Blackboard Blogs

Blackboard K-12 Video Contest Winner: Polk County Public Schools in FL

Congratulations to Polk County Public Schools!  Earlier this month at BbWorld '08, Polk County, in Florida, was introduced as the winner of the "2008 Blackboard K-12 Video Contest."  (Read the original contest announcement here.)

In Polk County's video, district administrators, staff members, teachers, and students explain why they use Blackboard technology for professional development and to increase the sense of engagement both students and teachers feel in the learning process:

For more information about Polk County Public Schools, visit http://www.polk-fl.net.  You can see this video and dozens of others created by and archived for the K-12 community at the BlackboardTV Channel on YouTube.

Why a Blackboard–Sakai Connector?

Of the dozens of e-Learning events, conferences and user group meetings I travel to each year, one conference I really look forward to is the annual Sakai Conference.  Surprised?

You shouldn’t be – many Sakai members and conference attendees use Blackboard products and services.

When I’m with clients at the Sakai conference, we talk about how their institutions want to share data and content between their respective mission-critical Blackboard implementations and their pilot Sakai instances.  Blackboard clients want this integration, and this is why we decided to develop it.

A couple of weeks ago at the Sakai conference in Paris, John Fontaine and I talked with many of our clients about John’s recent blog post on the Learning Environment Connector.  The Learning Environment Connector is a new technology in the process of being developed by Blackboard and a team from Syracuse University to enable connections between the Blackboard Academic Suite and other course management systems.

Don’t Let It Stay in Vegas! (Take It from BbWorld back to Your Campus)

You know the saying, so I won’t bother you by repeating it, but suffice it to say that we had a GOOD time two weeks ago at BbWorld ‘08. The days were filled, but the enthusiasm of clients and staff attending the annual global users conference was seemingly tireless.

For those of you that were able to join us in Las Vegas, hopefully you had a chance to sit in on at least one of our Blackboard Managed Hosting sessions or presentations.  Before re-capping events, I want to pass along the link to our new Managed Hosting Wiki page.  Visit the Wiki for up-to-date information about our services and policies.  Log in here using your Behind the Blackboard login and password.

In Las Vegas, I presented on the ecological benefits of Blackboard Managed Hosting in our exhibit hall booth.  In the 20-minute presentation, I demonstrated how the scale of our operations, as well as the technology that we use at all levels of the Blackboard reference architecture, help us to reduce the annual power draw of an average, medium- or large-size Blackboard client from approximately 28,000 kWh to under 6,500 kWh!