Q: Why do I sometimes get 2 emails from BB?
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A: Sometimes Blackboard will send a user 2 identical email messages
in a row. This seems to occur intermittently and we are trying to track
down the cause. If someone can get this to happen consistently, please
let me know [TWITCHEW@grinnell.edu]
.
Q: Why doesn't my Prof use Blackboard?
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A: Blackboard was only introduced on campus in the fall of 2000 and
then was only shown to a limited number of faculty as a means to quickly
and easily implement on-line discussions to facilitate in class discussion.
Many of blackboard's other features (grade book, document exchange,
chat, broadcast email, calendar etc.) are only now (F2001) being "advertised"
to the faculty members at large. The CTS
group has been working with interested faculty to help them use features
of Blackboard that would enhance their classroom teaching. Despite being
a fairly recent addition to the technology available on campus, more
than 80 courses/groups have asked to have a BB courses (listed
here) and the system has had ~310,000 "hits/clicks" between
7/2000 and 3/2001.
If you think your professor should look into using Blackboard, please
have him or her contact an IMT Specialist or ITS [POSTMASTER@grinnell.edu]
Q: Can my club, group or organization get a Blackboard
"course"?
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A: If your club, group or organization can get an email listserve then
you can get a "course" for blackboard. Just contact [POSTMASTER@grinnell.edu]
Keep in mind that BB is designed to serve the campus community and adding
non-Grinnell members to courses is handled on a case by case basis.
Q: I try and go back to a page using my back button
and I get a message talking about "missing data" or "expired
pages". What gives?
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A: Blackboard makes all its web pages "on the fly" and sets
them to "expire" so that when you visit a blackboard page
you always see the most up to date information. This means that when
you use the BACK button on your web browser you will get a warning that
the page is old/expired and ask you to reload. the only real solution
is to use the "OK" and arrow buttons or the "breadcrumb
links" near the top of the window to navigate.
Q: Will changing my Blackboard password affect
my other passwords for email and login?
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A: No. Additionally, changing your email or login password will not
affect your Blackboard password. We are planning on integrating Blackboard's
usernames and passwords with the rest of the campus in the spring of
2003.
Q: Why are discussion messages I write marked as
"unread"?
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A: Blackboard does not seem to mark any message that you have not viewed
as "read" and does not seem smart enough to realize that YOU
have probably read the messages you wrote. We have asked BB to fix/change
this.
Q: What is my Blackboard password?
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A: Your initial BB password is the last 7 digits of your student ID
number (include any leading zeros). There is one exception - if you
are a first year in Fall 2000 then your password is simply your student
ID number without any leading zeros.
If this is still all too confusing, use the "I forgot my password"
link on the login screen and you will be able to change your password
online.
Q: Can I change how the portal page appears?
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A: At the moment you have little control over how Blackboard Appears
and functions as a portal user. This is because we are only using a
"basic" version of Blackboard to support instruction. There
are more fully featured and integrated portal solutions available for
BB and other companies if there is a need or demand for such services.
Q: How often is the student data updated in BB?
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A: Student enrollment data is taken directly from the registrar's records
every day starting 1 week before classes and continuing till the second
week of class. Unfortunately students can not be automatically dropped
from a course. Instructors will have to do this for themselves using
the control panel button.
Q: How do I get rid of the "resources button"
on my BB course?
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A: This little yellow button takes students to the blackboard.com resources
center and not anywhere near our library. You can disable this little
bugger by doing the following:
- From within your blackboard course click the control panel button
- click on the "resources" link,
- then select the "Enable / Disable Resources Button" link,
- click "no" and the submit button.
Q: I want to use/activate a BB course for my classes
who do I contact?
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A: If you are an instructor teaching a regular course, then your BB
course is already created and waiting for you. Contact your CT
Specialist for training (or see the documents
area of this site). The CTS' can activate (make available) your course
for you or you can do it yourself by doing the following:
- From within your Blackboard course click the control panel button
- click on the "course settings" link,
- click on the "course availability" link,
- click "yes" and the submit button.
Q: How do I list my Course in the BB Course catalog?
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A: The BB course catalog is not automatically populated.
You can do it yourself by doing the following:
- From within your Blackboard course click the control panel button,
- click on the "course settings" link,
- click on the "categorize course" link,
- select a category (or categories) under which you want your course
to be listed.
- click "add" for each category you pick,
- click the OK button.
Note - Do not categorize the course from the "course utilities"
link - this is for creating a listing if you want the course hosted
on BB.com.
Q: When I email my class from Blackboard it fails
to send
a copy of the email message to me! Arrrghhh!
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A: This is a known bug, your email did go out but the instructor is
not copied. We and others have asked Blackboard to fix/correct this.
Q: Why are all these inactive courses
showing up on my BlackBoard portal screen?
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A: In order to provide the a "ready when you are" teaching
tool all courses created by the Office of the Registrar have an analogous
course created in Blackboard already populated with any student who
has ever enrolled in the course. (Instructors will have to manage drops
as there is currently no efficient mechanism for doing so.) The course
is marked as "unavailable" and shows up on the Instructor's
Blackboard portal in the "courses" module. Students enrolled
in the course do not see this screen until you choose to make the course
available.
Courses which remain "unavailable" at the end of the semester
are deleted, those that were active are switched to unavailable.
Q: How do I add students/participants
to my BlackBoard Course?
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We have created a Bb account for all current Grinnell College students,
faculty and staff. Therefore, you may self enroll students into you
course by doing the following:
In order to provide up to date enrollment data Blackboard courses are
already populated with any student who has ever enrolled in the course.
Unfortunately there is no efficient method for dealing with drops and
instructors must manages this themselves. We highly reccomend that you
do not REMOVE a participant from a class as this interferes
with any existing entries in the grade book. There is also a chance
that the drop request has not been processed by the Registrar and the
automatic course enrollement process may simply add the student back
to your course.
