The primary benefit of this default setting is that it allows instructors to use these converted tests as they were initially intended, without needing to recreate them from question banks.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. A new configuration option is in the Ultra configuration page in the Administrator Panel. The default state is off.
Brightspace Conversion Improvement: Gradebook Categories – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Original Experience and Ultra Experience
Original Course View and Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from D2L Brightspace
The Brightspace conversion process now supports the preservation of grade categories. This enhancement allows instructors to associate grade-related items with preserved categories after conversion which will simplify setting up their gradebooks. Instructors can set weights using these categories, ensuring an organized grading structure.
For administrators: This feature is available for all courses. There are no configurations needed.
Brightspace Conversion Improvement: Discussion Forums and Topics – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Original Experience and Ultra Experience
Original Course View and Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from D2L Brightspace
Discussion Forums and Topics in Brightspace are now preserved during the conversion process. Discussion Forums convert to Folders and Discussion Topics convert to Discussions.
The following Discussion Forum and Topic settings are also preserved:
- Visibility
- Due Dates
- Release Conditions
- Points
- Post First
For administrators: This feature is available for all courses. There are no configurations needed.
Brightspace Conversion Improvement: Embedded Equations – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Original Experience and Ultra Experience
Original Course View and Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from D2L Brightspace
We’ve resolved a rendering bug related to embedded math equations. Math equations converted from Brightspace would render but break when edited. This issue is now fixed. Equations converted from Brightspace to Learn can be edited without breaking. This ensures a more reliable and efficient transition for courses with mathematical content.
For administrators: This feature is available for all courses. There are no configurations needed.
Brightspace Conversion Improvement: File Uploads – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Original Experience and Ultra Experience
Original Course View and Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from D2L Brightspace
We resolved an intermittent issue where file uploads failed during conversion. All uploaded files now convert in a proper state so that users can view and download them.
For administrators: This feature is available for all courses. There are no configurations needed.
Brightspace Conversion Improvement: Quiz Timer Settings – 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Original Experience and Ultra Experience
Original Course View and Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from D2L Brightspace
We have improved the way Quiz Timer Settings are converted from Brightspace to Learn. In the past, timed quizzes were kept open after the timer has lapsed, despite the original configuration in Brightspace. With this update, we preserve the settings from Brightspace. Quizzes with timers will either continue to be open or auto submit once the timer ends.
For administrators: This feature is available for all courses. There are no configurations needed.
Moodle Conversion Improvement: Embedded Images– 3900.98
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Original Experience and Ultra Experience
Original Course View and Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from Moodle
We have an important update to our Moodle conversion process. We fixed an issue related to embedded images. Converted Images wouldn't display for students. The issue is now fixed for the following items:
- Assignments
- Books
- Choice
- Feedback
- Files
- Forums
- Glossaries
- Lessons
- Pages
- Questionnaire Descriptions
- Quiz Descriptions
- Text and Media Areas
- URLs
- Wikis
- SCORM
For administrators: This feature is available for all courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learn SaaS release 3900.95.0
Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3900.95.0
Release to Test/Stage: Tuesday, 11 June 2024 | Release to Production: Thursday, 11 July 2024
Original Experience, Ultra Experience
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
For full feature details, please review the corresponding notes for the Learn 3900.95.0 version included below on this page. Details can be found Behind the Blackboard.
Latest release: 3900.95.0-rel.93+e583816 to Production servers to take place on 1 August 2024.
For more information on updates and bug fixes, please visit Behind the Blackboard.
July 2024 – 3900.95 Release
The July 2024 - 3900.95 release is robust with features in 8 areas:
- Tests and assignments;
- Communication and collaboration;
- Flexible grading;
- Gradebook;
- Learner progression and personalized experience;
- Learn core and security; and
- Upgrade to Ultra
These improvements impact instructors, students, and administrators. Some features do require administrative action.
Instructors:
- Print answer key for assessments
- Improvements to prevent printing a question across pages
- Needs Grading improvements for assessments allowing multiple attempts
- Send a copy to email when scheduling announcements
- Improvements to the Group Submissions page
- Needs Grading improvements for Students and Questions tabs
- Recording audio and video when adding per question feedback
Students:
Instructors and Administrators
- Brightspace Conversion Improvement: Embedded Images and Multimedia
- Moodle Conversion Improvement: Graded Discussions
Administrators:
- ‘Reply to Email’ feature for Messages
- Test and Discussion events included in the Activity Accumulator and synthetic events clean-up
- Default Organization View settings
All users:
Tests & Assignments
Print answer key for assessments – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topic: Print Assessments
Instructors can now print an answer key for their assessments. A printed answer key is helpful for grading any printed assessment.
Printing provides a convenient solution for a variety of use cases:
- Accommodating students with specific needs or limited technology access
- Providing a printed assessment for testing in designated centers
- Backup and record keeping
- Conducting offline assessment
- Documentation and compliance
- Maintaining security and integrity
The print answer key option is available in Tests and Assignments with questions. Instructors may also save answer keys as a PDF.
To print an answer key from an assessment, navigate to the assessment. Select Print from the Content and Settings tab.
We plan to support printing question pools and printing from the mobile app in upcoming releases.
Image 1. Print answer key option
Image 2. Select desired print options
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Improvements to the Group Submissions page – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Some instructors prefer to assess their students using group assessments. To improve the user experience, we made several improvements to Group Submissions page. These improvements address overall performance and reduce the load time.
Performance tested scenarios in a course with 5000 students enrollments and 1000 groups:
- Loading the Group Submissions page from the content item: Load time reduced from 260s (about 4.5 minutes) to 34s (87% performance improvement)
- Loading the Group Submissions page from the Gradable Items gradebook view: Load time reduced from 260s (about 4.5 minutes) to 29s (88% performance improvement)
- Opening a Group Submissions from the Gradebook Grades view: Load time reduced from 276s (about 4.5 minutes) to 15s (95% performance improvement)
For administrators: These improvements are available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Improvements to prevent printing a question across pages – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
In response to client feedback, we enhanced the print functionality for assessments to ensure a more user-friendly experience. For the following use cases, questions now print so that a question is not separated incorrectly on the physical or digital paper page break (e.g., in PDFs). This improves readability and ease of use for instructors and students alike.
- Question headers will split the question number and points possible across pages
- Question header will not split the header from the question text
- Question answer icons and text will not split across pages
- Tables, lists, and images will not split across pages
- Very large text answer options may span pages, but the answer choice icon (e.g. option A) will display next to the first line of text rather than aligning to the center of the option
- In matching questions, the prompt/answer heading will not split from the answer pairs
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Needs Grading improvements for assessments allowing multiple attempts – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topics: Grading & Submissions and Grade Multiple Attempts
The value of multiple attempts on an assessment ranges from support of mastery learning to reducing student anxiety. To help instructors grade assessments with multiple attempts, we have added new settings.
When an instructor chooses to allow multiple attempts, there is now a way to see which attempt(s) display as Needs Grading.
From the ‘Attempts to grade’ menu. The options are:
- First attempt
- Last attempt (default)
- All attempts
Example: An assessment allows 3 attempts; a student made 3 submissions
| Option | Attempt(s) counting towards Needs Grading | Needs Grading count |
|---|---|---|
| First attempt | The first attempt submitted by the student | 1 |
| Last attempt | The last attempt submitted by the student | 1 |
| All attempts | All attempts submitted by the student | 3 |
Instructors will always have access to all attempts submitted by a student in the grading interface. The Attempts to grade setting only controls which attempts display as Needs Grading.
If All attempts is selected, the instructor must also select the calculation method for the student’s grade.
From the Final grade calculation menu, the options are:
- Average
- Highest (default)
- Lowest
Image 1. Updated 'Attempts to grade' setting
Image 2. New 'Final grade calculation' setting
Image 3. Updated Submissions page with the Needs Grading filter applied; in this example, the instructor elected to grade the last attempt, which is now also displayed
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Communication & Collaboration
Send a copy to email when scheduling announcements – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Announcements
Managing communication with students is an important instructor task. Instructors often plan certain communications in advance. Now instructors can schedule an announcement for a future date and select that it will send an email copy. The announcement tool will send the email copy on the day and time the announcements are posted.
In the past, instructors could schedule an announcement that would present to students on the selected day and time. Instructors could also immediately post an announcement and send an email copy to students at the same time.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Flexible Grading
Needs Grading improvements for Students and Questions tabs – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topics: Grade Assignments With Flexible Grading and Grade Tests With Flexible Grading
We continue to improve the grading experience for instructors. Now, the Needs Grading filter for the Student and Questions tabs reflect the 'Attempts to grade' assessment setting.
The Needs Grading filter on the Student tab will now only display students with ungraded attempts that count towards Needs Grading.
The Needs Grading filter on the Questions tab will now only display questions with ungraded responses from attempts that count towards Needs Grading.
Instructors will always have access to all attempts submitted by a student in the grading interface. The ‘Attempts to grade’ setting only controls which attempts need to be graded for the student to be removed from the Needs Grading workflow.
Example: An instructor configures a test with multiple attempts and chooses to grade the last attempt. Two students, Jessica Evans and Nathalie Williams, have made two attempts each. All four attempts are ungraded.
Image 1. Students tab with Needs Grading filter applied; two students display on the tab.
Consider the image above. After the instructor grades Jessica Evans' last attempt, Jessica will no longer appear on the Students tab even though her first attempt is ungraded.
Image 2. Questions tab with the Needs Grading filter applied
Continuing with the example, one essay question is displayed along with 2 responses to grade. The instructor is grading Jessica Evans. The attempt selector defaults to the last response to that question based on the assessment settings. After the instructor grades Jessica’s last response to the essay question, Jessica's responses will no longer appear on the Questions tab even though the response from her first attempt is ungraded.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Recording audio and video when adding per question feedback – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topic: Grade Tests With Flexible Grading
When grading by student or question, instructors can now provide contextual feedback as recorded audio and video. Instructors can add recorded feedback to all question types. Question level feedback promotes deeper understanding and personal growth among students. Question level feedback enhances overall submission feedback and automated feedback for auto-graded questions.
Audio and video feedback recordings do not count towards the institution storage quota.
Image 1. Question feedback recording option when grading a test by student
Image 2. Instructor view of the question feedback recording option when grading a test by question
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Gradebook
Improved navigation when accessing feedback – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Students
Some instructors choose to add feedback on a student’s overall submission and individual attempts. We've improved students' access to this valuable feedback. Now students can view overall and attempt-level feedback from the gradebook.
Image 1. Student’s gradebook with the Grade & Feedback panel displaying the overall submission feedback for Assignment 1; the student can also select the feedback icon on Attempt 1 to review feedback specific to that attempt
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learner Progression & Personalized Experience
Test and Discussion events included in the Activity Accumulator and synthetic events clean-up – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience and Original Experience
Ultra Course View and Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
Administrators and faculty need to review user activity. This user activity helps inform decisions in academic disputes and aids in troubleshooting.
Administrators can now view more granular events for what students did on assessments and discussions in the “activity_accumulator” table.
New events are saved in the “event_type” column.
| Event name | Rule |
|---|---|
| ASSESSMENT_SUBMIT | A student submits a test or an assignment |
| ASSESSMENT_DRAFT | A student saves a draft on a test or an assignment |
| DISCUSSION_RESPONSE | A student posts a response on a discussion |
| DISCUSSION_REPLY | A student posts a reply on a discussion |
| DISCUSSION_DRAFT | A student saves a draft in a reply or response to a discussion |
| DISCUSSION_EDIT | A student edits a reply or response to a discussion |
Note: The “activity_accumulator” includes only submissions the student makes. Auto submissions made by the system are not yet included.
Image 1: Query results of user interactions in a course including discussion and assessment events in the “activity_accumulator” table
We also cleaned up the “activity_accumulator” table to prevent the generation of synthetic and duplicate events. This makes student activity review simpler and more transparent.
