Staff access to Blackboard is being reduced from 18 January 2023
As you will be aware, the University is in the process of ending its use of Blackboard.
We’re now at the point where all future courses will be taught in Nuku, and there are only a small number of students and staff still using Blackboard to complete or administer courses that commenced in 2022. In January 2023, we changed our contract with Blackboard, and part of this is a reduced number of user licenses to reflect the reduction in active users, and the need to significantly reduce the cost to the University while we complete the transition.
These new conditions are not as flexible as we hoped, so we need to carefully manage who can access Blackboard and when, to ensure we stay within our new limit over the next few months.
The following information outlines what this means, if you need to do anything, and where to go for further information.
What this means for student access to Blackboard
From 13 January 2023, only students who are still actively participating in at least one Blackboard course will be able to log in to Blackboard. All other students will cease to have access to Blackboard from this date. There will be separate communications to students about this, through Whītiki and notices that will be going up in the remaining Blackboard courses.
What this means for staff access to Blackboard
From Wednesday 18 January 2023, staff access to Blackboard will be restricted to the following groups:
This is to ensure critical activities around teaching can finish, without us exceeding our new license allowance in this period.
We intend for there to be the ability for teaching staff to request access to Blackboard in the second quarter of 2023 (within Trimester 1 2023), to download course content for personal reference purposes if desired. This will be optional, keeping in mind that we will be archiving all content in Blackboard, and it will also be somewhat dependent on the number of licenses remaining when we reach that point. More detail on this will be provided closer to the time.
If you are teaching a T2 course you do not need to panic and download your courses from Blackboard. The FLaTAs will be in touch with you during Trimester 1 to work on your courses specifically and they will still have access to Blackboard and be able to copy across any of your old content with your collaboration. T1 course coordinators should have already been contacted, if not please speak to your FLaTA.
Archiving of Blackboard course content
All Blackboard courses will be saved and archived and made accessible on request in the future. The archived course saves all course data and files.
When we talk about archiving in this context, we mean the process of packaging up a Blackboard course and its content into a file format that can be stored and accessed later, once Blackboard has been switched off permanently in January 2024. It won’t look like Blackboard does now, but it will all be there. We will share more detail about this in the new year.
What happens with archived Blackboard data?
Archived course content and data will be retained for at least seven years, in line with the University’s established retention policy. This data will be made accessible on request as appropriate, such as for investigating an academic grievance, or doing a programme or accreditation review.
We’re now at the point where all future courses will be taught in Nuku, and there are only a small number of students and staff still using Blackboard to complete or administer courses that commenced in 2022. In January 2023, we changed our contract with Blackboard, and part of this is a reduced number of user licenses to reflect the reduction in active users, and the need to significantly reduce the cost to the University while we complete the transition.
These new conditions are not as flexible as we hoped, so we need to carefully manage who can access Blackboard and when, to ensure we stay within our new limit over the next few months.
The following information outlines what this means, if you need to do anything, and where to go for further information.
What this means for student access to Blackboard
From 13 January 2023, only students who are still actively participating in at least one Blackboard course will be able to log in to Blackboard. All other students will cease to have access to Blackboard from this date. There will be separate communications to students about this, through Whītiki and notices that will be going up in the remaining Blackboard courses.
What this means for staff access to Blackboard
From Wednesday 18 January 2023, staff access to Blackboard will be restricted to the following groups:
- Staff actively teaching a course that is still underway in Blackboard
- Faculty and school administrators supporting Blackboard
- CAD staff
- Service desk and app support staff
This is to ensure critical activities around teaching can finish, without us exceeding our new license allowance in this period.
We intend for there to be the ability for teaching staff to request access to Blackboard in the second quarter of 2023 (within Trimester 1 2023), to download course content for personal reference purposes if desired. This will be optional, keeping in mind that we will be archiving all content in Blackboard, and it will also be somewhat dependent on the number of licenses remaining when we reach that point. More detail on this will be provided closer to the time.
If you are teaching a T2 course you do not need to panic and download your courses from Blackboard. The FLaTAs will be in touch with you during Trimester 1 to work on your courses specifically and they will still have access to Blackboard and be able to copy across any of your old content with your collaboration. T1 course coordinators should have already been contacted, if not please speak to your FLaTA.
Archiving of Blackboard course content
All Blackboard courses will be saved and archived and made accessible on request in the future. The archived course saves all course data and files.
