Blackboard Upgrade on Schedule

Blackboard 8.0 will be fully operationally when you return from the holiday break!

Blackboard 8.0 is being installed throughout the day on January 2, 2009. On this day do not make any changes to your Blackboard courses for the SP 09 semester; any changes made on January 2 may be lost. You should be able to resume your work in Blackboard on January 3, 2009. You may also continue to work on your SP 09 Blackboard courses up to January 2.

When you return from the holidays, Blackboard 8.0 will be fully operational. The major change is the old Gradebook has become the Grade Center. TAC will be holding workshops at the PUP Conference and throughout the beginning of the Spring 2009 Semester to help you with using the Grade Center. Check out the TAC website at http://tac.nvcc.edu/ for the training schedule.

The Virginia Community College System (VCCS) is also sharing a wiki with a collection of known issues with the Grade Center. TAC will be adding a quick guide on troubleshooting the Grade Center to the Blackboard Support Website based on materials in the wiki.

Blackboard 8.0 is Coming Soon!

Blackboard 8.0 Is Arriving January 2, 2009!

The VCCS is upgrading to Blackboard 8.0 on January 2, 2009. The plan is to have Blackboard 8.0 fully operational for the SP 09 semester. You will be able to continue to work on your courses for Spring 09 throughout the process. No Blackboard URLs will change. You will continue to have access to Blackboard through My NOVA. Unlike the last upgrade, this one will not require a migration of all the content.

The major difference in the Blackboard 8.0 version is the Gradebook. The Gradebook has been replaced with the Grade Center that has new functionality. For more information about the new Grade Center check out the overview information and tutorials on the TAC Blackboard 8.0 Grade Center site.

Training on the new Grade Center will be offered at the Power Up Your Pedagogy Conference and during the first weeks in January on all of the campuses.

When you are ready to copy your course into your Spring 09 Blackboard course shell, check out the video about how to copy your course.

Remember that you have available for you use the Blackboard Support Site for Students and the Blackboard Support Site for Faculty & Staff.

FA 08 Blackboard Course Shells & Student Batch Enrollment

Information about Copying Content into your FA 08 Blackboard Course Shell(s) and Automatic Student Enrollments in your FA 08 Bb Courses . . .

Before every new semester begins, our NOVA Blackboard administrator, Michelle Gee (mgee@nvcc.edu), creates Blackboard course shells for each course listed in the Schedule of Classes and associates each with the appropriate faculty member who will be teaching that course, if the faculty member has been designated. All of the Bb course shells for FA 08 have been created.

Now is the time for you to copy your old course content into your FA 08 Bb course shell(s) if you need that content. A video for how to copy course content from one Bb course to another can be found at http://tac.nvcc.edu/blackboard/bb7faculty/copycourse.html

Other important information:

1. Our NOVA Blackboard administrator continues to batch enroll your students into your Blackboard FA 08 courses.

2. The initial enrolllment of students begins on Aug 19 and continues every two days until classes begin. The first two weeks of classes student enrollments are processed daily. After that point, students are processed every other day.

3. Remember that even after your students are enrolled, you must make your FA 08 Bb7 course “Available.” Enrolled students will not be able to participate in your courses until you make them “available.”

4. To make a Bb FA 08 course available, go to the Control Panel > Course Options > Settings > Course Availability > Set Availability

5. After you log into Blackboard, if you do not see your Blackboard course shells on the opening page, then contact Michelle Gee (mgee@nvcc.edu), so she can associate that course with your name.

From time to time, the VCCS may have to make some updates to the new Bb7 servers. Please remember that if you cannot get into Blackboard, close your browser and open the browser again, retype the URL, and click enter.

If you want to leave a comment here, go to the green bar at the end of this posted entry and click on “Comments.” You can then write your comment or question and click on the orange “Publish Your Comment” button. I will respond.

Blackboard 6 Servers Are Shutting Down

Important Blackboard 6 Notice from the VCCS . . .

The Virginia Community College System (VCCS) is planning to shut-down the Blackboard 6 servers permanently on Friday, January 25. If you have any old Blackboard courses or organizations on the Bb 6 servers and you want to keep their content, you have until Friday, January 25 to export/import that content from Bb6 to Bb7. Remember that all of your Bb course and organization content from SP 07, SU 07, and FA 07 has already been migrated to the Blackboard 7 servers.

If you need another Bb 7 course or organization shell to use so you can complete the export/import process for old courses, send our NOVA Bb Administrator an email requesting the Bb 7 course shell (Michelle Gee mgee@nvcc.edu). Remember that you already have your SP 08 Bb course shells in Bb 7 and many of you have already completed the export/import process from Bb6 to Bb7 for those courses.

