Higher Ed

We recently published the August 2007 issue of the Blackboard Academic Bulletin, our newsletter designed specifically for users of Blackboard software in higher education.

This issue is full of content, including:

• A review of BbWorld ’07 with highlights from the successful e-Learning conference in Boston
• Gordon Freedman discusses his experiences while recently attending BbSummit Asia in Singapore
• Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute is featured in the first in a series of articles highlighting this year’s Blackboard Greenhouse Program award winners
• Details about Blackboard’s new SafeAssign offering
• An announcement that the Blackboard Academic Suite is now available to users of the Blackboard Learning System – CE and Vista Enterprise Licenses
• An introduction to Application Pack 3 for Release 7 of the Blackboard Academic Suite
• Our monthly “best-of” Ask Dr. C questions and answers

We’re very interested in hearing about the articles you’d like to see in future newsletters. Feel free to send story suggestions to blogfeedback@blackboard.com.

If you’re a Blackboard software user and working on an upgrade to App Pack 2 for CE 6 and Vista 4 licenses, hopefully you know about the AP2 Upgrade Team, the AP2 wiki, and the WebCT Users List.

The AP2 Upgrade Team is a group of Blackboard solutions engineers, technical support managers, and product experts who know a lot about CE, Vista and App Pack 2.

The AP2 wiki is where we answer your questions, hold weekly "office hours" and collect essential information – upgrade reports from users, known issues, suggestions for getting started and the schedules for Webinars.  To access the AP2 wiki, log in to Behind the Blackboard and click the “Knowledge Base” link from the left hand side under “Documentation.”

Don’t miss our recurring Webinar, Hot Issues in AP2, which we update and run every two to three weeks – August 14 and 16 are the next two sessions.  This is where you get the low-down about known issues, Hot Fixes, and Service Packs that the Client Support and Engineering Services teams are working on.  For meeting times and access info, visit the AP2 wiki or go to https://blackboard.webex.com, search for “hot issues,” select your desired event, and use “ap2” as your password.

Clients are discussing many of the day-to-day issues with AP2 on the WebCT Users List.  It’s a fantastic resource.

Finally, if you’re upgrading to App Pack 2 and need something that we’re not currently providing, please contact either me (rshea@blackboard.com) or Sahar Javadi (sjavadi@blackboard.com).  We can help you locate further resources and support.

The Quiet Anniversary

BbWorld ’07 marked the first 10 years of Blackboard as a company, and more importantly the first decade of course management systems being used across campuses, in schools, and by organizations and government agencies.  Learning using electronic technology certainly occurred before 1997, but only became systematic and widespread 10 years ago.

Many important accomplishments in the education technology have occurred during those 10 years, and last week the rooms and hallways of the Hynes Convention Center were filled with quiet pride.  It was apparent to me that the education technology pioneers, experimentalists and entrepreneurs in attendance had established themselves on their campuses around the world.  They and the use of education technologies are no longer considered odd; they are firmly part of the education strategy.

We are on the cusp of further industry advancements in which the traditionalists (the place-based people), those who cannot or will not employ technology to extend, deepen, and make more relevant curriculum, disciplines and community online, are becoming the odd ones out.  Unless traditionalists join technology proponents, they are on the verge of becoming the black box technology people we once were seen as.

BbWorld ’07 in Boston was a memorable event for me and, I think, historical when viewed in a larger context.  In this post, the first of a two-part series, I’ll share a few key memories:

With 2,500 hundred educators, technologists, vendors and staff in attendance, the annual Blackboard users conference held last week bubbled with activity.  The gathering was particularly striking to me because e-Learning experts met and talked in person (exchanging business cards), and attended sessions designed to cover the best uses of the Internet and computers to teach and learn, train, build community, and measure and report outcomes across every sector of education.

Conference attendees included representatives from K-12 schools (some where kindergarteners logon to Blackboard software) to university systems comprised of hundreds of thousands of users with 24×7 access to Blackboard systems, to government agencies that train personnel in war zones.  All these users met in Boston to discuss similar goals: accelerating learning, opening access, accounting for progress and improving quality.

Like many people working with education and technology, at Blackboard we’re using more Web 2.0 tools to share information with members of the Blackboard user community.

Recently a colleague and I made a very short video invitation to attend our upcoming annual users conference in Boston, July 10–12; the video is called “BbWorld ’07…OF COURSE!”

We just grabbed my colleague’s small digital camera and walked around our offices here in D.C., asking several Blackboard team members why they’re attending BbWorld ’07.  She then edited the clips together on her laptop.  So quick, simple, easy.  Why haven’t we been sending all of our event invitations, messages about software upgrades, etc. in short video clips?

And here again is Adrian Alleyne’s short video titled “Adventures in First Life” – his humorous spoof on Second Life, one of the virtual worlds which several education institutions are exploring to extend their in-classroom experiences.  Check it out.