- Indirect user interactions may generate synthetic events. For example, a student might access a page where content was displayed without accessing content itself might generate a synthetic event. These synthetic events could lead to confusion, making it difficult to differentiate real user interactions and clutter databases. Now, no synthetic events are generated.
- Duplicated events were generated with a single user interaction. This could give the impression a user was more active than they were. Now, each user interaction registers a single event.
- When opening a folder, learning module, or other container, “CONTENT_ACCESS” events were registered for all items inside the container. Now, only the access for the container is registered.
Behaviors you can expect on existing events:
- “COURSE_ACCESS” events are generated only when a user accesses the course.
- “CONTENT_ACCESS” events are generated only when a user accesses that course content. This applies for all course content items: documents, assessments, discussions, journals, LTI activities, SCORM packages, etc.
As before, the “activity_accumulator” table can receive requests from Course Content public APIs. If you’re using the following API endpoints, take into account these new events and cleanup:
- GET /learn/api/public/v1/courses/{courseld}/contents
- GET /learn/api/public/v1/courses/{courseld}/contents/{contentld}
- GET /learn/api/public/v1/courses/{courseld}/contents/{contentld}/children
Key considerations:
- These changes apply to new events. Historic events will remain the same.
- The activity_accumulator table registers events of all users no matter the role. These changes apply to students and any other role that made these interactions.
- User actions made in mobile app are also included in the “activity_accumulator” table.
For administrators: To track user interactions in the Activity Accumulator table this feature needs to be activated. Go to Tools and Utilities in the administrator panel. Select System Reporting, then Auto-Reporting options. Select Yes in the event tracking field. The default state is on.
Enhanced privacy controls for Student IDs – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Customize User Information
We aim to support our clients' unique policies and use cases relating to personal information. Administrators can already:
- Restrict the display of certain fields for all users within the environment
- Reveal usernames to selected staff members through role-based privileges
With the new role-based privileges, administrators can now customize access to student IDs.
For example, instructors can be granted visibility of student IDs. This is helpful for distinguishing between students with similar names. At the same time, administrators can apply restrictions to prevent other roles from viewing student IDs.
We've also added a new privilege: “Show student/participant ID even when hidden from other users.” This privilege provides an extra layer of control by allowing specified users to see Student IDs. This ensures that only designated personnel have access to this information when necessary.
In the past, to view the student ID, a user was required to have access to edit the student information. This is no longer necessary.
Image 1. Customize User Information configuration from Administrator Tool Panel; select Customize User Information in Users section to access this page
For administrators: We recommend reviewing and modifying privileges according to your institution’s policies. With the introduction of a new privilege, we advise verifying custom roles.
‘Reply to Email’ feature for Messages – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Impact: Administrators
Related Topic: Messages
We aim to support institutions' specific policies and procedures about email communications. To help, administrators can now control how users interact with Messages sent as emails. When allowed, users can reply to Messages sent as an email.
There are two new settings for Ultra Messages:
- Allow email replies to messages from non-students/non-participants (instructors/leaders, administrators)
- Allow email replies to messages from students/participants
When drafting the message, instructors may choose whether they want to allow replies. When selected, replies from students will be directed to the instructor's email address registered in the system. Allowing replies helps interactions to be more efficient and will foster smoother communication.
Image 1. Messages for Organizations and Courses configuration from Administrator Tool Panel
For administrators: By default, both settings are deselected. This setting can be selected for students, non-students, or both.
Default Organization View settings – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Organization View, Original Organization View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Organizations
Administrators can now set the default experience for organizations:
- Original Organization View
- Ultra Organization View
- Instructor Choice
The Default Organization View options now align with the Default Course View options.
Image 1. Default Organizations Properties from Administrator Tool Panel
For administrators: System administrators can set the default organization view by navigating to System Admin> Organizations module >Default Organization Properties.
Upgade to Ultra
Brightspace Conversion Improvement: Embedded Images and Multimedia – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience and Original Experience
Ultra Course View and Original Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from D2L Brightspace
We have improved the way we convert HTML Documents from Brightspace to Ultra. Now, embedded images and multimedia are preserved for HTML Documents. HTML Documents from Brightspace convert into Content Items or Ultra Documents, depending on the course view. We now preserve embedded images and multimedia for either output.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Moodle Conversion Improvement: Graded Discussions – 3900.95
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience and Original Experience
Ultra Course View and Original Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from Moodle
We have improved the way that we convert Discussions from Moodle to Ultra. Now, graded discussions and their settings convert. We now bring over the points and grade category for the discussion. This change simplifies the process for those migrating from Moodle. Instructors will no longer need to update converted discussions to be graded.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learn SaaS release 3900.93.0
Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3900.93.0
Release to Test/Stage: Tuesday, 7 May 2024 | Release to Production: Thursday, 6 June 2024
Original Experience, Ultra Experience
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
For full feature details, please review the corresponding notes for the Learn 3900.93.0 version included below on this page. Details can be found Behind the Blackboard.
Latest release: 3900.93.0-rel.60+b2d93bf to Production servers to take place on 27 June 2024.
For more information on updates and bug fixes, please visit Behind the Blackboard.
June 2024 – 3900.93 Release
The June 2024 - 3900.93 release is robust with features in 9 areas:
- Instructional design;
- Tests and assignments;
- Communication and collaboration;
- Flexible grading;
- Gradebook;
- Learner progression and personalized experience;
- Integrations;
- Learn core and security; and
- Mobile App
These improvements impact instructors, students, observers, administrators, and all users. Some features do require administrative action.
Instructors:
- AI Design Assistant – output language selector
- Printing for assessments
- Streamlined point value editing for questions
- Post immediately when creating announcements
- Prevent auto-assigning members within self-enrollment groups
- Group members list available in the selected group
- Filter out graded responses when grading by question
- Grader Notes on student grades
- Weighted calculation usability improvements
Instructors and Students:
Students:
- Improved visibility of new grades and feedback in the student gradebook
- Return a true/false question to an unanswered state
Administrators:
Observers:
Everyone:
Instructional Design
AI Design Assistant – Language Selector – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: AI Design Assistant
To support multi-language use cases, the AI Design Assistant now includes a language selector. Instructors may use the language selector to set the desired language for generated content. This feature is especially beneficial for courses with multi-language requirements.
The language selector is included in all existing AI Design Assistant workflows. A list of supported languages in the language selector is available.
Image 1. Select the desired output language from the advanced options
Image 2. The generated output is in the selected language
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Printing for Assessments – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, users who have privileges to edit an assessment
Related topic: Print Assessments
Instructors can now print assessments. Printing provides a convenient solution for a variety of use cases:
- Accommodating students with specific needs or limited technology access
- Providing a printed assessment for testing in designated centers
- Backup and record keeping
- Conducting offline assessment
- Documentation and compliance
- Maintaining security and integrity
The print option is available in Forms, Tests, and Assignments with questions. Printing also provides the option to save as PDF.
To print an assessment, from Content and Settings, select Print.
Note: We plan to support printing answer keys and question pools and printing from the mobile app in upcoming releases.
Image 1. Print option from a test
Image 2. Select desired print options
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Streamlined point value editing for questions – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topics: Edit Tests and Questions
When editing a question, instructors can now access and edit the point value field with just two clicks. Reducing the number of clicks needed to edit the point value of a question saves instructors time and effort. This small change leads to a smoother workflow and enhances the overall teaching and learning experience.
Note: Editing the point values for matching questions requires three clicks.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Return a true/false question to an unanswered state – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Students
Students can now return a true/false question to an unanswered state after choosing an answer. Students clear their choice by selecting the same option again. Students may need to clear their answer selection for a test question. For questions that use negative scoring, if a student is uncertain about their answer, their score may be better if they leave it unanswered. In this case, clearing a response makes it easy for them to come back later using the unanswered question filter. This helps students better manage their time during a test.
In the past, a student could only change their answer to a true/false question to a different value.
Image 1. A true/false question with true selected as the answer
Image 2. The true/false question answer has been cleared
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Communication & Collaboration
Post immediately when creating announcements – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Announcements
Instructors can now post announcements as part of the drafting and editing processes. This makes the process of creating and posting announcements simpler.
Instructors can still post from the announcements page.
Image 1. When creating or editing an announcement, there is now an option to post
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Prevent auto-assigning members in self-enrollment groups – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Create and Manage Groups
Instructors use self-enrollment groups to provide agency to students on group activities. Currently, at the end of the enrollment period, unassigned students are always distributed into groups. To improve the use of self-enrollment groups for optional activities, instructors can now opt-out of this behavior. Instructors can deselect the option, which does not enroll students who do not self-enroll by the end of the enrollment to any group. This option gives instructors more flexibility when managing self-enrollment groups.
Image 1. The auto-enroll check box sets the behavior at the end of the self-enrollment period
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed. The default behavior is unchanged.
Group members list available within the selected group – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Related topic: Create and Manage Groups
Groups and group work form an important part of the learning experience. To improve and centralize member information, we have relocated the members list to the selected group page. This will now display as a member’s tab rather than a separate panel. Here, users can search for members and sort them alphabetically. This change enhances the visibility of the selected groups page and provides the groundwork for adding more features in future releases.
Image 1. Show Members option from the group sets page
Image 2. Once a group is selected, the members now appear on the groups page within the Members tab
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Filter out graded responses when grading by question – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
The Needs Grading filter now filters out graded student responses by default. Filtering this way helps instructors to focus on any remaining ungraded responses for a given question. It also provides instructors with an improved view of their outstanding grading workload. If instructors want to include graded responses, they can select Show graded responses. This selection preference is now stored per course and it persists across assessments in each course.
Image 1. Grading by question option with the grading status of Needs Grading filter selected
Image 2. Grading by question view with the grading status filter of Needs Grading and Show graded responses options selected
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Gradebook
Grader Notes on student grades – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topics: Grade Tests with Flexible Grading, Grade Assignments with Flexible Grading
Instructors can now add private grading notes to student grades. After a score is assigned, the new Feedback & Notes menu option is available. Grader notes form an important part of the academic record. These notes may serve as documentation for a grading decision or grade adjustment. Grader notes are private to graders and not visible to students.
Those with grading privileges can access Feedback & Notes from two places:
- The Grades tab in the Gradebook by selecting a specific score.
- The Submissions list page for an assessment, select the More menu for a student
Image 1. Instructor view of the Feedback & Notes menu option accessible from the Gradebook grid view and Submissions page for assessments
Image 2. Instructor view of the new grader notes option
Image 3. Instructor view of grader notes accessed from a student’s contextual menu on the assessment’s Submissions page
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Improved visibility of new grades and feedback in the student gradebook – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Students
Related topic: Grades
To ensure that students are aware of any new grades in the course we have added an indicator to the Gradebook tab. When there are new grades, the number of new grades appears on the tab.
After selecting the tab, items with new or updated grades appear at the top of the student gradebook and display a purple indicator. The purple indicator disappears and the count on the tab reduces when the student selects the item or reviews their submission.
We also reviewed the use of color in the gradebook based on student feedback. Now, we mark late assessments with a "(Late)" label to reduce stress sometimes associated with the use of the color red. In the past, late submissions appeared with a red assessment icon and label.
Image 1. Student view of an Ultra course with the new grade indicator on the Gradebook tab
Image 2. Student view of the gradebook displaying the grade indicator on the Gradebook tab and corresponding purple indicators for the 3 relevant items; the new “(Late)” label is also visible
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Weighted calculation usability improvements – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topics: Calculate Grades
Responding to client feedback, we have made two improvements for gradebook weighting:
- The label “0% per item” appeared for categories excluded from weighting. This caused confusion so we removed it.
- We updated the calculation rules panel to make it easier to understand the selected settings.
Image 1. Instructor view of the previous interface for weighted calculations
Image 2. Instructor view of the new weighted calculation interface where the ‘0% per item’ information is removed for excluded categories
Image 3. Instructor view of the updated text on the Calculation rule panel
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learner Progression & Personalized Experience
Student's overall grade visible to Observers –3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Observers
Related Topic: Observer Role
Observers are users who can only view the progress and performance of specified students. We now display the overall grade in the Grades tab along with other grades. This improves student monitoring for observers. If an instructor sets the overall grade to be visible to students, it will be visible to observers.