Use the print or video demo to help you move any content from the Bb6 servers to the Bb7 servers.

• Use the print directions found at http://www.nvcc.edu/home/nvsimpc/bb/exportimport.mht or
• Use the video demo found at http://tac.nvcc.edu/robert/blackboard6_7/blackboard7.html
• You need the Flash Player plug-in for the video to work. If you are using the most recent Explorer, it comes with Flash. If you need to download it, you can get it at http://www.adobe.com/shockwave/download/download.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash&ogn=EN_US-gntray_dl_getflashplayer or contact your campus Information Technology Manager.

Finally, make sure you have made your SP 08 Bb7 course “Available” after your students are enrolled. Enrolled students will not be able to participate in your courses until you make them “Available.”

To make a Bb SP 08 course available, go to the Control Panel > Course Options > Settings > Course Availability > Set Availability. Click the button next to the Yes under Set Availability and click submit.

Be sure to leaave any comments by clicking on the Comments link below this entry.

Automatic Student Enrollments in your Sp 08 Blackboard Courses

Automatic Enrollment of your Students in SP 08 Bb7 Courses Has Begun. . .

The good news is that now our NOVA Blackboard administrator has been given the okay to batch enroll our students into our Blackboard 7 SP 08 courses. As noted in previous Blackboard communications, the batch enrollment of students began yesterday on January 10. It will continue through the end of the day today, January 11. We thank you for your patience as everyone is working as fast as possible to complete this task.

Remember that even after the students are enrolled, you must make your SP 08 Bb7 course “Available.” Enrolled students will not be able to participate in your courses until you make them “Available.”

To make a Bb SP 08 course available, go to the Control Panel > Course Options > Settings > Course Availability > Set Availability.

From time to time, the VCCS may have to make some updates to the new Bb7 servers. Please remember that if you cannot get into Blackboard, when you try again, be sure to open the browser again, retype the URL, and click enter.

If you want to leave a comment to this blog entry, go to the green bar at the end of this posted entry and click on “Comments.” You can then write your comment or question and click on the orange “Publish Your Comment” button. I will respond.

Blackboard 7 migration is almost completed!

the latest on Bb 7 . . . .

The Blackboard 7 migration has been ongoing during the holidays. As of today, the following has been completed:

All faculty have Spring 08 Blackboard course shells for use for their SP 08 courses. If you discover that you do not have a Bb course shell for one of your courses and you need one, please contact Michelle Gee (mgee@nvcc.edu ), so she can associate the shell with your name.

Use the print or video demo to help you move any content into these Bb 7 SP 08 course shells.

• Use the print directions found at http://www.nvcc.edu/home/nvsimpc/bb/exportimport.mht or
• Use the video demo found at http://tac.nvcc.edu/robert/blackboard6_7/blackboard7.html
  You need the Flash Player plug-in for the video to work. If you are using the most recent Explorer, it comes with Flash. If you need to download it, you can get it at http://www.adobe.com/shockwave/download/download.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash&ogn=EN_US-gntray_dl_getflashplayer or contact your campus Information Technology Manager.
  

All faculty and staff must export/import their materials into their Bb 7 SP 08 courses because of the new method for creating courses in Bb 7. If you experience any major problems, please contact Michelle Gee or me.

All Fall 07 Blackboard courses have been migrated to the Bb 7 servers. Please check out those courses if you still are using them to be sure that everything migrated correctly. Be sure that all of your students, discussion forums, assignments, information, etc. were migrated correctly.

Faculty, staff, and students should now use My Nova on the NOVA homepage or http://learn.vccs.edu to access their past SP 07, SU 07, and FA 07 Bb courses if they need to use any of these. Students completing incompletes for SU 07 or FA 07 or completing an ELI course for those semesters should be using the new Bb 7 servers now. The usernames and passwords remain the same.

All Fall 07 Blackboard courses on the Bb6 servers have been made unavailable to your students now. DO NOT make them available and continue to use them. We do not know when the VCCS staff are shutting down the servers and the servers are no longer supported. You can still export/import any materials you want from there if something is missing in Bb 7.

Blackboard course organizations were migrated last night. Michelle Gee, our NOVA Blackboard administrator, has made all of the NOVA organizations available today. Organization content system content has NOT been migrated.

By January 10, our NOVA Blackboard administrator will automatically enroll your students in your SP 08 Bb 7 courses.