Do you enjoy spending time with students?  Looking for a new opportunity to interact? If you would enjoy being a key part of welcoming new students and supporting their transition to the Drake community, please consider joining the Blueprint for Success team and teaching a section of Drake’s first-year student success course. Jenny Jones, Director of Graduate Programs in the Zimpleman College of Business, shared the following about her experience: “I’ve taught several sections Blueprint for Success/Bulldog Foundations over the past few years and have thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to connect with the incoming students. As an instructor, you get to help the student acclimate not just to Drake University but to college life as a whole. You can create an environment where the students help each other adjust and learn from each other’s experiences. Each section I’ve led has had a different personality, but each section has been rewarding.”

Blueprint for Success helps students consider concepts and develop skills that are crucial for the development of meaningful personal lives, professional accomplishments, and responsible global citizenship. Students will explore the elements of an equitable and inclusive community, consider life skills necessary for success, and refine academic strategies. This course helps students transition into the Drake community with ease.

The course meets for 11 sessions, 50 minutes each session.  The sessions will be spread out through the fall semester. Instructors will be given all curriculum, materials, and facilitator guides for the course, and will not need to develop any curriculum on their own. In addition, instructors will partner with a peer mentor, and upper-class student leader who can help facilitate class sessions, support discussion, and be a valuable resource to your students.

In addition to assigned class time, chosen instructors will need to attend an all-day training the week of Aug. 1, a check-in meeting the week of October 15 and a wrap-up meeting during the week of Fall 2023 finals. Instructors will be paid a $1000 stipend for teaching Blueprint for Success unless this course serves as a part of your full-time teaching load.  Applicants must hold a master’s degree or equivalent, and teaching experience is preferred but not required. Have questions?  Sign up for a short consultation session. 

To apply, fill out the google form. The application is due Friday, April 7.

— Blueprint for Success Planning Team

The gradebook is populated with students when they’re enrolled in your course. You’ll see all the coursework that’s specific to the course you’re in. You can grade coursework, manage items, and post grades.

Gradebook Views

• List view shows all items in the gradebook by their title
  • Click on the item title to see student data and submissions.
• Grid view shows all items and all students in a spreadsheet like view.
  • For a details, click on any student or gradebook item.

Gradebook Settings

• Gradebook settings include:
  • Providing notifications expectations for Student Performance. The system will let you know if a student does not meet expectations.
  • Making adjustments to Grading Schemas (enhancements to be able to use/apply multiple grading schemas is coming sometime before fall semester)
  • Overall Grade calculations
  • Using Auto-zeros
  • Manage Categories to identify grading item icons, grouping grading items to assist with Overall Grading
  • Create and manage Rubrics
• Search and Filter the Gradebook for specific views of the data
  • Search from List View
    • Search for a submission receipt
    • Within a specific grading item:
      • Student Name
    • Filters from Grid View:
      • Merged course sections
      • Student Name
      • Groups
      • Gradable items, and
      • Categories

About Override Grades

• Override grades are grades you assign manually, for example, if you type in the grade pill in the gradebook. An override label appears next to the grade alerting you to the fact that an override occurred.
  • Sometimes a grade change results in an override grade. An override grade takes precedence over all other grade entries, including rubrics and any attempts with a grade.
• Revert an Override Grade – You can clear an override grade by selecting the final grading pill for the grading item and deleting the manually entered grade. The grade will then revert to the attempt or rubric grade (even if they are ungraded, it will be null).

Setting Exemptions, Date and Time Exceptions, and Accommodations

• Grade Exemptions can be added with or without scores for a gradable item. Students will not be held to the expectations for that gradable item when an exemption is added. The gradable item will be ignored as a part of the overall grade.
• Exceptions apply to single assessments or gradable items for an individual student due to extenuating circumstances.
• An Accommodation applies to all due dates or time limits in your course for an individual student.
  • More on how accommodations work with groups

— Karly Good, ITS

The University Curriculum Committee meets one last time this year, to review proposed courses that cover our Areas of Inquiry and serve as First Year Seminars.  If you plan to submit a course, please do so by April 6 so that committee members have time to read and review.  You can find details about all the AOIs and their learning outcomes here; you can find the submission forms for each AOI and FYS, here.  Professor Mary McCarthy is chair of UCC this year, feel free to let her know if you have questions.

