Critical dates for 2012 – 13

We are currently collecting information on critical dates for Blackboard availability for this academic year.  Critical dates are those dates on which it is essential that Blackboard is available, for activities such as assignment submission, online assessments, collaborative student report writing or access to materials in preparation for an assessment.

Critical date information is very important to us. We use these dates to schedule downtime for essential maintenance to Blackboard and other systems on which Blackboard depends with the least disruption to you and your students.  The information also helps us and the IT Servicedesk to more effectively support students and staff in the event of an unexpected disruption to Blackboard or related services (such as MyBristol).

Please could you send the following information about any critical dates to tel-help@bristol.ac.uk
* date and time of activity (e.g. online submission deadline)
* summary of activity (e.g. assignment submission, peer assessment activity,  online quiz or exam, departmental Blackboard demonstration, etc)
* approximate number of students involved
* course names or IDs
* staff contact details

Many thanks
TEL team
tel-help@bristol.ac.uk

Why can’t my student(s) see my course in Blackboard?

All units and programmes are automatically created as courses in Blackboard, and all students automatically enrolled, based on the registration data held in SITS. If some students can’t see a particular course in Blackboard:

• First, check the course is available. If under “My courses” on your Blackboard Home page you see “unavailable” after the course, this means the course is unavailable to students.  To make it available, follow the instructions in ‘What does course “unavailable” mean and how can I make a course available?’

• Second, if the course IS available, check the student is enrolled on it. Go into the course, and in the Control Panel, click Users and Groups, then Users. Change the middle search box to “Not blank” and click on Go. Search for their name in the list. If the student is not enrolled, they should check if they are registered for it in My Students.  If  you need to manually enrol a student see  ‘How do I enrol a student on my course?’

Why can’t I see a Blackboard course for a unit I am teaching?

All units and programmes are automatically created as courses in Blackboard, and all students automatically enrolled, based on the registration data held in SITS. However, staff are not automatically enrolled, since staffing data is not centrally available.

Any Instructor on a course can enrol another Instructor onto that course, and local Blackboard System Administrators can do the same – so please check if a colleague can enrol you. Instructions on how to enrol an Instructor are in this FAQ.

If another Instructor or a local Blackboard System Administrator cannot enrol you, please email tel-help@bristol.ac.uk and ask to be enrolled as an Instructor, giving the unit ID.

Staff Access to 2011-12 courses

As of Friday 28th of September we have completed the course rollover process. Last year’s courses have now been hidden from members of staff. Those staff that have requested continued access to last year’s courses will see them reappear during the morning of October 1st as we go through the requests and switch them back on. if you have requested access to a course from last year and you don’t see it by the end of October 1st, please let us know.

More information on the rollover is available on the TEL website.

Staff wishing to have access to last year’s courses should complete this form and send it to TEL help.