The Ultra gradebook currently has the ability to search for students using the grid view. With this release, instructors can go to the submission list and quickly locate a particular student to check the status of submissions or access the submission itself.

Additionally, Blackboard added pagination to the submission list. The default view is for 25 students, but instructors may also set the page to display 50 or 100 users. This setting is sticky, so a selection of 50 or 100 is retained when instructors leave the submission list and return later.

NOTE: When converting a learning module from the Original Course View to the Ultra Course View, the force sequence requirement is unchecked by default. Additionally, the file and folder structure may be flattened because the Course Content page only supports nested content two folders deep. Student activity in a learning module is removed when converting to Ultra.

The new Originality Report uses Blackboard's Ultra design and includes some new information about a submission's overall risk for being copied from another source. This new report interface is also more responsive for mobile devices and more accessible to screen readers than the old design.

The LockDown Browser is a custom browser that locks down the testing environment within Blackboard Learn, which means that students are unable to copy, print, access other applications, or visit other websites during an online exam. It works seamlessly with Blackboard Learn and is built in to the assessment settings. When instructors configure an assessment to require the LockDown Browser, students will only be able to begin their attempts if they access the assessment with the LockDown Browser.

Faculty can access this tool in an Ultra course by selecting the Settings area in a test or an assignment.

Instructors who make use of Item Analysis in Original courses recognize the benefit this report provides, specifically for reviewing the quality of assessment questions and improving assessments from one term to the next. However, many instructors are either unaware that this report is available or are not familiar with the term “item analysis” and don’t open the report. In the Ultra Course View, Blackboard updated the title to Question Analysis as a way to raise awareness of this powerful report and encourage its use.

 Question analysis provides statistics on overall performance, assessment quality, and individual questions. This data helps you recognize questions that might be poor discriminators of student performance. Question analysis is for assessments with questions. You can also download the report with raw question data to analyze it or keep it for future uses.

Batch edit due dates in course content

With Batch Edit, you can update selected course content using a new course start date. Enter the new course start date and the existing start date. The tool calculates the difference between the two dates and uses the number of days to shift dates in all selected course content at once. You don’t have to spend time opening course content and determining new dates. Alternatively, you can shift all due dates backward or forward based on a chosen number of days.

In this release, instructors can create groups and group sets at the course level, outside of assessments. Group sets help identify students who are paired together based on specific attributes or purposes.

In a future release, instructors will have the ability to apply course groups to graded content.

Learning modules are a valuable way to organize and present content in the Original Course View. Modules let content creators require students to access learning materials in a specified order, walking learners through a guided path. In this release, Blackboard brings the power of learning modules to the Ultra Course View.

Use learning modules to organize content for an immersive learning experience. Students can work on content in sequence without needing to close and open content items. Instructors can also enforce a content sequence so students access and complete content in the sequence specified.

Additional search criteria in Reuse Questions

Instructors can filter questions by more criteria on the Reuse Questions page for Ultra tests.

In addition to assessments and question banks that come over from the Original Course View, you can also filter by question types and Original Course View tags, such as categories. You can also search for keywords to find questions. The active filter area changes automatically as you select or clear criteria.

SCORM is a content standard that is used to author and present online learning materials and assessments to students. In this release, Blackboard added a number of enhancements to SCORM in the Ultra Course View:

• Instructors can assign a grade category to SCORM packages.
• Instructors can upload SCORM packages from the Content Collection.
• SCORM due dates appear on the calendar and in the activity stream.
• SCORM packages are supported in Ultra Course Preview and conversion from the Original Course View.

Instructors often reuse courses and content from one term to the next without major changes. At the start of a new term, instructors need a way to make these changes en masse.

 In this release, Blackboard introduces a new Batch Edit option on the Course Content page. For example, instructor can select multiple pieces of content and edit visibility for each selected piece at the same time.

Along with this feature, instructors and course builders will notice that the Books & Tools link has moved to the Details & Actions menu. In a future release, instructors will also have the ability to adjust dates in course content using Batch Edit.

Instructors give very specific rubric scores with feedback when grading student submissions. A simple rubric with wide gaps between levels of achievement are insufficient for providing the granularity these institutions require. Instructors working under these requirements need to be able to mark both students as Sufficient, but provide more granular scoring within the range of scores associated with this rubric row.

In this release, Blackboard expanded rubric criteria to include more granular levels of achievement, measured with percentages.

The Calendar and To Do modules show the due dates of course items, but this was previously limited to activities and assessments using just Blackboard Learn tools. In this release, the capability is expanded so that other content types, including those from 3rd party solutions, are now incorporated into these Original Experience areas when using a web browser.