— Renée Cramer, Deputy Provost

You’re invited to join a group of dedicated faculty and staff to talk about teaching and artificial intelligence like chatbots and text-to-image generators. At each of the sessions, listed below, we’ll have a brief opening presentation, then a chance to mingle—café style—to get feedback on and brainstorm about your particular instructional concerns related to the technology, including a table to conversation about the question of our value in light of the technology, and a table where you can get ideas for incorporating AI into your class’ work. We’ll have two sessions via Zoom, and two in person—if you come in person, we’ll provide light refreshments.  The sessions will be:

Thursday, March 23, 12:00 – 1:00 via Zoom
Tuesday, March 28, 11:00 – 12:00 in person
Monday, April 3, 12:00 – 1:00 via Zoom
Friday, April 7, 11:30 – 12:30 in person

Please register here. You’ll be able to pick your session and modality on the Eventbrite link.  We will email you the zoom link the morning of, if you attend on the 23rd or 3rd.

And, please sign up now for Books for Breakfast on April 7 and April 21 from 8:30 – 9:30 a.m. We will meet to eat good food and talk about a lovely book: Helen Sword’s Air and Light and Time and Space: How Successful Academics Write.

— Renée Cramer, Deputy Provost

Drake faculty and staff who exemplify the Core Value Commitment to Mission will be recognized at the next Provost’s Drake Social on Monday, March 20, in the Cowles Library Reading Room, beginning at 4 p.m.

To nominate a colleague, please use this Qualtrics form. Feel free to fill out multiple forms. All those nominated will be recognized on a rolling display at the event.

What do we mean when we talk about Commitment to Mission at Drake? We look for colleagues who act with integrity, purpose, and optimism in service to both our students and our community.

When you nominate colleagues, be prepared to describe how each colleague meets this description. Several nominees will be chosen at random for prizes!

Refreshments will include wine, beer, soft drinks, and an assortment of light snacks. Keep in mind that this is a family friendly event—bring your children and partner!

—Madison Bemus, Office of the Provost

Think twice before you rush to enter an old friend’s March Madness pool this week. There’s nothing wrong with a little camaraderie, but the email invite might be coming from a cybercriminal looking to steal your personal information or money.

Cybersecurity researchers say the annual NCAA basketball tournament brings a slew of phishing emails from scammers looking to capitalize on the public’s eagerness to join the fun. March Madness captures widespread attention, and the yearly rush to get brackets filled out before the first game tips off adds a sense of urgency. That combination makes March Madness a slam dunk for cybercriminals. Emails mentioning the tournament have a better chance of drawing clicks from unsuspecting victims.

Online NCAA pools have been around for years, but March Madness-related phishing has become a growing problem due to the proliferation of social media and artificial intelligence. These technologies have made it much easier for criminals to write and send custom scam emails known as spear phishing. In the past, cybercriminals had to craft spear-phishing emails one by one, doing painstaking research to find the personal details needed to make emails look real. Now social media platforms provide all the personal data needed for potential victims. Artificial intelligence then automates the composition process, allowing scammers to send out millions of highly customized emails that boost their chances of a payoff.

Here are some reminders to avoid getting scammed:

Think before you click. If something doesn’t seem right about an email, just delete it—ideally before you open it. You’re better off not taking the risk.

Examine the link. Before you click on a link, try hovering your mouse over it. This will reveal the full address, which can expose signs of fraud. A “.ru” on the end, for example, means the site was created in Russia. Misspellings are another good tipoff to a fake website. If the URL says marchmadnness.com, avoid it.

Don’t open attachments. They may contain malware. Never type confidential information into a form attached to an email.

Guard your financial information. Be wary of emails asking for account numbers, credit card numbers, wire transfers, or failed transactions. There’s no reason to share such info via message or an unsecure site.

ITS will continue to simulate phishing and assign training to those most susceptible. If you believe you’ve been targeted by phishing, see Reporting a Phishing Message (How-to).

