Blackboard Policies
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Please review our Blackboard policies below.
Course Sites and Course Content Retention Procedure
Define how long course sites and course content will be retained in the Learning Management Systems (LMS), currently Blackboard.
This procedure establishes guidelines for University of Louisville’s retention rules for course sites being stored in University of Louisville’s Blackboard Learning Management Systems. This procedure is designed to reduce the number of historic courses currently being viewed in the Blackboard course list view, decrease the amount of storage costs, and adhere to Blackboard’s support procedure.
General/Definitions: For purposes of this procedure, unless otherwise stated, the following definitions shall apply:
- Course Sites: A site created within Blackboard that is specific to a single course being offered during a specific semester at University of Louisville.
- Archive(d): The process of decommissioning data into a format that can be restored when required. Archived data will remain active for a predetermined period after which will be permanently deleted from University of Louisville’s systems.
- Restoration: Refers to the activity of pulling archived data back into an accessible state.
This procedure applies to all courses taught in the Undergraduate and Graduate programs. The procedure refers to all courses automatically generated in the registration system and subsequently populated in Blackboard. Additionally, this procedure refers to any restored or otherwise manually created (GUI) added courses by Delphi and/or Information Technology.
- To retain course sites and course content for a period of time which instructors, students, staff and administrators find adequate and useful
- To optimize the performance of the LMS
- To ensure that storage space is used efficiently and minimize the financial impact of system backups and increasing disk storage
- To adhere to the Blackboard support procedure
A course data quota will be placed on all courses in the LMS. The course quota is 500 MB and the individual file size limit is 25 MB. Users are responsible for reducing the size of content within their courses and should follow the guidelines for reducing content in the LMS. Instructors can check the size of their courses using the Course Size tool found in the Course Tools area of your course.
Blackboard course sites will be retained for a period of 4 (four) years. After that period, the course sites will be permanently deleted. This includes all files, grades, assignments, quizzes, surveys, links, videos and anything else associated with the course site.
If you are unable to locate a course within Blackboard contact the Blackboard helpdesk for assistance at bbsupprt@louisville.edu or 502.852.8833. Instructors are also encouraged to create and keep a local archive of their own courses.
Blackboard Integration Policy
The rationale for creating a policy regarding Blackboard integrations is that the Delphi Center will consider system security, student data integrity, application functionality, Blackboard performance, Follett integration consent and overall university compliance. Please note that a request for “your” integration to be placed into Blackboard affects the entire system, including all courses.
- The designated university learning management system (LMS) at the University of Louisville currently is Blackboard (Bb).
- Building blocks, or blocks, are small applications integrated into the Blackboard LMS that extend the usability and functionality of Blackboard, aid in the administration of Blackboard, or otherwise provide customization. Blocks installed into Bb range from providing simple links to outside systems to sharing student data or adding additional course tools.
- LTI, Learning Tools Interoperability, is an integration that can be used with an LMS to connect with external service tools.
- Integration refers to the process of and result of embedding third-party applications into Blackboard.
- Any third-party application that has an interaction with Blackboard will be noted as an “integration” in this document even though applications can take many forms within the system.
In the past, Learning Management Systems (LMS) support in the Delphi Center has been contacted directly by building block or integration vendors and/or individual faculty about installing integrations. A policy is needed to help structure the management of the increased amount of integration requests. In order to meet the most critical needs of the university, LMS support has developed a procedure. The support Team will provide a consistent and timely response to all requests.
The steps a faculty member should take to initiate an integration of digital or physical content are as follows:
Per the university’s contract with the bookstore vendor, Follett, all proposed integrations must be researched by Follett to gain integration consent.- Contact Sara Harvey or Kevin Heimerdinger, Campus bookstore managers, at (502) 852-8307, 1543txt@follett.com and (502) 852-8301, k.heimerdinger@follett.com
- Provide the name of the vendor, contact information if any, and the desired content provided by this integration.
- Andrea will work with the Follett research department to supply content or establish a relationship with the specified vendor to acquire and deliver desired content.
- Follett provides information to the Delphi Center for linking within the course shell, gradebook synching and any other features or functions desired in the LMS.
Please contact Sara Harvey or Kevin Heimerdinger, Campus bookstore managers, at (502) 852-8307, 1543txt@follett.com and (502) 852-8301, k.heimerdinger@follett.com
- Once Follett contacts provide consent for the integration to proceed, the requestor is complete the procurement process below:
- The procurement process requires your department Unit Business Manager to submit the following to the UofL Business Strategic Support (Purchasing)
NOTE: This approval is required whether or not an application has a cost:
Vendor Contract AND/OR Vendor Terms and Conditions of Use
Vendor HECVAT OR
A Completed Vendor Assessment Form:
- Do you plan to have this product make use of ULink userid/passwords for authentication?
- Do you plan to use this product to send email claiming to be from any @louisville.edu address?
- Do you plan to use this product to send email to UofL accounts?
- Do you plan to receive data from or send data to any other UofL computer system?
- When procurement approval is received, the requester should submit a Blackboard Integration Request Form to the Blackboard Helpdesk. Please provide the DA number from procurement in the "Additional Information?" field within the form. The steps below will be followed:
- Realize that a request and implementation, if approved, can take one to three months and sometimes longer.
- Keep in mind the initial start date required for your integration. Follett and the LMS will need a minimum of one semester for approvals, testing and implementation.
- By submitting the request, the requestor agrees to be the point of contact for the implementation process.
- By submitting the request, the requestor agrees to be the primary tester or designated tester.
- The request form requires such information as the contact information for the third-party vendor in addition to the institutional benefit, costs involved and an estimate of how many instructors or users would be using the integration.
- The integration will be analyzed in many ways including its compatibility and impact on Blackboard.
- After the request is received, the Delphi Center will notify the requester within five working days as to the status of the request.
The requestor will be involved throughout the evaluation process so please ensure you or your tester have time for testing, analysis and consultation with the Delphi Center for Teaching and Learning, vendor or developer as needed.
**Please note that each integration is unique and there are circumstances that can affect the timelines for testing and implementation, vendor responsiveness, time for requestor to complete testing and complexity of the integration, can all affect the time need for implementation.- The evaluation process may include, but is not limited to the following: IT policies, Follett integration process and requirements, University of Louisville policies, FERPA guidelines, financial considerations, user surveys, Blackboard Advisory Committee review, Delphi Center Advisory Committee review, Delphi Center director’s approval, comparable higher education adoption and compatibility testing.
- After the evaluation process the requestor will be notified.
- If approved, the requestor will be notified of the implementation date.
- Implementation date may be affected by university and Information Technology schedules.
- If not approved, the requestor will be notified with the reason(s) the application was not integrated.