When we talk about archiving in this context, we mean the process of packaging up a Blackboard course and its content into a file format that can be stored and accessed later, once Blackboard has been switched off permanently in January 2024. It won’t look like Blackboard does now, but it will all be there. We will share more detail about this in the new year.
What happens with archived Blackboard data?
Archived course content and data will be retained for at least seven years, in line with the University’s established retention policy. This data will be made accessible on request as appropriate, such as for investigating an academic grievance, or doing a programme or accreditation review.
Course coordinators and teachers: What you need to do
If you are still teaching in Blackboard through January to March:
We have a list of active Blackboard courses that are still being taught as at 18 January, so if your course is on that list, you will be automatically added to the new access group, and so will your students.
We have a list of active Blackboard courses that are still being taught as at 18 January, so if your course is on that list, you will be automatically added to the new access group, and so will your students.
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If you…
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then…
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try to log in from 18 January and find you don’t have the access you expected
would like to download your teaching materials for reference purposes finish teaching and no longer need access at all |
contact the Digital Solutions service desk immediately. You will need to let them know which Blackboard course you are still actively teaching so they can also check the access of any other teachers and students.
please complete this by 31 March 2023 at the latest. email [email protected] and let us know so we can remove you from the access group, which helps us manage the licenses. |
If you have already finished teaching your last course in Blackboard:
You can access Blackboard freely until Tuesday 17 January 2023 to download copies of your teaching materials and anything you wish to keep for personal reference. If you don’t wish to download any of your teaching resources from Blackboard for personal reference, then you don’t need to do anything at all.
Please accept our sincere apologies if you had previously received assurances from the Nuku team of more open access through early 2023. We were working with the information we had at the time, and unfortunately it wasn't accurate. We do also apologise for the short notice in communicating the correct information, in relation to the access change.
You can access Blackboard freely until Tuesday 17 January 2023 to download copies of your teaching materials and anything you wish to keep for personal reference. If you don’t wish to download any of your teaching resources from Blackboard for personal reference, then you don’t need to do anything at all.
Please accept our sincere apologies if you had previously received assurances from the Nuku team of more open access through early 2023. We were working with the information we had at the time, and unfortunately it wasn't accurate. We do also apologise for the short notice in communicating the correct information, in relation to the access change.
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If you wish to download copies of your teaching materials after the 17 January cut-off, and…
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then…
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it’s only a few documents and you know exactly which Blackboard courses they’re in
you have a lot of things you’d like to download the things you want are in a T1 course, and you haven’t yet heard from a FLATA about migration the things you want to download are in a course that will be migrated for Trimester 2 |
contact your school admin (if they would normally support you in Blackboard) or your CAD learning designer or FLATA, and they will have access to download things for you.
contact your CAD learning designer or FLATA to chat about it. If it’s going to be easier, they’ll make sure we let you know when we have some licenses available in Trimester 1 sometime. contact your CAD learning designer and they’ll make sure the FLATA for your course gets in touch promptly. They will have access to download things for you. chat to your FLATA about it when they get in touch to kick off the migration process. They will have access to download things for you. |
We recommend you save any downloaded files in your University Office 365 OneDrive for personal reference, or in a course folder on your school SharePoint if it is for shared reference.
Faculty and school admin staff: What you need to do
Use the following list to determine what you need to do, if anything:
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If you…
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then…
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need access to Blackboard past 17 January and you have attended Canvas training for administrators
try to access Blackboard from 18 January and find you cannot log in need access to a specific course in Blackboard after 17 January that you don’t have access to currently have been given access to Blackboard but don’t need it have been asked by a teacher to help them download course resources, because they no longer have access |
we will automatically include you in the new Blackboard access group. You don’t need to do anything.
contact your CAD learning designer for help. contact your CAD learning designer for help. email [email protected] and let us know so we can remove you from the access group, which helps us manage the licenses. help them if you are able to, otherwise direct them to their CAD learning designer or FLATA. |
Note:
FLATAs all retain access to Blackboard and can help academics download content as part of the migration process.
FLATAs all retain access to Blackboard and can help academics download content as part of the migration process.
Further information
If you have further questions about any of the information on this page, or about access to Blackboard and Blackboard course content from 18 January 2023 onwards, please email [email protected] or contact your CAD learning designer or FLATA directly.
Page last updated: 17 February 2023
