Self-Paced Enroll Anytime Instructor Resources

These resources are available to instructors who teach enroll-anytime courses. This page is continuously updated. If you have any questions, please contact the SPEA Coordinator or Julie Zikmund.

Resources

Enrollment Reports

Each week instructors receive an automated report indicating new enrollments for the course.  

  • The report will be sent on Tuesdays or Wednesdays from the OEL (Office of Extended Learning) Registrar.
  • Instructors will get an email even if there are no new enrollments. The text within the email states how many names are included on the attached report. If the text states there are 0 new enrollments, there is no need to open the attachment.
  • The report covers registrations received 8-14 days before the report date. The extra padding is there to ensure that students are ready to start work in your course; we have already verified co/prerequisites and English proficiency when needed.
  • The report contains the student's name, course, and email used when registering for the course. Please note: you should still use the student’s UND email address for correspondence, but we understand that sometimes students don’t check their UND email right away and you need an alternative method to reach them.

If you wish to view a full course roster, view and/or download the Blackboard Grade Center/Gradebook.

Welcome Emails

A great way to welcome an online student to your course is to send a welcome email.

Once you send a welcome email to the student, check the box in the corresponding column in the Grade Center/Gradebook to indicate it is completed. 

Due to timing of reports, occasionally students might appear in Grade Center/Gradebook before they appear on your report; it’s appropriate to welcome them as soon as you know about them.

You may use whatever welcome email text you feel is appropriate. The Student Welcome Email Templates has a few ideas you may choose from, or you can choose to write your own.  This is the first contact a student has with you, so leave a great first impression.

Course Surveys

Course Completion Surveys are compiled twice a year:. The results include the date ranges for April 1 to September 30, and October 1 through March 31. The Office of Extended Learning follows the SELFI procedure and guidelines as closely as possible.  Survey responses are collected via Qualtrics, and the questions are similar to the semester SELFIs.

Course Enrollment Surveys links are in every SPEA Blackboard course. They provide feedback to OEL regarding registration processes. The responses are reviewed monthly. 

Final Grades

When giving final grades, follow these steps: Final Grade Reporting for Campus Connection Do not approve the roster. 

  • If/when students request an extension, they will get an I in Campus Connection. You will not be able to enter grades for these students. Instead please email und.courses@UND.edu with the final grade. 
  • When students request an extension we add an "x" to the end of the End Date field in the Grade Center (Original), or we will indicate the extension in the feedback area of the Student Order Number, Term, End Date in Ultra courses. It's a manual process so there is room for error, but we hope it provides a quick indicator of which students purchased extensions.
  • In Grade Center (Original) is the column for "Term." In Ultra, it's listed in the feedback area of the Student Order Number, Term, End Date item.
  • This helps you identify which semester you’ll find their enrollment in Campus Connection. 
  • Please enter their final letter grade in Blackboard Grade Center/Gradebook in addition to posting the final grade in Campus Connection or emailing UND.courses@UND.edu.

Daily Needs Grading Email

When an instructor has items in the course that need grading (indicated by an exclamation point in the Grade Center), an email will be sent by OEL staff to the instructor notifying them that there are items that need to be graded.

  • The notification email simply states there is something to grade. The details of what needs grading can be found in the Needs Grading report within the Blackboard course (Original).
  • If an item is automatically graded by Blackboard, it will not appear in the Needs Grading report and therefore the instructor will not get a notification.

The last assessment in the course must have an item that required grading. In the past we allowed the option of creating a note that advised students to contact the instructor; this is no longer accepted. 

Student Retention Emails

Instructors are encouraged to send retention emails to students. You may write your own email or use the guides below:

  • Student 30 Day Gap In Course Email Template
  • 30 Day No Work: Retention Center Tutorial - Some instructors have reported that the Blackboard retention center doesn't always work as intended. If that's the case for you, try looking at the grade center column that shows the student's last login date. If it's been a while, check in with the student.
  • Ultra courses: Set Blackboard to contact students when they have been inactive for 21 days.
  • Encourage students to use the Suggested Deadline spreadsheet to get back on track. If your course doesn't have a Suggested Deadline spreadsheet, contact the SPEA Coordinator to have one created. (See below.)