Image 1. Current overall grade visible to observer
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Announcements API enhancements - additional filtering options – 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related Topic: Learn APIs
Announcements play a crucial role in course communication. They ensure that students stay informed about important deadlines and course materials. Administrators and developers now have additional REST API capabilities to streamline integrations and save time. New announcements filtering options allow administrators and integrated tools to retrieve data more efficiently. This optimizes audit and search processes, reducing query volume and data processing after retrieval.
New filter options:
- Creation Date: Retrieve announcements based on their specific creation date
- Modified Date: Retrieve announcements based on their last modification date
- Availability: Filter announcements based on their availability status
For administrators: The required privileges for Announcements API remain unchanged.
Learn Core & Security
Base Navigation - Course and Organization filters and personalization - 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: All
The courses and organizations tabs in Base Navigation are some of the most accessed places in Blackboard Learn. We received feedback in numerous focus groups and were inspired by client ideas posted in the Idea Exchange. We heard the pages should fit more institutions’ situations and give users more options to customize. This release includes the following improvements:
We removed the carousel for navigating between terms. There is now a term selector and filter you can use on its own or with other filters.
You can set filters, make term choices, and add text searches. All of these are clearly displayed below the search box. Remove these search settings or filters to see more courses or organizations. Remove them by selecting the close icon “x” on each.
Your selections and filters are remembered automatically even if you log out or switch devices. Set up the pages the way you like, and we’ll keep it that way until you change it.
The terms selector has specific logical behaviors to help users:
- “Current Courses” and “Current Organizations” are the default term selections. If terms aren’t used or all your courses/organizations are open or use continuous duration, you’ll default to the “All Terms” selection option instead.
- You can now choose to view “All Terms” to see everything regardless of term.
- The “Upcoming Courses” and “Upcoming Organizations” term options will only display if you have upcoming courses/organizations.
Image 1. Course page with search for "medical" and current courses
For administrators: This feature is available for all environments with Base Navigation enabled. There are no configurations needed.
Mobile App
Landing Page Enhancements for Blackboard Learn Mobile App - 3900.93
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra and Original Experience
Ultra and Original Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
To enhance usability and streamline user interaction in the mobile app, we added filters to the following landing pages:
- Courses
- Organizations
- Grades
Users now can use filters at the top of each landing page, allowing them to refine their search results.
When a user applies a filter, its tag appears at the top of the landing page. Users can remove filters by unselecting the respective tag.
Image 1: Courses landing page with filtering option
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations
Learn SaaS release 3900.91.0
Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3900.91.0
Release to Test/Stage: Tuesday, 9 April 2024 | Release to Production: Thursday, 2 May 2024
Original Experience, Ultra Experience
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
For full feature details, please review the corresponding notes for the Learn 3900.91.0 version included below on this page. Details can be found Behind the Blackboard.
Latest release: 3900.91.0-rel.38+0f923c8 to Production servers to take place on 30 May 2024.
For more information on updates and bug fixes, please visit Behind the Blackboard.
May 2024 – 3900.91 Release
The May 2024 - 3900.91 release is robust with features in 9 areas:
- Competency based education;
- Tests and assignments;
- Flexible grading;
- Gradebook;
- Learner progression and personalized experience;
- Integrations;
- Learn core and security;
- Mobile App;
- Upgrade to Ultra.
These improvements impact instructors, students, observers, administrators, and everyone. Some features do require administrative action.
Instructors:
- Supporting multiple performance criteria in release conditions
- Reuse questions in Forms
- Multiple attempts for Forms assigned to groups
- Improved Gradebook navigation
Instructors and Students:
- Add question feedback when grading a test by question
- Weighted Calculation Improvements
- Landing page enhancements for Blackboard Learn Mobile app
Instructors and Administrators:
Administrators:
- Align goals to questions in question pools
- Limit enrollments by Course Role
- Set the size limit for file type uploads to zero
- Moodle Conversion Improvement: Question Pools
- Moodle Conversion Improvement: Partial Credit for Multiple Choice and Multiple Answer Question Types
- Bulk Conversion for Moodle and Brightspace
Observers:
Everyone:
Competency Based Education/Mastery Learning
Align goals to questions in question pools – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Administrators
Related topics: Question Pools, Goals
Institutions want to align goals to course content. Goal alignment ensures curriculum design meets specific learning outcomes.
Now, instructors can align goals to questions within a question pool. Question-level goal alignment ensures that assessment items measure the desired learning outcomes. This helps to ensure the accuracy and effectiveness of evaluation and feedback practices.
Image 1: Option to choose Align with goal from the menu when adding or editing a question in a question pool
Learn more about goal alignment in the Ultra Course View.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Supporting multiple performance criteria in release conditions – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topics: Content Release Conditions
Release conditions determine when students can view course content. Release conditions are on the content's visibility setting on the course content page. Currently, you can set:
- Which course members or groups have access;
- When the course content is accessible, visible, and hidden;
- When student performance is necessary for completing an assignment or scoring.
Instructors can now set more than one performance criteria per content item.
Image 1. Release condition panel with additional performance criteria selected
Tests & Assignments
Reuse questions in Forms – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topics: Forms
Reusing questions streamlines the Form creation process and saves users time and effort. Instructors can now select Reuse questions when editing or creating a Form.
Image 1. Reuse questions option in a Form
Instructors can filter questions from existing Forms within the course. Filter criteria include a keyword search, select Forms, and by question type. Any question the instructor selects is then copied into the Form. The instructor may edit the question, if desired.
Image 2. Filter criteria for question reuse in Forms
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Multiple attempts for Forms assigned to groups – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Forms
Instructors can now assign a Form to a group and allow multiple attempts. When assigning forms to groups, enabling multiple attempts promotes dynamic, iterative learning experiences. Groups can now submit the Form, receive feedback, and submit another response.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Flexible Grading
Add question feedback when grading a test by question – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
When grading by student or by question, instructors can provide contextual feedback. Instructors can add feedback to all question types. Question level feedback promotes deeper understanding and personal growth among students. Question level feedback enhances overall submission feedback and automated feedback for auto-graded questions.
Image 1. Instructor view of adding per-question feedback when grading by question
Image 2. Instructor view of question with saved feedback
After scores are posted, students can access their feedback in the Gradebook. Students can access both overall feedback and question-specific feedback.
Image 3. Student view of feedback added to an essay question
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Improved Gradebook navigation – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
To create a more intuitive navigation, we replaced the grid and list view buttons with text links. The options are now:
- Gradable Items
- Grades (grid view)
- Students
The Gradebook will remember the last view you used in each course.
Image 1. Instructor view of the new gradebook navigation menu
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Weighted Calculation Improvements – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Related topics: Calculate Grades, Grade Columns
Instructors have diverse grade calculation needs. Some instructors use weighted calculations to help with aggregating calculations like midterm or final grades.
Now instructors can assign equal weights to items in the same categories. The chosen calculation method, whether proportional or equal, applies to all categories. In the past, weighted items in the same category had proportional weights. These weighted items were based on the possible points of each item.
To better understand student performance, some instructors use drop rules to remove outliers. Because it’s important to know the weighting method when managing these settings, we now display the instructor's chosen weighting option in the calculation rules panel.
Image 1. Instructor view of the new Proportionally and Equally weighted calculation options
Image 2. Instructor view of the new proportional weighted calculation option. Instructors can see what percentage each item in the category contributes to the overall category weighting
Image 3. Instructor view of the equally weighted calculation option; instructors are informed of the equal percentage that items count towards the overall category weighting
Image 4. Instructor view of the updated Edit calculation rule panel confirming the selected category weighting option
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learner Progression & Personalized Experience
Observer role support in Ultra Courses – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Observers
Related Topic: Observer Role
Academic advisors, parents, coaches, and other users may find it beneficial to monitor the progress of one or more students. This enables them to effectively support the students in their learning journey. Now these observers can monitor student progress and performance in Ultra courses.
The streamlined process for Ultra courses eliminates the need for complicated instructor settings. Observers will have access to the following information:
- Last Access Date: Observers can view when the student last accessed the course.
- Grades tab: This tab provides details on a student’s earned grades. The information included is:
- Overall Grade
- Upcoming and past due dates
- Any exceptions granted to the student
- Late submissions
- Progress tab: This tab helps the observer understand a student's progression in the course. The information included is:
- Navigation through the course content
- Course elements visible on the student’s learning path
- Completeness and progress indicators for items, folders, and learning modules
To view a student's progress, progress tracking must be enabled in the course.
Image 1: Observer view of a student’s grades in an Ultra Course
Image 2: Observer view of a student’s progress in an Ultra Course
Observers can access a dedicated dashboard in the Tools area of the Base Navigation. Observers should first select the student they wish to observe and then choose the specific course they want to access. Both Original and Ultra courses can be observed from this dashboard.
Image 3: An observer chooses which student they want to observe in the Observer Dashboard
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed. As before, administrators can manage observer-to-student relationships manually, with a bulk file, or through data integration.
A user must be assigned the Observer system role as their primary system role. In this release, Observer accounts continue to be mutually exclusive from other user accounts. We plan to remove this restriction in a future release.
Integrations
Limit enrollments by Course Role – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience and Original Experience
Ultra Course View and Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
For some institutions, instructors or staff manage some course membership manually. For example, institutional policy might define that student enrollments and instructor assignments come from the student information system (SIS), but instructors manage graders and assistants in their own courses.
Now administrators can limit the course roles that a user can add, edit, or remove from the roster. This allows institutions to better enforce their policies. It also helps prevent potential data conflicts and mismanagement. We changed some course role privileges in this release to support this.
There are now two privileges for allowing a course user to add other enrollments:
- Course Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Enroll User
- Use this privilege when you want course role limits to apply.
- Course Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Enroll User for all roles
- Use this privilege when the user can enroll users with any course role but you want to apply course role limits to the enrollment edit and remove privileges.
Similarly, there are now two privileges for batch enrolling users:
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Batch Enroll Users
- Use this privilege when you want course role limits to apply to batch actions.
- Course Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Batch Enroll Users for all roles
- Use this privilege when the user can batch enroll other users with any course role. Course role restrictions would still apply to the edit and remove privileges.
To configure restrictions, go to the Administrator Panel and select Course/Organization Roles. In Course/Organization Roles, select Edit for the appropriate course role. A new section allows selecting course roles and adding them to the list of manageable roles.
Image 1. An administrator configures a course role so users can only manage Course Builder, Grader, and Teaching Assistant roles.
Image 2. User is only allowed to enroll others with the course roles of Teaching Assistant, Course Builder, or Grader.
Image 3. User is able to edit or remove this enrollment because the role, “Teaching Assistant” is allowed.
These restrictions also apply to other course role privileges for editing and deleting enrollments.
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Change System DSK User's availability in Course/Organization.
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Change System DSK User's Role in Course/Organization
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Remove System DSK Users from Course/Organization
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Set System DSK instructor as primary in Ultra Course View
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Change Non-System DSK User's availability in Course/Organization
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Change Non-System DSK User's Role in Course/Organization
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Remove Non-System DSK Users from Course/Organization
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Set Non-System DSK instructor as primary in Ultra Course View
For administrators: We recommend administrators review course role configurations, so they best align to institutional policies. Confirm the assignment of expected privileges. Set any appropriate course role restrictions for course roles with the privileges above.
Learn Core & Security
Reduced motion setting – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Accessibility Overview
The Ultra Experience has animated elements such as panels opening and closing. Some users may prefer or need to reduce animations and motion. Many devices and operating systems have settings to reduce non-essential motion.
We added support for the ‘prefers-reduced-motion’ feature to select animated panels. Panels will snap into place when users have configured reduce motion. Before they used a swiping motion.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. It is also available for the Original course panel when Base Navigation is enabled. Users should use device settings for reducing motion.