— Chris Mielke, ITS

This article is part of a series of OnCampus articles  called “About … Blackboard Learn Ultra.”  The series is designed to provide information on Blackboard Learn Ultra in small soundbites.

Blocks are the content elements that you add to organize and segment content. You can add blocks for paragraphs, images, headings, lists, videos, and more.  With blocks, you can easily edit the order of the content by reordering the blocks within a Blackboard document.

Example of Block Editing

Block editing in a syllabus would allow you to separate each of the typical sections. Using the example layout below, you could build it into 5 blocks or 13 depending on the depth of flexibility required:

1. About the course: 1) course title, 2) course description, and 3) learning objectives
2. Course environment: 4) instructor contact information, 5) meeting schedule, 6) open education resources and textbook requirements, and 7) technology requirements to be successful
3. Standard syllabus statements: 8) policies, 9) academic success resources, 10) academic honesty, etc.
4. Assessments: 11) assessment descriptions and 12) grading schemas
5. 13) Course schedule

To reorder the syllabus, click the two-direction arrow under the (…) menu of any given block and drag the block of content to drop it in the preferred order.

Block Editing Benefits

Using block editing also makes it easy to:

• Add different types of content (typed/copied-pasted content, uploaded files, HTML, and cloud documents) inline in a specified order.
• Keep your content evenly spaced and yet separated slightly to add white space without managing the formatting between sections.
• Remove blocks without editing other content on the page.
• Only editing the section of the content you want to change without disturbing the other content on the page.

How-to Build Blocks

In the Blackboard content area select the add tool (+) and Create a Document. Choose a type of content to add to the document and keep it brief (a course description or learning objectives, for example). Save that block and hover below it to add (+) another block of the same or different type. Remember to practice editing with blocks in mind by practicing simple acts like reordering the content as you see fit or removing unnecessary blocks. Learn more about creating content in Blackboard documents.

— Karly Good, ITS

This semester we are starting a series of OnCampus articles  called “About … Blackboard Learn Ultra.”  The goal of these articles is to provide some development opportunities in small soundbites that provide the information needed to work efficiently in Blackboard Learn Ultra.

Calendars in Blackboard Learn Ultra

This month we are sharing features of the calendar tool at all levels and roles in Blackboard.  You can use the calendar tool to help you stay on top of course schedules and due dates. Watch the video below to learn more about how to integrate your calendar into your workflow. In addition, once you start using the calendar in your workflow, it also supports the students using the calendar in their workflow. Once you begin adopt in the calendar, share resources with your students to join in!

Instructors

The information provided in the video is also available in a detailed written document about using calendars from the instructor perspective.

Help Your Students

Share this resource to help Students with their workflow of using the calendar in Blackboard Learn Ultra. If you like, you can post the embedded video from within this document into your course content or send it as an announcement to encourage students to use calendars to improve student success.

— Karly Good, ITS

We have had terrific attendance at faculty development centering on artificial intelligence, and a great set of conversations. Nicki and I are working to continually update the CTE website. We’re trying to make a weekly practice of those updates, starting later this week, to include resources as they become available from a host of global institutions.

I also invite you to join a group of dedicated faculty and staff to talk about teaching and artificial intelligence like Chatbots and text-to-image generators. We’ll have a brief opening presentation, then you’ll have a chance to mingle—café style—to get feedback on and brainstorm about your particular instructional concerns related to the technology, including a table to conversation about the question of our value in light of the technology, and a table where you can get ideas for incorporating AI into your class’ work. We’ll have two sessions via Zoom, and two in person—if you come in person, we’ll provide light refreshments.  The sessions will be:

Thursday, March 23, 12:00 – 1:00 via Zoom
Tuesday, March 28, 11:00 – 12:00 in person
Monday, April 3, 12:00 – 1:00 via Zoom
Friday, April 7, 11:30 – 12:30 in person

Please register here. You’ll be able to pick your session and modality on the Eventbrite link.

And, please sign up now for Books for Breakfast on April 7 and April 21 from 8:30 – 9:30 a.m. We will meet to eat good food and talk about a lovely book: Helen Sword’s Air and Light and Time and Space: How Successful Academics Write.

— Renée Cramer, Deputy Provost