Blackboard available for all teachers
Use of Course Management System software open to all for Spring 2002 semester

By SUE WUETCHER
Reporter Editor

The Blackboard course management system (CMS) will be available in the spring semester for any UB instructor who wishes to use it, the Faculty Senate Executive Committee learned at its Oct. 24 meeting.

Numerous training sessions, including evening sessions, will be offered by the Educational Technology Center to provide anyone teaching a course at UB with instruction in Blackboard 5.5, the newest version of the CMS, said David Willbern, associate vice provost for educational technology and director of the ETC.

Blackboard can be accessed at http://ublearns.buffalo.edu/.

Willbern and Rick Lesniak, director of academic services for Computing and Information Technology, appeared before the FSEC to update senators on the use of Blackboard, which began with a pilot program of 120 courses during the Spring 2000 semester and has grown to 350 sections this semester. Their high-tech presentation to the FSEC turned into what Willbern jokingly called "analogue teaching" when an overheated sensor shut down the machine projecting his laptop screen onto an overhead screen for viewing by FSEC members.

Willbern told senators that in order for the pilot program to be implemented university-wide, a "a full-scale, enterprise-wide system" was needed to automatically link with the student information system, so that "enrolling students into this is seamless and automatic." Until that point, staff in instructional technology services had to "batch load" individual courses into the system, he said.

Now, once an instructor signs up to use Blackboard for a particular course, students enrolled in the section are put into the system automatically, Lesniak said.

A CMS, which distributes instructional materials for viewing using the World Wide Web, provides many benefits to both students and instructors alike, proponents say. Instructors can provide course materials, such as syllabi, lecture notes, scanned documents or images, library reserve materials, Web links and even audio and video files that students can access at any place, any time. The system allows for easy updating of announcements, assignments and course calendars; addition of new material, and modification of existing material.

It also allows instructors to divide classes into collaborative groups that work online. Students can communicate via email, discussion boards and real-time chat rooms. Grades can be posted to the CMS so that students can check their progress throughout the semester.

UB chose the Blackboard CMS after an extensive review by a task force of 10 to 12 such products, Willbern said, noting that many instructors at UB already were using Blackboard. Another of the selling points of Blackboard, he added, was that the system was described as being "so easy (to use) that even faculty can learn it."

And faculty members do not need any knowledge of HTML code in order to use the system, noted Lesniak. He also told senators that so far there have been no incidents of anyone "hacking" into the system, either at UB or at the other institutions that use Blackboard. "It's a pretty tight code," he said. "The people who put this together are very good at what they do."

Although use of Blackboard is highly recommended, it is not mandated, Willbern pointed out.

Lesniak added that the research shows that Blackboard "is the system most widely being used and the only one surviving well during the downturn in IT."

One of the next projects to be developed with Blackboard, Lesniak said, is its use in "team communications" among faculty research groups at numerous institutions.

In other business, members of a group working on a revision of the Spring 2002 calendar told FSEC members they soon would have a recommendation on how to add a week to the semester.

The Spring 2002 semester in its current form is only 13 weeks long, and fails to meet the 15 weeks of instruction required by the state, said William Baumer, professor of philosophy.

Baumer, who is working on the calendar issue with Kerry Grant, vice provost for academic affairs and dean of the graduate school, and Charles Fourtner, professor of biological sciences, told Faculty Senate Chair Michael Cohen that the group would make a recommendation on how to add the week at the FSEC's next meeting.

Among the options being discussed are starting the semester a week earlier than planned, on Jan. 14; extending the semester by a week in May, or dispensing with reading days during final exam week and holding exams on Sunday.

President William R. Greiner noted that reconsideration of the spring calendar brings up the issue of when the spring semester should begin. It traditionally has begun the Tuesday after the Monday Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, giving UB what Greiner called "an usually long mid-year break."

He said that he has disbanded the university-wide Calendar Committee and has given the responsibility for setting the academic calendar to Grant in the Provost's Office. "This is an academic issue; responsibility for that calendar properly lies in the Provost's Office," he said.

He noted that the Calendar Committee originally came about due to sensitivities regarding the religious holidays within the academic calendar. "I think if you put it (responsibility for the calendar) into the Provost's Office, it will simplify this issue a great deal," he said.

Fourtner pointed out that one of the rationales for having a later start to the spring semester was that it would allow students to take short courses at other institutions during the mid-year break.

One consideration when determining the starting date of the spring semester is "whether or not we want that opportunity to teach" during early January, he said, noting the bridge courses offered by the Law School in January have proven to be very successful.