FA2022 Courses Created in Blackboard on July 28, 2022

Fri, 29 Jul 2022 08:13:09 -0400
blackboard, course-creation, fa2022, fall, ultra-course-preview

Blackboard course shells for FA2022 were created on July 28, 2022.

The Ultra Course Preview setting is again enabled in FA2022 courses, which allows faculty to convert a new Original course to see what it looks like in Ultra.

Please review the release notes for the latest updates as well as feature parity charts -- more than 30 new updates were added over the last few months including points-based gradebook and rubrics, question banks, and more!

Learn more about What's New in Ultra for Teaching & Learning on August 1 or 11.

Attend an Ultra Essentials training on August 16 and 17.

Have a question about Ultra? Ask an Ultra Ambassador!

Ally, an accessibility tool, is also enabled in all course shells. Ally automatically scans uploaded and created course content, then performs a series of steps to make that content more accessible. Please review the Ally FAQs for more information about the accessibility indicators on course content and alternative formats.

For faculty who will be teaching hybrid or online, the instructional technology team would like to share several resources to support online course development and instruction.

1. Choose from our PIVOT Solo lessons to refresh or enhance your online teaching preparation. Five key topics cover course organization, active learning, community building, assessment, and supporting students.

2. Explore our Panopto folder for a wide variety of recorded webinars on various instructional technologies available at UMBC.

3. Learn about the Quality Matters Impact program, a new initiative to formally recognize courses that meet Quality Matters standards and demonstrate exemplary online/hybrid course design.

About Course Creation

Bb shells for FA2022 are available for all courses (designated as lecture, lab, field or discussion) listed in the UMBC Schedule of Classes (SOC), provided that there is an instructor of record listed. As new course sections and/or instructors are added to the SOC by Department Scheduling Coordinators, corresponding Bb shells are automatically generated overnight.

If you are an instructor, and your name is not associated with the course you are teaching in the SOC, please see your Departmental Scheduling Coordinator to resolve the issue. Once you are listed in the SOC, your Bb course shell will be created automatically.

If you and your Department Scheduling Coordinator believe you are correctly assigned as the instructor of record in the SOC and you do not see your course shell in Blackboard, please submit a Request Tracker (RT) ticket via my.umbc.edu/help.

If you need a Bb shell for a research or independent study course, please submit a new course request.

Instructors who teach multiple sections of the same course will find those enrollments merged into one Bb course shell. These sections may be split upon request by an RT ticket, which we recommend submitting at least one week before the semester starts, if not as soon as courses are created in Blackboard.

Student enrollment in Bb mirrors the official registration in SA and updates hourly. However, courses are not accessible to students by default until the instructor of record makes them available.

As always, if you have any questions about teaching, learning, and technology at UMBC, please consider the following options:

PIVOT | Academic Continuity | Keep On Teaching | Student Technology Resources

Check our extensive FAQ collection

What's new in Ultra? | Known Issues

Open a ticket via RT

Follow the Instructional Technology & DoIT myUMBC groups

Request a consult with instructional technology staff