What's New

Student access to Mastery powered by Outcomes: Students can now securely view their own mastery progress directly in Blackboard. This native experience increases transparency, supports learner ownership, and establishes a foundation for future Outcomes enhancements.

Review both sets of Discussion due dates across multiple views in Blackboard: Blackboard now displays both due dates and participation requirements for Discussions across Course Content, Discussion pages, and Gradebook views. This ensures instructors and students can easily track expectations from key entry points, improving clarity and workflow efficiency.

AI Conversation: Use Message Limits: Instructors can now set maximum message limits for AI Conversations to guide interaction length and keep discussions focused on the intended learning task. Students see a dynamic message counter that signals when they are nearing the limit, helping them manage participation and understand when the activity is complete.

Specify assignment submission type: Instructors can define the expected submission type for assignments, including file submissions, text submissions, or both. Students see a submission workflow optimized for the selected type, reducing confusion and improving submission efficiency.

Improvements to multiple choice and multiple answer questions: We modified the default number of answer options a student can select from 4 to 1. When creating or editing a multiple choice or multiple answer question, instructors can change the number of answer options that a student can select. Multiple choice answer options alphabetical labels (A, B, C, D) have also been restored.

Increased SafeAssign file size limit to 25 MB for Direct Submit: SafeAssign now supports Direct Submit files up to 25 MB, reducing submission failures for larger documents that include images or complex formatting.

Video Studio: Control Playback Speed: Users can now adjust playback speed in Video Studio using preset options from 0.5x to 2x, allowing them to review content at a pace that fits their learning needs. This enhancement improves accessibility and supports flexible, efficient content engagement for both instructors and students and is included both in Video Studio placements in Blackboard Core and premium Video Studio offering.

Add Substantive and Non‑substantive Content indicators in instructor discussion analysis: Instructors now have clear text labels identifying Substantive and Non‑substantive content in student discussion posts, improving clarity around the green and red text highlights used in discussion analysis. This enhancement streamlines grading and ensures accessible, consistent interpretation of student contributions.

Adjust grades for individual student attempts in group submissions: Instructors can adjust grades for individual students within a group submission. Visual indicators clearly show when grades differ across group members, supporting fairer evaluation of individual contributions.

Student names display in chosen sort order in Flexible Grading: We’ve improved how student names appear in Flexible Grading. The name display format is now linked to the selected sort order. By default, student names are now shown as Surname, First Name to help instructors quickly locate students. When sorting by First Name (ascending or descending), names will display as First Name Surname.

Create multiple repositories with support for Institutional Hierarchy in the Learning Object Repository: The Learning Object Repository now supports Institutional Hierarchy. A dedicated repository is created for each node in the Institutional Hierarchy. This structure gives each group control over its own content and makes it clear who can create or manage shared items.

Copy automations in course copies: Automations now copy when courses are copied, restored, or imported. Automations are always copied in an inactive state and must be reviewed and activated in the destination course. This feature reduces repeated work by removing the need to recreate automations for every course.

Filter objects by type in the Learning Object Repository: Administrators can now filter items in the Learning Object Repository by type. This filter helps users locate and manage objects more efficiently, saving time.

Improved support for Ally in the Learning Object Repository: The Learning Object Repository (LOR) management view now displays the accessibility score and alternative format download options for files uploaded into the LOR. Accessibility scores do not appear on the Course Content page for items added from the LOR, since instructors cannot edit or improve these centrally managed objects.

Handle images as thumbnail links in Announcement emails: Announcement emails now display embedded images as clickable thumbnail previews instead of long URLs, giving users a clearer, more streamlined view of content. Selecting a thumbnail opens the full announcement in Blackboard, helping users access complete context quickly and improving the overall announcement experience.

Associate subjects using Flat File SIS feeds: Institutions can associate Subjects with Courses and Organizations using Flat File SIS integrations, reducing manual configuration and supporting more consistent curricular structures.

Grades Journey: Apply the Format for date column setting to the Last Attendance Date: The Format for date column setting now applies to the Last Attendance Date column mapping. This update ensures consistent date formatting across all mapped date fields and supports SIS‑specific formatting requirements. This feature requires a Grades Journey license.

Preserve activity data for individual Assignments during Original to Ultra conversion through Bulk Copy and Convert: Administrators can now preserve student submissions, grades, instructor feedback, and rubric details when converting Assignments from Original to Ultra courses, ensuring students retain access to their academic history. This enhancement supports the transition ahead of Original’s end-of-life and lays the groundwork for retaining additional activity types in future releases.

Course Catalog: Preview certificates on the Certificate Management page: Certificate managers can now preview the certificate PDF directly when adding or editing a template. This allows them to verify the certificate’s appearance immediately and reduces cognitive load by eliminating the need to remember templates by name.