PRE-SEMESTER
Course Shells
Course shells are generated a month or two before the semester begins. There is no content in the shell, and only two navigation buttons: Announcements and Staff Information. You have the option to create the entire course, or copy materials from a previous course (source) into the new course (destination).
Copy Materials to New Course
To learn how to add some or all of your pre-existing course materials to your new course by going to: http://www.samuelmerritt.edu/academic_technology/BbEST and click on the demo “Preparing for the Next Term” - Copy all Course Content”. Or, you can request to have an entire course copied by going to the Helpdesk and click on “Submit a Technical Support Request Online”: http://www.samuelmerritt.edu/information_technology/helpdesk
Remember to provide the Course ID and Title of BOTH the source (original) course and the new (destination) course on your ticket to ensure we copy the correct course. (One way you can find this information is by clicking the course’s Control Panel and viewing the Blue Bar that has the Course ID and Course Title. NOTE: Navigation Buttons may not appear immediately. Click on REFRESH to display.
PRE and DURING SEMESTER
Faculty and Student Enrollment
With Snapshot, faculty and student enrollment in Blackboard academic courses is automated, and updated every two hours, based on information pulled from the PowerCampus database. Faculty assignments and updates should be sent to the Office of the Registrar by your director, chair or dean. It is the responsibility of the faculty of record to ensure course access is appropriately granted to other faculty. Students will populate the Blackboard course once they’ve registered for the class. Please do not add students. If there is a problem with student enrollment (few or no students in the course), please contact Blackboard support at 510.869.6836 Press option 1.
Making your Course Available
Control Panel > Settings > Course Avalability: Make course available: Yes
POST SEMESTER
Making your Course Unavailable
Control Panel > Settings > Course Availability: Make course available: No
Hiding Courses
From your Blackboard Welcome Page click on the pencil icon in the "My Courses" bar on the far right.
In the "Customize: My Courses" window, you can deselect the check mark in Display Course Name so that the course will not display.
ALTERING COURSES **CAUTION**
PLEASE be careful not to alter any content or materials in a course that has been completed. It is a record of the course and faculty / student participation. TIP: Working with source and destination courses at the same time might be confusing, and changes could be made to the wrong course. One way to easily identify the “new” course is to change the color of its button/text navigation in the left panel. To do so, go to the “new” course’s Control Panel > under Course Options: Course Design > Course Menu Design.