**Update** Blackboard Restored **Update**

Blackboard issues have been resolved. If you have further problems, please contact eLearning Services.

Blackboard is Temporarily Down

Attention faculty and students:

Please be advised that Blackboard is currently experiencing technical difficulties. Until this issue is resolved, you may have problems logging in to courses and/or doing anything within a course if you are able to log in. Blackboard is aware of, and working to resolve the issue. We will keep you all informed of further developments as we are updated by Blackboard Inc.

Thank you for your patience.

New Blackboard Features Available for Spring 2014

Safe Assignments (SafeAssign)
SafeAssign replaces Turnitin as a plagiarism prevention service. SafeAssign helps instructors prevent plagiarism by detecting unoriginal content in student papers. In addition to acting as a plagiarism deterrent, it also includes features designed to aid in educating students about plagiarism and the importance of proper attribution of any borrowed content.

Please note that beginning with the 2014 summer semester, Turnitin will no longer be available. SafeAssign has many of the same features as Turnitin.

Differences between SafeAssign (SA) and Turnitin:

• SafeAssign comes free with Blackboard, the Turnitin license is costly.
• Peermark, which allows a peer-marking function is not available in SA.
• In-line grading is not available with SA.
• Rubrics are not available with SA.

Date Management
The Date Management tool allows instructors to easily adjust all content and tool dates in their course from one convenient location. After copying your course, you can now easily transition from old dates to new ones relevant to the new course by accessing the Date Management tool via the Control Panel under "Tools". You can choose to adjust dates (due dates, availability dates, etc) automatically or individually.


Groups Management
The Groups Management Building Block allows faculty members to:

• Easily see which students are in which groups, including which students are not in any groups.
• Easily see and modify group memberships. Avatars are now available to distinguish among users.
• Choose and manage membership for groups sets with an improved workflow.
• Import and export groups and group memberships.
• Sort columns, perform bulk actions for deleting groups, and create Grade Center smart views for one or more groups on the All Groups page.
• Optionally, manage tool availability for all groups on the All Groups page.