Helpful Items to Share with Your Students

  • Suggested Deadline Spreadsheet - This excel spreadsheet that allows students to view suggested deadlines. The student enters their start and desired end date, and the spreadsheet populates the suggested deadline for each lesson. Consider using this tool when sending retention emails, as well as posting it in the Syllabus area of the course. Please contact the SPEA Coordinator for help in customizing this spreadsheet for your own course.
  • "Study Tips Sheet" for students
  • "Tips To Succeed" for students

Changes to the Course after Launch

Once the course is launched, very few changes should be made. 

  • Please do post announcements when you will be offline for a few days and your grading and email responses will be delayed.
  • If you find articles or videos that may prove interesting to students and supplement the existing content, please share those with students. You could do that through an announcement or in a "Supplemental items" folder if your course has them. This is a great way to connect your course to the "real world."
  • Feel free to fix any typos or grammatical mistakes that you might find.
  • If a weblink breaks or an address changes, you may update the link. 

Do not make any other changes to your course unless approved by the SPEA Coordinator. 

Course Development

Development Process

  1. All revisions should be made in a new Blackboard course shell, not the existing course.
  2. Complete work on lesson 1, the syllabus and textbook area first. Once you and the instructional designer have finalized lesson 1, The SPEA Coordinator will review it.
  3. After all items in step 2 have been reviewed and approved, work on the next half of lessons in the course. The instructional Designer and the SPEA Coordinator will do a quick review again, just to be sure things are still headed in the direction we all are happy with.
  4. Once work on the course is complete, you and the instructional designer will hand it off to the SPEA Coordinator for final review.
  5. After the SPEA Coordinator signs off on the course, the department chair and/or college representative will be added to the course so they may review it.
  6. After all parties have reviewed and approved the course, the course may be launched and opened to new enrollments. 

Instructor Videos

Note: 6/21/24  The criteria regarding instructor videos is in the process of being edited. Please check with the SPEA Coordinator or the Instructional Designer to learn about the current guidelines/requirements. 

  • Instructor videos should be added to YuJa. 
  • YuJa automatically captions videos. Please review the captioning and correct major errors.
  • Each lecture should have download enabled in YuJa.
  • Add the length of the video in the to-list as well as the video item itself, and preferably a short description of what the video covers.
  • Lesson intro video: think about the first and last few minutes of a live class. Consider recording an intro video in your SPEA lesson that covers the same thing. What is covered, why is it important? What points should they pay special attention to? How do they finish the lesson?

Student Videos

Does your course require students to submit video recordings? The preferred tool is currently YuJa. Here are instructions you could include in the course:

  • To record the video, you may use a computer with a webcam or a mobile device.
  • You may either record your video directly to YuJa with the video recorder, or you may record the video on your computer/mobile device and upload it to YuJa later.
  • After the video is recorded or uploaded to YuJa, log in to YuJa to get a direct link. For instructions on how to use YuJa, please see the SPEA Student YuJa Manual.

Allowing students the option of submitting a written paper or a video submission is a great week to keep students more engaged in content, and it is likely to increase the quality of their submission. It also makes grading more interesting for you as the instructor. 

Instructional Resources

Proctored Exams

Exams should only be proctored by a UND-supported vendor. More info to come after the new vendor contract is finalized. 

General Development Tips

  • Each lesson should have lesson objectives that match what is being assessed in the lesson, and a to-do list.
  • Ally ratings should be as strong as possible. Focus first on the syllabus and items that are critical to completing lessons. Items such as slide notes that accompany a video are less important. If you need help updating documents so they have a strong Ally writing, feel free to send the original document to Catherine.
  • Within Blackboard items, use the pre-formatted options for headings and bulleted lists. Not sure what to do? No problem. Enter your content and let the SPEA Coordinator know it's ready to be formatted.

Course Review

Once the course development/revision is completed, the SPEA Coordinator and the Instructional Designer will evaluate the course. The Chair of the Department and the Dean of the College receive a copy of the rubric and are enrolled in the Blackboard course. They will review and approve the course before it is opened for new enrollments.