- iOS: Accessibility > Motion > Reduce motion (on)
- Android: Settings > Accessibility > Remove Animations (on)
- Windows: Settings > Accessibility > Visual effects > Animation effects (off)
- Mac OS: System Settings > Accessibility > Display > Reduce motion (on)
Set the size limit for file type uploads to zero – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: File size upload limit
Administrators set policies to help ensure responsible storage use. We reduced the minimum size setting for a group of file types from 25 MB to 0 MB. This allows setting limits for very small files. Administrators can also restrict certain file types completely by setting them to zero. This can help encourage users to store certain file types elsewhere. For example, institutions may use these settings to prevent video uploads to Blackboard. They may want users to upload videos to a specific video streaming platform instead.
For administrators: We recommend reviewing any extensions and limits previously set. Restrictions apply for new uploads only in Ultra courses and in Content Collection.
Mobile App
Landing page enhancements for Blackboard Learn Mobile App – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
The landing pages (Grades, Messages, Courses, Organization) are now designed in a card layout. For the Courses and Organization pages, the course status indicator previously located in the course image has been moved below the course or organization title. The current functionality remains the same. These design changes align the landing pages with the design principles and language of the Blackboard Mobile App.
These enhancements are a part of a larger redesign of the Blackboard Learn mobile app landing pages to ensure uniform design, optimized user experience, and natural user flow across various devices and screen sizes.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Support for Observer role for Ultra Courses in Mobile App - 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Observers
Users with the Observer role can now view student progress in Ultra Courses using our mobile app. This provides student advisors and support staff the ability to track student success.
They also can view grade related information. Observers view the same information displayed to a student. Mobile access for the Observer role makes it easier for support staff to help students.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Upgrade to Ultra
Option to convert Content Areas to Learning Modules – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related Topic: Convert Courses to Ultra
In previous releases, Content Areas converted to Folders when converting Original courses to Ultra. We updated conversion so administrators can choose if Content Areas convert to Learning Modules or folders.
Converting to Learning Modules is helpful for the following types of courses:
- Original Courses using more than one Content Area to organize course materials
- Courses migrating from Canvas, Brightspace, and Moodle Learning Management Systems
The default setting is to convert Content Areas to Learning Modules.
Image 1. Convert Content Areas to Learning Modules toggle
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed. We recommend administrators review this configuration to set the most appropriate institutional choice.
A new configuration option is available on the Ultra Experience Management page. The default state is ON. When OFF, Content Areas will convert to Folders instead of Learning Modules.
Restricting Original Course View Course Copy workflow – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Original Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Copy Courses
We have added a restriction to the Course Copy workflow in Original courses. Users can no longer push a copy from an Original course to an Ultra course. We made this change to reduce the likelihood of an Ultra course becoming corrupted. The Original Course Copy workflow was never designed for copies into an Ultra course.
Instructors can still copy from one Original course to another. For Ultra courses, instructors should always start a copy process from the Ultra course.
Image 1. Copies to Ultra courses are blocked when copying from Original
Users can copy course materials from Original to Ultra by using Copy Items in an Ultra course. They can copy an entire Original course into an Ultra course. They also have the option to pick and choose which items they want to copy into an Ultra course.
Image 2. Users can copy content from Original to Ultra using Copy Items
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed. Administrator copy processes aren’t changed in this release. While unchanged, admins should use caution when copying from Original to Ultra. The admin copy workflow can have the same types of issues and can lead to course corruption. If possible, try to limit to doing only full course copies using the admin copy workflow.
Moodle Conversion Improvement: Question Pools – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Original Experience, Ultra Experience
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from Moodle
In Moodle, any time you edit or save a question it creates a new version of that question. Our conversion process was bringing over every version of a question as a new question. Question Pools and Tests were being affected and didn't match what was in Moodle. We updated our conversion logic in the following ways:
- If a question in a Test is using the latest version, we add it to a Question Pool that is linked with that Test. This matches the behavior in Moodle with Quizzes and Question Banks.
- If a question in a Test is using an older version, we only add that question to that Test. This ensures that Question Pools only have the latest versions of questions. This matches the behavior in Moodle with Quizzes and Question Banks. Question Pools will no longer contain every version of a question as they did before.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Original and Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Moodle Conversion Improvement: Partial Credit for Multiple Choice and Multiple Answer Question Types – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Original Experience, Ultra Experience
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from Moodle
In Moodle you can create a Multiple Choice question type. Multiple Choice question types can have a single answer or more than one answer. They can also support partial credit. We have updated our conversion logic so that partial credit weights convert.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Original and Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Bulk Conversion for Moodle and Brightspace – 3900.91
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related Topic: Convert Courses to Ultra
Bulk Conversion from Moodle and Brightspace is now available. Institutions moving from Moodle and Brightspace can share exports with our implementation team. Our implementation team will take the packages and bulk import and convert them. This service is part of our standard implementation for institutions transitioning to Blackboard.
Learn SaaS release 3900.89.0
Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3900.89.0
Release to Test/Stage: Tuesday, 12 March 2024 | Release to Production: Thursday, 4 April 2024
Original Experience, Ultra Experience
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
For full feature details, please review the corresponding notes for the Learn 3900.89.0 version included below on this page. Details can be found Behind the Blackboard.
Latest release: 3900.89.0-rel.31+520e1f0 to Production servers on 18 April 2024.
For more information on updates and bug fixes, please visit Behind the Blackboard.
April 2024 – 3900.89 Release
The April 2024 - 3900.89 release is robust with features in 10 areas:
- Instructional design;
- Competency based education;
- Tests and assignments;
- Communication and collaboration;
- Flexible grading;
- Gradebook;
- Learner progression and personalized experience;
- Integrations;
- Learn core and security, and
- Upgrade to Ultra
These improvements impact instructors, students, and administrators. Some features do require administrative action.
Instructors:
- AI Design Assistant – Context picker for Learning Modules, Assignments, Discussions, and Journals
- Default question points value changed from 10 to 1
- Duplicate questions in Assessments, Forms, and Question Banks
- Likert answer options expanded to include 4 and 6
- Auto-submitted indicator in attempt logs
- Overall grade information added to gradebook download
- Edit gradebook category for Partner Cloud content
- Long names visible and sorting controls for the Student Activity report for assessments on small devices and mobile app
- Self-enrollment group improvements
- Individual date adjustments from Batch Edit
Instructors and Students:
- Student feedback remains visible to students regardless of release condition settings
- Anonymous posts for Discussions
- Reply all in messages
- Usability improvements for flexible grading
- Add question feedback when grading by student in Flexible Grading
- Calculations changed from using BigDecimal to BigFraction
Students:
Instructors and Administrators:
Administrators:
Instructional Design
AI Design Assistant – Context picker for Learning Modules, Assignments, Discussions, and Journals – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topics: Learning modules, Assignments, Discussions, and Journals
Context selection is key for tailoring course content generated with the AI Design Assistant. The context picker also helps to ground generated content in an appropriate context.
File types supported by the context picker include PDF, Word, PowerPoint, text, RTF, and HTML.
We are extending the context picker for test questions to other generation workflows:
- Learning modules
- Authentic assignments
- Authentic discussions
- Authentic journals
Image 1. Example of context picker for learning module generation; select Auto-Generate Modules from the plus icon's dropdown menu
Image 2. Choose Select Course Items
Image 3. Select course items for context and then choose Select items
Image 4. Select Generate to apply the context to the generation workflow
Image 5. Select generated Learning Modules and add them to your course
When Ultra documents are selected as context, file attachments on the Ultra document will also be included as context for all context pickers.
For administrators: You have to enable AI features to use the Context Picker for Learning Modules, Assignments, Discussions, and Journals. In Installed Tools, select Settings for AI Design Assistant and Unsplash. The default state is off. When this feature is on, the privilege will need to be assigned to course roles as necessary, such as Instructor. The privilege to assign is "Use AI features."
Persistent navigation for Learning Modules – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Students
Related topic: Learning Modules
To improve students' navigation in a learning module, we updated the navigation bar. Now the navigation bar is sticky and remains visible as students vertically scroll through content. Students no longer need to scroll back up to the top of content to access the navigation tools.
Image 1. The navigation bar is always visible
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Competency Based Education
Student feedback remains visible to students regardless of release condition settings – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Related topic: Content Release Conditions
Instructors may want to control access to course content using release conditions. This is helpful for providing custom learning paths through course content. The release conditions include an option to show or hide content to/from students before they meet release conditions. We've modified how these settings impact the students' view of feedback from instructors. Now instructors can set release conditions without any impact to feedback to students.
In the past, when an instructor selected the option to hide content, students could view associated grades but not the feedback. We have corrected this to ensure that students can always review feedback.
Image 1. Instructor view of release conditions settings with date/time release condition set in combination with Hide state in “When will content appear?”
Image 2. Student gradebook view with display of student’s feedback and grade regardless of the release condition setting in Image 1
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Tests & Assignments
Default question points value changed from 10 to 1 – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topic: Create Tests
We recognize that manually adjusting the point value for questions can be time-consuming and error prone. Based on valuable client feedback, we are changing the default point value from 10 to 1. Moving forward, any newly created questions will have a default point value of 1. This change helps reduce the need for manual adjustments.
Questions copied from another assessment retain the designated point value.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Rubric API Enhancements – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Learn APIs
Rubrics are fundamental tools for instructors, aiding in the fair and consistent evaluation of graded work. Now, administrators can leverage the enhanced API to perform the complete spectrum of CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) operations for rubrics.
Developers will gain access to the following endpoints:
- POST /learn/api/public/v1/courses/{courseId}/rubrics
- PATCH or DELETE /learn/api/public/v1/courses/{courseId}/rubrics/{rubricId}
For administrators: The REST integration user must have the following entitlements:
- For POST method: "Course/Organization Control Panel (Tools) > Rubrics > Create Rubric"
- For PATCH method: "Course/Organization Control Panel (Tools) > Rubrics > Edit Rubric"
- For DELETE method: "Course/Organization Control Panel (Tools) > Rubrics > Delete Rubric"
Duplicate questions in Assessments, Forms, and Question Banks – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topic: Edit Tests and Questions
This enhancement is a direct response to client feedback.
Sometimes an instructor may want to have a question repeated with the same answer options but a different question. Instructors can now select Duplicate to quickly copy an existing question within the same assessment (test, assignment, form) or in a question bank. This feature eliminates the need for manual duplication and simplifies the process of creating multiple questions with the same answer options.
Instructors may edit the question text and answer options. There are no changes to how an instructor edits the question.
Image 1. Duplicate menu option for a test question
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Likert answer options expanded to include 4 and 6 – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topic: Likert Questions
Instructors can now create Likert scale questions with 4 or 6 answer options. This allows for greater granularity in student responses. An even number of answer options also supports the creation of questions where students cannot select a neutral option. This enhancement is in response to valuable user feedback.
Image 1. Likert question with 4 and 6 answer options
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Auto-submitted indicator in attempt logs – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Attempt Logs
Understanding the context of student submissions is helpful to instructors. Now the Attempt Log indicates whether a submission is manual or automatic. This indicator provides instructors with deeper insights into student behaviors. This addition also allows instructors to better track their student progress.
Image 1. Attempt marked as "Auto submitted" in the log
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Communication & Collaboration
Anonymous posts for Discussions – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and Students
Related topics: Create Discussions for Instructors, Discussions for Students
Discussions play a pivotal role in nurturing peer-to-peer interaction and critical thinking. Students need to feel free to express their ideas and opinions without fear of judgement. To support this, we've added an option for instructors to allow anonymous posts in ungraded discussions. This feature provides flexibility for instructors. They can toggle anonymity on or off as the discussion progresses. Any existing anonymous posts keep their anonymity.
