Summer 08 Courses To Be Removed From Blackboard

The VCCS has marked all Blackboard Summer 08 courses (SU08) for archival, and they will be removed from the Blackboard "production" area on August 5th. Blackboard is, of course, not designed as a permanent storage area for course materials. Keeping old courses can negatively impact the overall performance of the system and needs to be cleaned-up periodically. All archived courses will be available through the VCCS for about 1 year after they are removed from Blackboard.

If you have taught online, login to your "MySVCC" page and click on "Blackboard" to see which courses you are enrolled in as an instructor. You will need to click on the "pencil" icon found on the upper right corner of your "My Blackboard Courses" module. This will allow you to see all courses that you have taught that are currently in Blackboard, even if you have chosen to not have them displayed in your "My Blackboard Courses" module.You may want to export content from your SU08 courses and save the zipped files on your computer for future use.

Directions to Export Course Content
1. Go to the "Control Panel" within your course.
2. Click on "Export Course" within the "Course Options" box.
3. Click "Export" again.
4. Select all materials you wish to export...including "Grade Center Columns and Settings".
5. Click "Submit".
6. When you receive an email confirmation that this has been processed, go back to "Export Course", you should see the zipped file with your content. Click on the zipped file and save to your computer or flash drive.

End of Summer Sessions and Blackboard

It is almost the end of the summer session. There are a couple of things that will need to be done soon or after the end of your session.

1. If you taught a cyber course during any of the summer sessions and have not posted an announcement concerning completing the online course evaluation, please do so ASAP!! There is a button located on the course menu that will direct students to the evaluation. Please place a permanent announcement in your course asking students to click on that button to complete the online survey of the course.
   
2. Once the summer session is completed, please make the course area in Blackboard unavailable to students. Click here to view instructions on how to alter course availability.

Summer Session Course Evaluations

Cyber course evaluations are now available within your online course(s). First summer session (5-week) courses are nearing an end, so it is time for students in these online courses to complete their evaluation.

If you are an instructor of an online course for the first five week session, please post an announcement in your course instructing students to complete the end of course evaluation by clicking on the "Course Evaluation" button on the course menu.

Students were instructed on the "Course Evaluation" page to click on "Mark Reviewed" after completing the evaluation. If they do this : ) , then you will be able to see who has complete it by following the steps noted below.

1. Go to your course within Blackboard
2. Click on "Course Evaluation" on your course menu on the left
3. Click "Edit View" in the upper right corner
4. Click the "Manage" button found on the right
5. Click on "Adaptive Release and Review Status: User Progress"

From that screen you will be able to see who has clicked on "Mark Reviewed".

Granted, this is assuming that students will read the directions and will be honest, but it may at least give you some idea of student completion of the course evaluation surveys. We appreciate your assistance in encouraging students to complete these evaluations.

Removing Students From Your Course In Blackboard

It is best to not remove students from your course area in Blackboard. When you remove a student, all information on that student's access and all submitted work, including discussion board postings, is removed as well.

Continue to check your class roster and compare this to your student enrollment in Blackboard. If students are dropped due to nonpayment, withdraw on their own, or if you administratively drop...you need to make the course unavailable to the individual students. They will no longer have access to the course, but if their enrollment status changes or if the student(s) file a complaint...all of the student's (students') statistical information and work is still there.

To Change Individual Student Course Access (Availability)

1. Go to your course in Blackboard
2. Go into the "Control Panel"
3. Click on "List/Modify Users"
4. Click on the "List All" tab
5. Click on "List All" button
6. Click on the "Properties" button to the right of the student's name
7. Scroll down to part 4 of the "Modify User Properties" window
8. Under "Available"...change this to "no" to make the course unavailable to that student; change this to "yes" if you wish to give access back to that student
9. Click "Submit" (Bottom Right)

Spring 09 Courses

If you have not made your Spring 09 course(s) unavailable to students, please do so immediately unless you have incompletes. If you do have incompletes, as soon as they are resolved, the status of your course should change to unavailable.

The college gets complaints from students when they continue to have access to courses that are not part of their current semester. It can be confusing for students to see links to courses in Blackboard in which they are no longer enrolled.

Here is a link to instructions on how to change the availability of your course.

http://svtechtime.blogspot.com/2009/05/changing-course-availability-in.html

The Summer Session Begins

May 22nd begins our Summer Schedule of courses at Southside. I began running the enrollments for the summer session tonight, May 21st, at 10:00 pm. for all online and hybrid courses. Enrollments for seated courses with an area established in Blackboard were run for those who submitted a request to blackboard@southside.edu.

Since we are ready to roll, there are a few things that should be checked as we start this new session.

1. Is your course available or unavailable? If your course is part of the first five-week session or the ten-week session, your course should be available by the morning of May 22nd. Double check the status of your course within Blackboard and make any necessary modifications. There is a posting in my blog on changing availability. Please see that for step-by-step instructions.
   
   
2. If your content isn't quite up and ready to go, keep your course available, but post a welcome announcement with information for your students. Let them know when you will have the content ready. Students become very concerned if they can not access the course on time.
   
   
3. Check your course menu, do you have duplicate buttons or areas that are empty? When you copied over course content into your new course, you probably copied buttons that you don't need. You need to get rid of those to clean up your course menu. Click here to view, download, and/or print a handout on modifying your course menu.
   
   
4. Are your students enrolled in your Blackboard course area? Go to the "Control Panel" in your course and click on "List/Modify Users", then "List All", and "List All" again. From this screen you can see all of the students enrolled and compare to your enrollment list in SIS. If you don't see any students enrolled but they are on your enrollment list...let me know. Send me an email at blackboard@southside.edu. Let me know that you are not seeing any students enrolled and include your 5 digit course id number in the email.

Changing Course Availability in Blackboard

1. Go to https://my.vccs.edu/
2. Log-in
3. Click on "Blackboard" under the "My Tools" list.
4. Click on the course (listed on either your "Teach" tab or "SVCC" tab)
5. Click on the "Control Panel" option (from within the course)
6. Click "Settings" in the "Course Options" box
7. Click on "Course Availability"
8. Click "No" to make it unavailable to all students enrolled; Click "Yes" to make it available to all students enrolled
9. Click on "Submit"