Instructor Change Steps

When an instructor is done teaching a course (e.g., retirement, resignation, workload, etc.), someone must take over teaching the course. The Department/College is responsible for finding a new instructor.  With the instructor change, the department may consider any of these options:

  • A new instructor takes over the existing course. The course remains open for enrollments, and minimal edits are made to the existing course. The new instructor may or may not work on creating a new course while teaching the existing one. 
  • A new instructor takes over the existing course. The course stops accepting new enrollments and will no longer be open to new students. Minimal edits are made to the existing course. The new instructor may or may not create a new course. 

The Department/College notifies the SPEA Coordinator that an instructor change will occur and the timeline for the change.  The steps below outline the instructor change procedure.  Some procedures may need to be adjusted slightly if it is for a temporary 30-day instructor change.

Upon Notification of the Upcoming Change

  • Once the Department/College notifies the SPEA Coordinator about the change, the SPEA Coordinator will:
    • Email the incoming and outgoing instructors with the timeline or changes so they have it easily accessible in writing. Include the Word version of the syllabus. (see sample message at end)
    • Add the new instructor with the Instructor role to the Blackboard course so they may become familiar with the course.
    • Set up a meeting with the new instructor and an Instructional Designer (ID). At the meeting:
      • Review the instructor change process and expectations.
      • Walk through the course and discuss what changes should be made. Emphasize that additional changes should not be made unless approved by the SPEA Coordinator and ID. This applies to the instructor change period as well as after the change.
      • Introduce the roles of SPEA Coordinator, the Instructional Designer, and the Student Records (SRS) team.
      • Make sure instructor understands the date they should start grading items. Until that date they can start work on the syllabus, welcome video, course commercial, etc., but they should not post the changes yet.
      • Review expectations for grading, welcome emails, how to handle final grades, and notifying students when there will be an extended absence.

Two to Four Weeks Before the Change

  • The outgoing instructor will post an announcement letting the students know there will be a change.
  • The outgoing instructor continues to grade items until the date of the change.
  • The new instructor will revise (but not post) the syllabus, create a welcome video, and become familiar with the course.
  • Suggested: the outgoing and new instructors meet to review the course/grading expectations.

Day of Change

  • The SPEA Coordinator will:
    • Email the new instructor to confirm  they are ready to teach the course
    • Remove outgoing instructor from the Blackboard course
    • Update course commercial on webpage with one recorded by the new instructor, if applicable
    • Update the Course Completion Survey in Qualtrics.
    • Notify others in the Office of Extended Learning and update internal SPEA class documentation.
  • The new instructor and SPEA Coordinator should work together to complete the following:
    • Delete outgoing instructor welcome  announcement, as well as any old announcements that are no longer pertinent
    • In Blackboard, post the revised syllabus as a pdf file
    • Update the Faculty information item in the course
    • The new instructor should post announcement introducing themselves. ("…expectations and grading will be the same…") Include a welcome video.
  • In addition, the SPEA Coordinator should facilitate the following:
    • The Office of Extended Learning will update Campus Connection.
      • Add the new instructor to the current and future terms (if the future class number was already created)
      • Add the new instructor to previous terms that have students still enrolled in the Blackboard course.

        The outgoing instructor will remain listed for the current and previous terms, which means both instructors will display under that class number.

        Note: if this is a 30-day change, only add the new/temp instructor to the applicable terms. If they aren’t teaching during a future term, they will not be added to that class number.
    • The office of Extended Learning will update the automatic reports sent from the Enrole database. 

30 Day Instructor Change

When an instructor is retiring from UND but will ultimately continue teaching a SPEA course after retirement, complete a 30-day instructor change. Begin by completing the instructor change steps outlined above, with modifications where appropriate.

After the 30 days when the original instructor is returning, complete these steps:

  • The original instructor will:
    • Post announcement in course about the switch, delete old announcements
    • Update Faculty information in Blackboard
  • The Office of Extended Learning will:
    • Update weekly enrollment report that is emailed to the instructor
    • Remove outgoing instructor from all Campus Connection sections
    • Remove the temporary instructor from the Blackboard course

 

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