Image 1. Setting to turn on anonymous posts
Image 2. A student making an anonymous post
Image 3. An anonymous post in a discussion
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Self-Enrollment Group Improvements – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Create Groups
Self-enrollment groups provide an important part of student autonomy throughout the learning experience. To support more use cases for self-enrollment groups and based on client feedback, we are reducing the maximum members per group from 2 to 1. This will cover use cases such as sign-up sheets and booking 1:1 slots with students.
Image 1. Instructors can set maximum members per group to 1
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Reply all in messages – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Original Experience
Original Course View
Impact: Instructors and Students
Related topics: Messages for Instructors, Messages for Students
Responding to messages is an important part of course communication. The "Reply all" option in the Original Course View is limited to messages with up to 100 recipients. With this release, we have raised limits to 1000 recipients. This is to help with wider course communication and based on client feedback. When using the "Reply all" feature, it will respond to all users on the original message. If you wish to select which users to reply to, the "Reply" option allows you to desired select users.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Original courses. There are no configurations needed.
Flexible Grading
Usability improvements for flexible grading – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Related topics: Grade Tests With Flexible Grading, Grade Assignments With Flexible Grading, Override Grades
Streamlining the grading process saves instructors time and reduces their workload. We have implemented several enhancements to Flexible Grading in response to instructor feedback. All the enhancements target improved usability and efficiency.
We relocated the attempt selector to improve visibility and efficiency. It is now nearer to the attempt grade pill. This allows instructors to switch between a student's attempts during grading.
Image 1. Instructors view displaying the relocated attempt selector next to the attempt grade pill
The grading interface now displays a single grade pill. This provides a more intuitive grading workflow. The single grade pill also prevents accidental grade overrides.
Image 2. Instructors view displaying a single grade pill as well as the submission receipt for the displayed attempt
Overriding the final grade is now an explicit grading option. The three-dot menu next to the attempt grade pill now includes an Override Final Grade option. When selected, an Override label appears above the grade pill. Here the instructor can adjust the final grade for the submission.
Image 3. Instructors view displaying the new override grade workflow
Image 4. Instructors view displaying a graded submission where a grade override has been applied
The submission receipt for the selected attempt now displays beneath the attempt selector.
For administrators: The Flexible Grading experience is a available behind a feature flag. The feature is on by default to ensure that the Flexible Grading interface is available to users by default. You can turn off the Flexible Grading interface by setting this feature to Off.
Add question feedback when grading by student – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Instructors can now provide contextual feedback by student on all question types. Question level feedback promotes deeper understanding and personal growth among students. Question level feedback complements the existing capabilities of overall submission feedback and automated feedback for auto-graded questions.
Note: We are targeting the 3900.91 May release for per-question feedback when grading tests by questions.
Image 1. Instructor view of adding per question feedback
Image 2. Instructor view of question with saved feedback
Once students have submitted their tests and scores are posted, students can access the feedback. Students can access both overall feedback and question-specific feedback.
Image 3. Student view of feedback added to an essay question
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Gradebook
Calculations changed from using BigDecimal to BigFraction – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS and Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience and Original Experience
Ultra Course View and Original Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Instructors need a gradebook that supports diverse grading scenarios. We are changing the software library used to perform calculations in calculated columns and the overall course grade.
Example: A course contains 3 assignments worth 22 points each. The student scores 13/22 on the first assignment, 14/22 on the second assignment, and 15/22 on the third assignment. An instructor creates a calculated column to calculate the average of these assignments.
Using the new software library, BigFraction, the average will calculate as 14/22.
With the former software library, BigDecimal, the average would incorrectly calculate to 13.99/22. The new software library ensures calculations compute as expected.
For administrators: This change applies to both Ultra and Original courses. There are no configurations needed.
Overall Grade added to the Gradebook Download – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topic: Work Offline with Grade Data
Some instructors download grades from the gradebook to analyze in other applications, such as Microsoft Excel.
Now, instructors can choose to include the Overall Grade for students in the downloaded gradebook. This additional data point helps provide a comprehensive view of student performance.
Image 1. Instructor view of Download Grades panel with ‘Select All Items’ option selected
Image 2. Instructor view of the downloaded grades file that contains the Overall Grade column
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Edit gradebook category for Partner Cloud content – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related topic: Grade Columns
Some instructors want to change the gradebook category for third-party content and tools (e.g., Cengage). Now instructors can edit the category information from the gradebook.
Image 1. Instructor view of the Edit menu option for a Partner Cloud generated gradebook item
Image 2. Instructor view of the Edit panel for a Partner Cloud generated gradebook item
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learner Progression & Personalized Experience
Long names visibility and sorting controls for the Student Activity report for assessments on small devices and mobile app – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Original course view
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Student Activity Details for Assessments
Depending on the culture, personal name lengths vary. To continue demonstrating our commitment to diversity and inclusion, we adjusted long names in the Student Activity report for assessments. This change ensures that names are visible on a variety of devices. This helps instructors avoid confusion when viewing students with similar names.
Also, instructors can now sort the student list by last name in small devices so they can organize the list easily.
Image 1: Long names visibility and sorting control in the Student Activity report for an assessment on a small screen
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Integrations
Delete a deployment ID - 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience and Original Experience
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Managing LTIs
Multiple deployments allow administrators to integrate to an LTI 1.3 third party tool that manages different credentials through the institutional hierarchy. Now administrators can delete these deployments and remove tenants that are no longer active.
Image 1. Delete link in deployment drop down menu
For administrators: Deployment management is available for both the Ultra and Original Experience.
Converting Building Block content to LTI: Student submissions and feedback – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Original Experience
Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Convert Building Blocks to LTI
We remain committed to ensuring a smooth transition experience from building blocks to LTI. We have further enhanced our conversion tool. Now administrators can include student submissions and instructor feedback.
During the conversion process, the tool prompts administrators to select whether to include the content links added in student submissions and feedback. If selected, those links in student submissions and feedback transition to LTI format within the selected course.
Image 1. Option to migrate student submission and feedback content
We encourage administrators to review the conversion tool settings. Please make informed choices based on your institution's requirements.
For administrators: If a course contains content from Kaltura, Panopto, Echo360, MediaSite and/or ShareStream building blocks, you must perform the conversion process for each building block.
Rubric Evaluations API Enhancements
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Learn APIs
Rubrics provide educators with a structured approach for assessing student work. We continue to enhance the rubric evaluations APIs. Now we have endpoints to create and update rubric evaluations to gradable items associated with a rubric.
Developers will gain access to the following endpoints:
- POST …/public/v1/courses/{courseId}/rubrics/{rubricId}/associations/{rubricAssociationId}/evaluations
- PATCH …/public/v1/courses/{courseId}/rubrics/{rubricId}/associations/{rubricAssociationId}/evaluations/{evaluationId}
Before using these options, consider the following tips for a smooth experience:
- When using the PATCH method, include the cells intended for update. Confirm that at least one cell relates to the evaluationId provided in the URL.
- Provide only one value per aspect in the rubric cells. Check that it matches the rubric definition.
- Before creating or updating rubrics, verify that the gradebook grade allows for such changes. This step ensures accurate and reliable assessment data.
For administrators: The REST integration user must have the "Course/Organization Control Panel (Grade Center) > Full Control" entitlement.
Announcements API Enhancements: Creator Information – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Learn APIs
Course announcements are vital for timely communication in courses. Some courses contain users in varying roles. Identifying announcement authors via REST API is challenging for users. We've enhanced the Announcement API by adding the "Creator" parameter. This reveals the user IDs of the authors of both Course and System Announcements.
With the new "Creator" parameter, developers can now identify the authors of announcements via API. Administrators can also filter announcements by the creator.
For administrators: The required entitlements for Announcements API remain unchanged.
Learn Core & Security
File Size limits now also apply to the Content Collection – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: File size upload limit
Administrators must manage storage used by courses. We have enhanced group file size limits to now also apply to the Content Collection. This change helps administrators ensure responsible usage of storage across the platform.
For administrators: We recommend that you review any extensions and limits previously set.
Moodle Conversion Improvement: Gradebook Categories – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience and Original Experience
Ultra Course View and Original Course View
Impact: Instructors and Administrators
Related Topic: Migrate from Moodle
Categories provide a way for instructors to group assessments together in the Gradebook. Instructors can use categories to adjust the weighting of items in the Gradebook. Now when importing a Moodle package (.mbz), categories are preserved. Instructors will have the option to align these categories to assessments.
For administrators: This feature is available for all courses. There are no configurations needed.
Individual date adjustments from Batch Edit – 3900.89
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Related Topic: Batch Edit
Updating availability and due dates after a course copy, import, or a conversion can take time. We're making it easier for instructors to make date adjustments for any item on the Batch Edit page. Instructors now have the option to change the due date and availability (Show On and Hide After) for any item.
Image 1. Adding a due date for an assignment
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learn SaaS release 3900.86.0
Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3900.86.0
Release to Test/Stage: Tuesday, 6 February 2024 | Release to Production: Thursday, 7 March 2024
Original Experience, Ultra Experience
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
For full feature details, please review the corresponding notes for the Learn 3900.86.0 version included below on this page. Details can also be found Behind the Blackboard.
Latest release: 3900.86.0-rel.49+1802b14 to Production servers to take place on 28 March 2024.
For more information on updates and bug fixes, please visit Behind the Blackboard.
March 2024 – 3900.86 Release
The March 2024 - 3900.86 release is robust with features in 10 areas:
- Instructional design;
- Competency based education;
- Tests and assignments;
- Communication and collaboration;
- Flexible grading;
- Gradebook;
- Learner progression and personalized experience;
- Integrations;
- Learn core and security, and;
- Upgrade to Ultra
These improvements impact instructors, students, and administrators. Some features do require administrative action.
Instructors:
- AI Design Assistant – Context picker for test question generation
- Goal alignment to Journals
- No Due Date assessment setting
- Last used view state of flexible grading side panels preserved
- Gradebook item statistics
- Text grade schema converts to points
- Send messages to students from the Student Activity report for assessments on small and medium devices and the mobile app
- Moodle conversion improvements
Instructors and Students:
Administrators:
Instructional Design
AI Design Assistant – Context picker for test question generation – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
The AI Design Assistant offers inspiration and efficiency when generating test questions. Instructors can now select course items to help define questions. This option improves the alignment of generated questions to course content.
The context picker does not draw context from items that are attached to an Ultra document. Only items that appear on the context picker’s menu are used by the context picker. In future releases, attached files will be included in the context picker.
Image 1. Auto-generate question option in assessment
Image 2. ‘Select Course Items’
Image 3. Select course items and then, ‘Select items’
Image 4. Select ‘Generate’ to apply the context to the generation workflow
Image 5. Select questions generated and add them to your assessment
For administrators: In Installed Tools, select Settings for AI Design Assistant and Unsplash. The default state is 'off.' When this feature is ‘on,’ you will need to assign the following privileges to course roles as necessary, i.e. Instructor: 'Search for images using Unsplash’ and ‘Use AI features’.
Competency Based Education
Goal alignment to Journals – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Institutions want to align goals to course content. Goal alignment ensures that the curriculum is designed to meet specific learning outcomes.
Instructors can now align goals to journals to ensure that the activity measures the desired learning outcomes. This helps to ensure the accuracy and effectiveness of evaluation and feedback practices.
Instructors can also align goals to the following course items:
- Assignments
- Tests, including individual questions
- Questions in banks
- Discussions
- Rubrics criterion
- Files
- Web links
- Teaching tools with LTI connection
- Documents
Image 1. Instructor view of the “Align with goal’ menu option used to align a journal to a goal
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Tests & Assignments
No Due Date assessment option – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Due dates are an important aspect of the teaching and learning process. In some scenarios, such as self-paced learning, an instructor may not want to apply a due date. To make the option for not having a due date more evident, we've added a "No due date" option for Tests and Assignments.
Image 1. Test Settings panel showing the new “No due date” option
We also updated the default due date and time to tomorrow’s date at 11:59 pm.