All of the following create calendar items and due notifications:

• Assessment items such as assignments and tests
• Interactive tools including graded discussions, blogs, journals, and wikis
• Grade Center columns created manually and not linked to content items such as an observation or offline assignment
• SCORM packages
• Content items generated from building blocks when a linked Grade Center column has a due date
• LTI resource links when a linked Grade Center column has a due date

Enhanced delegated grading

The ability to reconcile grades was previously limited to instructors and users who were granted the permission by an administrator. Now instructors can grant this permission to graders.

The Can reconcile grades option appears when the instructor delegates grading. Instructors can choose to grant the permission to any or all graders who are delegated submissions.

In this release, Blackboard introduced a search function in the Ultra gradebook to help users locate specific students when the list may be too long to browse.

To search for a student, open the Ultra gradebook in grid view. You can type the student’s name or student ID. Matching names appear below the search box. Select a student to filter your gradebook view and see their attempts and grades.

In the future, Blackboard will enhance the tool to allow searching by gradebook columns and categories.

Download inline grading annotations

Both instructors and students can download certain file types (DOC, DOCX, PDF, PPT, PPTX, XLS, XLSX) with annotations as an annotated PDF.

Students can download the annotated file after their submission has been graded.

Instructors need a way to ensure the anonymity of students (hiding personally identifying information) to avoid bias when grading. Some regions mandate anonymity for high-stakes assessment.

Ultra Courses now support an enforceable means to anonymize student information to instructors and other reviewers. After grading is complete, the information can be revealed. Student identities remain hidden until all grades are posted, at which point names are revealed.

Instructors may want to set up the gradebook so that unsubmitted, past-due work is automatically marked as zero. For larger courses, it can be burdensome and time-consuming to grade these missing submissions as zeros manually.

This release includes a global gradebook setting to allow instructors to assign automatic zeros to missing work past the due date. Instructors can save the time it takes to go through the gradebook to manually enter zeros for this work. Students can still submit work after an automatic zero is assigned and instructors can grade as normal.

• On the global Messages page in the base navigation, courses are grouped according to term, similar to the way they are grouped on the Ultra Courses page. Your current courses appear first when you open the Messages page. You can use the arrows to navigate through the groups.
• The number of messages you've received in each course is displayed with a course card. Select the course card to jump to all of your messages.
• In your Ultra course, you can select the number of messages that appear per page.
• When you select a course message to view, you can use arrows to browse through messages in order.

Conversation Improvements

Conversations on course content items have been improved in the following ways:

• The Conversations panel has been increased to full-width.
• Students can now respond and reply to each other in conversations the same as they do in discussions.
• Activity indicators are available for new conversation posts.
• A student or instructor can see all conversation participants.
• A student or instructor can search all conversation participants.

instructors can download grade data within their Ultra courses. Instructors can select to download the entire gradebook or select columns, choose to export in a *.CSV or *.XLS format, and save it to the device or the Content Collection for future access.

Uploading gradebook data is not yet available but in development for future release.

The following enhancements were added to group assessments:

• New empty state page lets instructors create as few or as many groups as they’d like from the beginning.
• Instructors can edit group names after students begin attempts.
• New Unassign All option appears when creating groups.
• Instructors can edit group membership if a given group hasn’t started working or existing attempts are removed.

SCORM is a content standard used to author and present online learning materials and assessments to students. In this release, Blackkboard adds support for selecting, adding, presenting, and using SCORM content in Ultra courses. Instructors can import SCORM packages into an Ultra course and select grading options for the package as a whole or each content item individually.

Course Announcements

Instructors can draft, schedule, and post course announcements in the Ultra Course View in this release.

Insert recordings via content editor in assessment feedback

Instructors can record video and audio using the editor in assessment feedback.

This feature will launch in mid-June 2015.

Instructors and students can now connect to Google Drive and upload content directly into their courses.

Collect external coursework submissions and grade with rubrics

A new assessment setting allows instructors to track external submissions, such as a student's performance in an offline or non-Ultra course context, and use a rubric to grade. Instructors can keep track of all relevant coursework within Ultra and eliminate the need to transcribe grades from items or activities that took place physically. 

Speed up grading with Discussion Analysis

A new Discussion Analysis feature displays key metrics such as critical thinking, sentence complexity, responses, replies, and average word count. The critical thinking metric is analyzed using a Blackboard-developed algorithm, while sentence complexity uses Flesch-Kincaid readability benchmarks. This allows an instructor to determine a student's discussion participation grade based on many qualitative factors that aren't easy or quick to evaluate but deserve in-depth analysis.

Instructors and students can connect to UMBC Box and upload content directly into their courses. Google Drive is coming soon.

Activity indicators for active Collab rooms