Image 2. Test Settings panel displaying the new default due date and time
There may be cases when the “No due date” selection conflicts with the Assessment Results settings. When this occurs, the instructor is prompted to review the settings.
Image 3. A warning banner appears when the "No due date" selection conflicts with Assessment Results settings
Instructors can navigate to the Assessment Results section in the Settings via the link in the banner.
Image 4. Assessment results timing options when there is no due date
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Communication & Collaboration
Announcement indicators and mark announcements as read/unread – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Announcements are an important communications channel within a course. Over the past 12 months, course announcements usage has more than tripled! With such an increase in usage, it is important to help create awareness of new announcements and read/unread controls.
Now, there is a number indicator next to the announcement tab in the course. The indicator signals the number of unread announcements available.
Additionally, users can now mark announcements as read or unread. On the New Course Announcement pop-up, users have the option to mark the read state. Users can also mark announcements as read or unread from the Announcement page.
Image 1. Number of unread Announcements next to the Announcement tab
Image 2. Announcements pop-up with the option to mark as read/unread
Image 3. Announcements page with the option to mark as read/unread
Image 4. Matching announcement and messages indicators for consistency
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Flexible Grading
Last used view state of flexible grading side panels preserved – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Instructors want to configure the grading interface according to their preferences. In flexible grading, instructors can collapse or expand the left panel (student cards) and right panel (feedback and rubrics). To provide a better user experience, the last used state is now preserved in the browser. Now, navigating between student attempts and across sessions provides a more efficient experience.
Image 1. Flexible grading view with both the left and right panels expanded
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Gradebook
Gradebook item statistics – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Item statistics give insight to course members' overall performance on a graded content. Now, instructors can select a column in the gradebook to access summary statistics for any graded item. The statistics page displays key metrics such as:
- Minimum and maximum value
- Range
- Average
- Median
- Standard deviation
- Variance
The number of submissions requiring grading and the distribution of grades also displays.
Image 1. Access to item statistics from the grid view
Image 2. Access to item statistics from the Gradable Items view
Image 3. Item statistics page
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Text grade schema converts to points – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
This particular upgrade won't be released to production. A new project is on the way to support all text column needs. When the time comes, we will be announcing this new initiative.
In the Original course view, instructors can create text schemas that are unsupported in the Ultra course view. When converting courses, text schemas convert to a points schema. After conversion to Ultra, instructors can create and apply an alternate schema if desired.
For administrators: There are no configurations needed.
Learner Progression & Personalized Experience
Send messages to students from the Student Activity report for assessments on small and medium devices and the mobile app – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Instructors lead busy, on-the-go lives and access Learn from a variety of devices. Some instructors use small or medium devices or the mobile app. Now these instructors can send messages to students from the Student Activity report for assessments. The message option is in the ellipsis menu for each student.
Image 1. Send message option in the Student Activity report for an assessment on a small screen
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Integrations
Converting Building Block content to LTI: MediaSite course content – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Original Experience
Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Convert Building Blocks to LTI
Mediasite, a comprehensive rich media system, integrates with Original courses via building blocks. With building block support ending, administrators can now use the conversion tool with Mediasite content.
The tool currently supports the conversion of content embedded with the content editor and mashup links. The conversion tool transitions Mediasite for content links from Building Block to LTI.
Image 1. The administrator accesses the tool to convert Building Block content to LTI
Image 2. The administrator selects the MediaSite Building Block and maps Building Block tools to LTI placements
Administrators must configure the MediaSite LTI integration before converting links. Custom parameters will not be required for this configuration.
Image 3. Building block mappings can be viewed and edited
Next, an administrator will choose courses to be scanned for MediaSite links. Select the MediaSite Building Block. Use the course search tool to select courses for link migration.
Image 4. The administrator selects the ShareStream Building Block and chooses courses to migrate
Administrators can monitor the status of a conversion process. Choose MediaSite as the Building Block. Define the start and end dates to find the desired migration task. Select Search. The results will indicate the number of courses that were successful, and the number of courses with failures.
Image 5. Checking the status of a migration task
For administrators: If a course contains content from MediaSite, ShareStream, Panopto, Kaltura and/or Echo360 building blocks, the conversion process must be performed once for each Building Block.
Converting Building Block content to LTI: Automatic Conversion – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Original Experience
Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Convert Building Blocks to LTI
Many Original courses contain content links for the partners listed below. Now, we auto-convert Building Block links for these partner contents to LTI when importing an Original course or restoring an Original course archive.
- Kaltura
- Echo360
- Panopto
- ShareStream
- MediaSite
The automatic conversion ensures that course content transitions to LTI. This will promote consistency and adaptability across the platform.
For administrators: To ensure the auto-conversion of building block links to LTI, please review the following:
- The administrator must configure each building block in the Migration Service Settings section of the Conversion tool in the Admin Panel Settings.
- The administrator must configure each associated LTI integration before converting the links.
- The administrator will have the capability to enable/disable this functionality through a feature flag via a support ticket.
Rubric Associations API Enhancements – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: Learn APIs
Rubrics serve as a well-organized and transparent framework for assessing student work. Administrators can now manage associations for rubrics via API for the following:
- tests
- assignments (without questions)
- graded discussions
- individual questions (Original course view only)
Managing rubrics and their associations via API streamlines rubric alignment across many courses.
Administrators can now use the enhanced API to perform the full spectrum of CRUD operations: create, update and delete rubric associations.
Developers will gain access to the following endpoints:
- POST: public/v1/courses/{courseId}/rubrics/{rubricId}/associations
- PATCH: public/v1/courses/{courseId}/rubrics/{rubricId}/associations/{rubricAssociationId}
- DELETE: public/v1/courses/{courseId}/rubrics/{rubricId}/associations/{rubricAssociationId}
For administrators: Refer to the API documentation for detailed information about entitlements to perform CRUD operations on Rubric Associations.
Learn Core & Security
Group File Size Limit – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Administrators
Related topic: File size upload limit
Administrators are tasked with the management of storage used by courses. To help, we have added a feature to equip administrators to set file upload limits by file extensions. For example, if an administrator wants to prevent users from uploading any Word documents, they can set the file upload extensions for .docx, .doc, .docm, .dotx, .dot, and other Word extensions. This way, users will not be able to upload any files with those extensions to the course that exceed the limit set by the administrator.
Administrators can specify a maximum file size that applies to files in general. They may also set maximum file sizes by groups defined by file extensions. There are no restrictions on the number of groups an administrator can define.
Example:
- An institution has a policy of 512MB size limit for most files. The administrator sets that limit for the maximum file size.
- The institution licenses a video platform and wants users to store large videos there. Because of this, the limit for video in Ultra courses will be 25MB.
- The administrator creates a group for video and sets the limit.
- The administrator defines the following file extensions, each separated by a comma. This will restrict all video files .webm, .mkv, .flv, .vob, .ogv, .ogg, .drc, .gif, .gifv, .mng, .avi, .MTS, .M2TS, .TS, .mov, .qt, .wmv, .yuv, .rm, .rmvb, .viv, .asf, .amv, .mp4, .m4p, .m4v, .mp2, .mpe, .mpv, .mpg, .mpeg, .m2v, .svi, .3gp, .3g2, .mxf, .roq, .nsv, .f4v, .f4p, .f4a, .f4b
Image 1. Manage files limits by maximum file size; add custom file groups
Image 2. A message informs the user of any files that do not comply with the limit set by the institution
For administrators: This feature applies to Ultra courses except for Content Collection direct uploads. To configure it, open the Administrator Panel -> System Configuration -> File size limits.
Upgrade to Ultra
Moodle Conversion Improvements – 3900.86
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: Instructors
These improvements will not be available immediately in the release to Test/Stage environments for the 3900.86 release. We will update this note and send an email notification to followers of this page when it becomes available.
We continue to make progress on improving the conversion of Moodle courses. With this update, we're adding support for converting the following Moodle Question Types:
- Multiple Choice (Single Answer)
- Multiple Choice (Multiple Answers)
- True/False
- Matching
- Short Answer
- Numerical
- Essay
- Calculated
- Calculated Multichoice (Single Answer)
- Calculated Multichoice (Multiple Answers)
- Calculated Simple
For administrators: This feature will be available for all courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learn SaaS release 3900.84.0
Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3900.84.0
Release to Test/Stage: Tuesday, 9 January 2024 | Release to Production: Thursday, 1 February 2024
Original Experience, Ultra Experience
Original Course View, Ultra Course View
For full feature details please review the corresponding notes for the Learn 3900.84.0 version included below on this page. Details can also be found on Behind the Blackboard.
Latest release: 3900.84.0-rel.49+3c179b0 to Production servers to take place on 29 February 2024.
For more information on updates and bug fixes, please visit Behind the Blackboard.
February 2024 – 3900.84 Release
The February 2024 - 3900.84 release is robust with features in 8 areas:
- Tests and assignments;
- Communication and collaboration;
- Flexible grading;
- Gradebook;
- Learner progression and personalized experience;
- Integrations;
- Learn core and security, and;
- Upgrade to Ultra
These improvements impact instructors, students, and administrators. Some features do require administrative action.
Instructors:
- Forms
- Likert question type
- Rubrics performance level descriptions: Display choice persists
- Send reminders from gradebook: Improved student count for instructors
- Audio/Video Recording in feedback: Usability improvements
- Missed due dates included in the Course Activity report
- Long student names visibility in the Course Activity report
Instructors and students:
Instructors and Administrators:
- Limit enrollment management actions based on data source key of enrollments
- Import Moodle packages
- Better control over "Student Alerts" notifications for instructors
Administrators:
Tests & Assignments
Forms – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Some instructors need to collect information to place students in clinical experiences. Others need to survey their class to gauge student interests or opinions. Now, instructors can create a Form for these use cases.
The following items are supported in a Form:
- essay question
- Likert question
- multiple choice question
- true/false question
- text
- local file
- file from cloud storage
- page break
By default, a Form is not graded. Questions in a form don’t have correct or incorrect answers.
Image 1. An example ungraded Form used for clinical teaching placement
Some instructors may choose to grade a Form to encourage participation. When this is the case, instructors must manually enter a grade for each submission.
Instructors may view Form submissions by student or by question in the new grading view.
Image 2. Ungraded Form submissions by question
Image 3. Graded Form submission by student
Instructors may download the Form results from the Gradebook and Submissions page as an Excel spreadsheet or CSV file.
Image 4. Download Form results from Gradable Items view
Image 5. Download Form results for Submissions page
In the Gradebook grid view, student submissions for an ungraded Form appear as “Submitted.” Graded Forms display the manually entered grade or appropriate grading status.
A Survey created in the Original course view converts/copies to a Form in the Ultra course view. Only questions and options are supported in a Form convert/copy. After conversion, an exception suggests that instructors review their questions.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Likert question type – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Likert questions help provide a quantitative measure of opinions and attitudes. The responses often range from strongly disagree to strongly agree. This question type is now available in the Form assessment type.
Image 1. Set up a Likert question
The scale range defaults to 3 options, with suggested labeling for options 1 and 3 as strongly disagree and strongly agree. Instructors may select a range of 3, 5, or 7 and label the poles as desired. Instructors may also choose to include a "not applicable" option.
Image 2. Example Likert question in an end of unit survey
Note: A Likert question in a Survey created in the Original course view converts/copies to a Form in the Ultra course view. The scale range default is 3.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Rubrics performance level descriptions: Display choice persists – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Rubrics play a critical role in the grading process for many educators. Rubrics performance level descriptions are hidden by default. Instructors can choose to display the performance descriptions as needed for grading.
In the past, the performance level descriptions display option didn’t persist when navigating submissions. This caused frustration for instructors.
Now, the rubrics grading interface stores the most recently used display option. This means that instructors who rely on performance level descriptions when grading don’t have to turn them on each time they navigate to grade another submission. The performance level display option preference is stored on a per-user per-assessment basis.
Image 1. Rubric grading displaying performance level descriptions
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Communication & Collaboration
Send reminders from the gradebook: Improved student count for instructors – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Some instructors like to send reminders to students who haven't yet made a submission for an assessment. The send reminder option in the gradebook saves instructors time in student support. We have refined the scenarios that determine the students who will receive the reminder. This will make the recipient list more accurate.
A student user will be counted and receive the reminder if they didn't submit and:
- they are available in the course.
- they have not received an automatic zero.
- they don’t have a manual override score that was posted.
These changes help ensure that the number of students indicated in the send reminder confirmation is more accurate.
The Send Reminder option is now also available for LTI and 3rd party tools with assessments in the gradebook. With LTI Advantage integrations, the tool can inform Blackboard Learn when a student has submitted, even if they haven’t yet received a grade. If the tool doesn’t support this, it is possible that students will receive a reminder even if they’ve submitted their work. The tool provider can enhance their integration to improve this.
Image 1. Send Reminder confirmation
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Flexible Grading
Audio/Video Recording in feedback: Usability improvements – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Audio/video feedback is a more personalized and engaging means for providing feedback. It is beneficial for addressing complex concepts and sharing detailed explanations. To ensure easy and clear access to this tool, we have exposed the Audio/Video option on the feedback toolbar. When in use, the recording window appears on the right side of the screen so that the instructor can view the student submission. The instructor can scroll through a student's response while recording their feedback. The instructor can maximize the recording window for better visibility.
Image 1. Audio/Video recording on the main tool bar
Image 2. Audio/Video recording window in default state
Image 3. Audio/Video recording window in maximized state
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Gradebook
Feedback on override and automatic zero grades for Tests and Assignments – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Feedback is crucial for students as it supports and shapes their learning journey. Now, instructors can give feedback for overridden tests, assignment grades, and automatic zeros. This option appears in the Gradebook grid view, and the Submissions list after the override or automatic zero is entered.
Image 1. Feedback from the grid view
Image 2. Feedback from the submission list
Image 3. Feedback panel
Override feedback on group submissions will be supported in a future release.
Additionally, instructors can now upload feedback for students as part of the offline grading process. In the past, only uploaded grades were visible to students.
Students can view override feedback after grades are posted.
We also improved students' access to the feedback. Now, feedback for all attempts on a test or assignment is visible in a panel.
Image 4. Student view of feedback
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Learner Progression & Personalized Experience
Missed due dates included in the Course Activity Report – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Punctuality and time management are key for student success. Instructors need an easy method for identifying students who may be at risk. Now, instructors can view the number of missed due dates for students in the Course Activity Report.
Instructors can customize the missed due date alert in the Alert Settings.
There is no default setting for missed due date alert. Be sure to customize the alert settings.
Image 1. Customize missed due date alert
Students who trigger the missed due dates alert appear in the Course Activity report table and chart and in the downloaded report.
Image 2. Missed due dates in the Course Activity report view
Image 3. Students with missed due date alerts appear in the Course Activity chart view as a purple dot
Students will not receive notifications based on course missed due date alert setting. If a student opts in to missed due date alerts, alerts are sent for each content item.
As before, activity stream notifications for instructors include a summary of students with alerts per course. Now, the summary includes missed due dates alerts. These alerts are triggered every day in case there are new students with alerts in a course. New courses need at least 2 weeks of activity to start triggering these notifications.
Image 4. Missed due date alerts appear in the instructor's activity stream
The missed due date alert applies when a student doesn’t submit before the due date in the following:
- Assessments, including group and formative
- Assessments with the “collect submissions offline” option selected - when an instructor creates an attempt and enters the submission date/time after the due date
- Assessments with the “hide student names” option selected - alerts only after all student submissions are graded and student names are exposed
- Discussions and journals marked for a grade
- SCORM packages when the “Grade individual SCOs” option is selected in SCORM settings
- Other 3rd party activities, such as LTI and Respondus
Special considerations:
- Students with a due date accommodation never have their work marked late. A student with due date accommodation won't have any missed due date alerts.
- Students with a due date exception will have a missed due date alert if the excepted due date passes and there is no submission.
- Students with an exemption never have their work marked late. A student with an exemption won't have any missed due date alerts.
- Hidden content with a due date or content with date/time and performance release conditions are included in missed due date alerts.
- Content with a due date and release conditions for individual course members or groups will alert only those students/groups included in the condition who miss the due date.
- New items added to the gradebook with a due date are not included in the missed due date alerts.
Image 5. Admin view of missed due date metric and alert setting
To view the Course Activity and Student Activity Details reports, the user’s role needs to have “Course/Organization Control Panel (Grade Center) > View Grades” privilege.
For administrators: A new configuration option is on the Ultra configuration page in the Administrator Panel. The default state is on. If the missed due date option is set to off, the Course Activity report still displays students' overall grade, hours in course, and days since last access.
Long student names visibility in the Course Activity Report – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Depending on the culture, personal name lengths vary. In demonstrating our commitment to diversity and inclusion, we have adjusted long names in the Course Activity Report. This change ensures that names are visible even on small devices. This helps instructors avoid confusion when viewing students with similar names.
Image 1. Students with long names in the Course Activity Report
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
To view the Course Activity and Student Activity Details reports, the user’s role needs to have the “Course/Organization Control Panel (Grade Center) -> View Grades” privilege.
Better control over "Student Alerts" notifications for instructors - 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Administrators
Notifications of certain student-related alerts help instructors be more aware of students who may be at risk. To help, we've made it easy for instructors to control what student alerts they receive in their Activity Stream.
The “Student Alerts” options are:
- Low overall grade
- Missed due date alert
- and Last access alert
Image 1. “Student Alerts” section in the Activity Stream’s notifications settings
Image 2. A student alert notification with a low overall grade, last access, and missed due date alerts
Administrators can control these 3 notifications at the institutional level in the administrator panel.
Notifications are:
- Student Last Access Alert for Instructors
- Student Low Overall Grade Alert for Instructors
- Students Missed Due Dates Alert for Instructors
Image 3. “Notification Settings” menu in the administrator panel
Key considerations:
- These alerts are only available for courses.
- Courses must have at least 10 students and no more than 2000 students. Courses with enrollments outside of that range won’t receive notifications.
- Notifications for these alerts are sent nightly only when new alerts are met.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses.
To view the Course Activity and Student Activity Details reports, the user’s role needs to have “Course/Organization Control Panel (Grade Center) > View Grades” privilege. These notifications are based on the values set in the Course Activity alert settings.
Integrations
Google Workspace: Add a second primary domain – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
We've finalized the addition of this feature and will release it to client production instances or client environments during the week of January 15 to 22.
Some institutions manage two primary Google Workspaces: one for instructors and one for students. Now, The Google integration for Blackboard Learn permits the addition of a second workspace. This allows students to access Google Files added to the course from their instructor. Students can log in with their Google Workspace accounts to access the content.
Enable “Connect another Google Workspace” to configure a second workspace. Be sure to enter a Client ID, API Key, and Client secret copied from Google Cloud. Also, make sure to configure the Consent Screen.
As part of the configuration process, ensure that the Authorized redirect URIs, already mentioned in the Help documentation, are accurately entered in the newly created Consent Screen in the Additional/Secondary Workspace.
Image 1. Configure a Google Integration
Ensure that student users have an Institutional Role set to Student.
Image 2. Institution Role options for a student user
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra and Original courses. Access the Administrator Control Panel to configure.
Converting Building Block content to LTI: ShareStream course content - 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
ShareSteam is an integrated partner solution for managing and streaming video. In the past, it integrated with Original courses using Building Blocks. Its newer integration uses the Learning Tool Interoperability (LTI) standard. With support ending for Building Blocks, administrators may wish to assist instructors with updating links that were created in the past.
We’ve enhanced the link conversion tool to assist administrators with transitioning from the ShareStream Building Block to LTI. The link conversion tool supports these types of ShareStream video links:
- Content embedded with the Content Editor
- Mashup links
- Course tool content
Image 1. The administrator accesses the tool to convert Building Block content to LTI
Image 2. The administrator selects the ShareStream Building Block and maps Building Block tools to LTI placements
Administrators should select the ShareStream Building Block and the correct ShareStream LTI integration. Administrators must configure the ShareStream LTI integration before converting links. Custom parameters can be added if ShareStream informs you that this is required.
There are multiple ShareStream tools. These should be mapped to the correct LTI placements created by the administrator.
Image 3. Building block mappings can be viewed and edited
Next, an administrator will choose courses to be scanned for ShareStream links. Select the ShareStream Building Block. Use the course search tool to select courses for link migration.
Image 4. The administrator selects the ShareStream Building Block and chooses courses to migrate
Administrators can monitor the status of a conversion process. Choose ShareStream as the Building Block. Define the start and end dates to find the desired migration task. Select Search. The results will indicate the number of courses that were successfully converted and the number of courses with failures.
Image 5. Checking the status of a migration task
For administrators: If a course contains content from ShareStream, Panopto, Kaltura, and/or Echo360 building blocks, the conversion process must be performed once for each Building Block.
Kaltura course content conversion - 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Original Experience
Original Course View
Impact: Administrators
We improved the tool that migrates Kaltura Building Block links to LTI links. It now supports converting links created with older versions of the Kaltura integration. Content added to Learn Original courses with the older Kaltura V1 and V2 Building Blocks will now convert. Also, the content can be converted to LTI 1.1 for all Kaltura versions.
Administrators can rerun the migration tool on courses if older Building Block links are not converted with previous conversion tasks.
For administrators: This improvement is part of the migration tool. The older Building Blocks embedded videos within tables and anchor tags. This content is now processed correctly. There is no need for additional steps or configurations.
Learn Core & Security
LDAP authentication requires encryption – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Impact: Administrators
At Anthology, we’re continuously improving the security stance of our products. LDAP is an authentication method supported in Blackboard Learn. It's no longer possible to configure LDAP connections without encryption. The “No SSL” option can’t be selected for new LDAP configurations.
The “No SSL” setting was only appropriate for self-hosted clients operating in closed networks. With the ending of standard support for self-hosting, we’ve removed this option. Existing configurations using “No SSL” won’t be changed, but new configurations aren’t possible.
For administrators: We do not recommend using the “No SSL” option with LDAP. If you have an existing LDAP configuration using this setting, you should work with your IT team to transition to a secured integration. We also recommend you consider using the more modern federated authentication method SAML. This change is for all Learn environments. There are no configurations needed.
Limit enrollment management actions based on data source key of enrollments – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: Instructors, Administrators
There are cases when instructors need to manage some course or organization enrollments.
Instructors may need to add co-instructors, assistants, or graders. However, institutional policy often mandates instructors should not alter records from a Student Information System (SIS).
Now, administrators can limit whether users can make changes to enrollment records based on how the enrollment was added. Enrollments added through the GUI belong to the SYSTEM data source. Enrollments added through integrations are assigned to other data sources based on configuration (non-SYSTEM).
The following Course/Organization Role privileges have been changed:
- Change the availability of enrollments
- Change a users’ roles in the course
- Set an instructor as primary instructor
- Remove (delete) users from the course
The 4 Course/Organization Role privileges have been split into 8 privileges—4 for enrollment records in SYSTEM and 4 for enrollment records not in SYSTEM. These are found in the privileges manager for each Course/Organization Role:
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Remove System DSK Users from Course/Organization
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Change System DSK User's availability in Course/Organization
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Change System DSK User's Role in Course/Organization
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Set System DSK instructor as primary in Ultra Course View
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Remove Non-System DSK Users from Course/Organization
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Change Non-System DSK User's Role in Course/Organization
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Change Non-System DSK User's availability in Course/Organization
- Course/Organization Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Set Non-System DSK instructor as primary in Ultra Course View
Administrators can configure each Course Role with the appropriate privileges for their policies. The privileges and restrictions are applicable to users in both Ultra and Original Course Views.
The Original Course View has a bulk remove action for enrollments. If the course user is restricted from removing any of the selected users, the action is stopped with a warning.
Image 1. Administrator sets the privileges for a Course Role
If the above entitlements related to System DSK Users are permitted and entitlements related to Non-System DSK Users are restricted, it will allow user to Remove, Edit Availability, Edit Roles and set Instructor as Primary for System DSK users only.
Image 2. Ultra example when Remove Non-System DSK Users’ entitlement is restricted
The remove member icon does not appear when a course user with no permissions tries to delete a Non-System DSK user.
Image 3. Ultra example when Remove System DSK Users’ entitlement is permitted
The remove member icon appears in the GUI when a course user with permissions tries to delete a System DSK user.
Image 4. Course user in Original Course View is restricted from a bulk remove action because they aren’t allowed to delete the selected users
Image 5. Course user in Original Course View is restricted from a bulk remove action because they aren’t allowed to delete some of the selected users
The upgrade process should retain consistent behavior with the prior release. For example, if a Course Role had the privilege to remove users from a course/organization, they should now have the equivalent privileges:
- Remove System DSK Users from Course/Organization
- Remove Non-System DSK Users from Course/Organization
For administrators: We recommend that you review privileges configured for your Course Roles. You can adjust Course Role privileges to better conform to your institutional policies.
For administrators: A new Course Role privilege was added in this release, "Course Control Panel (Users and Groups) > Users > Enroll User for all roles." This privilege does not need to be configured as it will support an upcoming enhancement and does not yet serve a purpose. More information will come in upcoming release notes.
Upgrade to Ultra
Import Moodle packages – 3900.84
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Ultra Experience, Original Experience
Ultra Course View, Original Course View
Impact: Instructors, Administrators
Switching from Moodle to Blackboard Learn Ultra is now easier than ever. Instructors can now import Moodle packages into Ultra and Original view courses themselves. This change removes instructor reliance on an administrator.
Image 1. Import Course Content
Learn more on importing courses from Moodle for more directions. We also have a guide to help you understand the differences in terminology.
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra and Original courses. There are no configurations needed.
January 2024 – 3900.82 Release
We're aware that updates to copy workflows for admins are causing issues and we're actively working on a resolution.
The January 2024 - 3900.82 is robust with features in 9 areas:
- Instructional design;
- Mastery learning / Competency based education;
- Tests and assignments;
- Flexible grading;
- Gradebook;
- Learner progression and personalized experience;
- Integrations;
- Mobile; and
- Upgrade to Ultra
These improvements impact instructors, students, and administrators. Some features do require administrative action.
Instructors:
- AI Design Assistant – Authentic Assessment prompt generation
- AI Design Assistant - Generate Rubric Improvements
- Delegated Grading improvements
- Improved attempt display in Flexible Grading
- Sorting controls in Students view for assessments graded anonymously
- Enhanced grid view
- Total & Weighted Calculations
- Category information on the Gradable Items page
- Original Course View: Updated options display when sending email from the Grade Center
- Attempt logs for enhanced assessment integrity
- Unused files management
- Batch Edit: Change to specific date and/or time
Instructors and students:
All users:
- Multi-Factor Authentication for the internal authentication method
- Mobile: Help Center and About sections added to More menu
Instructors and Administrators:
Administrators:
Instructional Design
AI Design Assistant - Authentic Assignment prompt generation – 3900.82
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
AI plagiarism is a growing concern among academics. Research indicates a variety of issues with a reliance on AI detection. Detection models cannot keep up with advancements in AI technologies. Our approach to combatting AI plagiarism is different. We empower instructors to lean into the effective practice of authentic assessment.
Learn more with our academic paper AI, Academic Integrity, and Authentic Assessment.
Now instructors can generate assignment prompts that encourage students to:
- engage in higher-order thinking,
- apply their learned knowledge,
- produce authentic submissions that are evidenced, and
- emulate real-world situations.
To ensure the instructor is in control, the generation process allows instructors to:
- enter an assignment description,
- select a desired cognitive process based on Bloom's Taxonomy,
- set the complexity, and
- generate an assignment title.
The instructor can review the generated prompts and select one to add to the assignment. After adding the prompt, the instructor can edit or further refine the prompt as appropriate.
Image 1. The auto-generate assignment option
Image 2. Three generated prompts; each include a title, prompt, and cognitive level
Image 3. Instructors can add additional context through a description, select the desired cognitive level and complexity, and then generate prompts
Image 4. Selected title and prompt added to an assignment
For administrators: To use this feature, enable the AI Features option in Ultra Experience Management. Select Building Blocks from the Administrator Panel, then select Installed Tools. Locate AI Design Assistant and Unsplash and select Settings from the drop-down. The default state is off. Set Enable AI Design Assistant to on. Set Generate Assignments to on. You must also activate privileges. Assign the following privilege for the appropriate Course Roles (e.g., Instructor): Use AI features.
AI Design Assistant - Generate Rubric Improvements – 3900.82
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
The AI Design Assistant helps instructors create rubrics for assessments. We've streamlined a time-intensive task and created efficiency for instructors with rubric creation. Being careful to consider user feedback, we have made some improvements to rubric generation. The improvements improve column and row labels . We also improved the distribution of percentages/points for criteria.
Image 1. Rubric generation outputs using the AI Design Assistant
For administrators: To use this feature, enable the AI Features option in Ultra Experience Management. Select Building Blocks from the Administrator panel, then select Installed Tools. Locate AI Design Assistant and Unsplash and select Settings from the menu. The default state of the AI Design Assistant is set to Off. Select Enable AI Design Assistant to turn the feature on. You must also set Generate Assignments to On. Assign the Use AI features privilege for the appropriate Course Roles (for example, Instructor).
Mastery Learning/Competency Based Education
Grade visible to students in Gradebook when item is hidden by release conditions – 3900.82
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors, Students
Release conditions provide options for custom learning paths through course content. When instructors set release conditions, content is unavailable until students meet those conditions. An option to 'Hide' selected content from students is available. This setting also hides the grade from the student view of the gradebook.
Now, instructors can set release conditions without concern of hiding grades. Regardless of the setting in "When will content appear?", students can see the grade. All other functionality of release conditions is unchanged.
Image 1. Release conditions settings with date/time release condition set in combination with Hide state in “When will content appear?”
Image 2. Student gradebook view with display of student’s grade regardless of the release condition setting in Image 1
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Tests & Assignments
Delegated Grading improvements – 3900.82
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Instructors sometimes distribute the grading workload for an assessment to multiple graders. This is a popular practice in larger classes. Instructors can assign graders to groups of students with the new delegated grading option. Each grader only sees the submissions made by students in the group(s) assigned to them.
Now instructors can also use delegated grading in combination with anonymous submissions and tests.
Image 1: Instructor view of the assessment Settings panel for a test with the Delegated Grading and Anonymous grading options enabled
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Flexible Grading
Improved attempt display in Flexible Grading – 3900.82
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Multiple-attempt assessments result in more submissions, which can increase the complexity of grading.
In the past, when an instructor selected a student in the list the most recent attempt displayed. Now, the attempt selected for display is based on the grading status and attempt aggregation model selected.
| Attempt Aggregation Model | Grading Status and Attempt Displayed |
|---|---|
| Average of all attempts | If all attempts are graded, the most recently submitted attempt displays. If ungraded attempts exist, the most recent, ungraded attempt displays. |
| First attempt with a grade | If all attempts are graded, the first submitted attempt displays. If ungraded attempts exist, the oldest ungraded attempt displays. |
| Attempt with highest grade | If all attempts are graded, the attempt with the highest grade displays. If ungraded attempts exist, the most recent, ungraded attempt displays. |
| Last attempt with a grade | If all attempts are graded, the most recently submitted attempt displays. If ungraded attempts exist, the most recent ungraded attempt displays. |
| Attempt with lowest grade | If all attempts are graded, the attempt with lowest grade displays. If ungraded attempts exist, the most recent ungraded attempt displays. |
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Sorting controls in Students view for assessments graded anonymously – 3900.82
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
We are adding sorting controls to assessments graded anonymously. Now instructors can apply these sorting options:
- Submission date (oldest - newest) of latest attempt
- Submission date (newest - oldest) of latest attempt
The grading interface stores the most recently used sorting option. If an instructor stops grading an assessment and resumes grading later, the last sorting option is applied.
Image 1: Sorting options on an anonymously graded assessment in flexible grading
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Gradebook
Enhanced Grid View – 3900.82
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
To improve usability and maximize the screen real estate of the gradebook grid view, we have made several enhancements:
Improved row visibility and display more rows:
- We reduced the size of the column icons and the spacing around them.
- We removed group names and highlighting on group assessments.
- The course name moves up and hides when vertically scrolling.
Improved student identification:
- When hovering over a truncated student name, the full name displays in a tooltip.
- Student IDs display beneath student names to aid in distinguishing between students with similar names.
Image 1. Improvements to gradebook grid view
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Total & Weighted Calculations – 3900.82
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors and other users with permissions
Instructors need a gradebook that supports diverse grading scenarios. The gradebook supports the creation of calculated columns and an overall course grade. We are expanding gradebook functionality to also support total and weighted calculated columns. These types of calculations are helpful for specific events or periods, such as midterms or finals.
Total calculated columns can be point-based or weighted calculations. Like setting up the Overall Grade, instructors may link/unlink items in a category in the calculation. They may also choose to exclude categories from the calculation. For an included category, instructors may edit the calculation rule. The calculation rule allows instructors to drop scores or to include only the lowest or highest score in the category.
Instructors may wish to define a total calculated column for their own use. In this case, they can choose to hide from students. If desired, instructors can include a total calculated column in the overall grade calculation.
Image 1. Add a Total Calculation column from the Grid view
Image 2. Add a Total Calculation column from Gradable Items view
Image 3. Editing a Weighted Total Calculation Column
Image 4. Define rules for the Weighted Total Calculation column
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Category Information on the Gradable Items Page – 3900.82
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
To provide greater efficiency and clarity in the gradable items view, we have added a Category column. This column, along with the grading item icon, helps instructors more readily identify to which category, if any, an item belongs. Instructors can sort this column ascending or descending alphabetically.
Image 1. Category column on the Gradable Items, sorted Z – A
For administrators: This feature is available for all Ultra courses. There are no configurations needed.
Original Course View: Updated options display when sending email from Grade Center – 3900.82
Blackboard Learn SaaS, Blackboard Learn 9.1
Original Course View
Impact: Instructors
Instructors can send emails to students in places like the Grade Center and Retention Center. Previously, the option to include student names in the sender copy was misleading. The checkbox seemed to apply to both sending a copy of the message and including recipient names. We’ve improved the presentation to clarify the expected behavior. A copy is always sent to the sender. The sender can opt-in to including recipient names in their copy of the email.
Image 1. The options to add attachments and include the names of recipients are better organized
For administrators: This feature is available for all Original courses. There are no configurations needed
Learner Progression & Personalized Experience
Attempt logs for enhanced assessment integrity – 3900.82
Blackboard Learn SaaS
Ultra Experience
Ultra Course View
Impact: Instructors
Assessment integrity is a paramount concern for educational institutions. We empower instructors with valuable insights into students' progress for native assessments. The Attempt Logs prove to be an indispensable tool for validating issues students may encounter during an assessment. The logs also help instructors identify signs of academic dishonesty.
For tests, the logs provide the following:
- Detailed information, including the date and time of the start and answers to each question
- Question-specific details, such as question number, a preview of the question, and estimated time spent on each question
- Submission receipt number, final grade, and attempt grade
- Easy toggling between all in-progress and submitted attempts for comprehensive assessment tracking
Image 1. Test attempt log with multiple attempts made by the student
For Assignments, the logs offer:
- Start and submission date and time
- Submission receipt number
- Seamless toggling between different attempts for a holistic view
Image 2. Assignment attempt log
Instructors can access the Attempt Logs from two primary areas:
- Context Menu on Submission Page - exclusive to individual assessments
- Grades Tab under Student Overview Page - available for both group and individual assessments
Image 3. Access from the Submission tab