Impact & Blackboard Webinar Summary

MartinaBlanco · ‎08-14-2023

For those of you that were able to attend our first Impact + Blackboard AMA, thank you! If you were not able to attend live, here is the recording (Passcode: 6X@E4cgA). As promised, we have a few follow-up items for you including the projected product enhancements and content additions. We would also like to invite you to our next Impact + Blackboard AMA on Thursday, September 28th at 9:30am EST. You will receive a calendar invite with the meeting link. For customers who cannot attend, this webinar will be recorded and shared afterward. Also, in order for us to best prepare for your questions please submit your questions in advance. Should you have any questions, please reach out to your Impact CSM Team!

Product Enhancements for Blackboard:

In the past few months, our Impact Product and Engineering teams have partnered with Blackboard’s Product Management team to be able to deliver some key enhancements that will improve the experience of using Impact within Blackboard and Blackboard Ultra. We aim to have these enhancements roll out before Fall semester, so keep your eye on our Release Notes and we will make sure to send out another communication to announce their releases.

These enhancements include:

Ability to leverage page-level analytics in order to create proactive hints and walkthroughs
One of the main obstacles that we have faced with our Ultra integration has been the inability to do proactive messaging on the element level. Thanks to an enhancement on the Blackboard side to the UEF (Ultra Extension Framework), we are now able to scan an Ultra page for the presence of elements and create proactive events. This will increase the possibilities of using Impact messaging for more use cases.
Making Walkthroughs available for Blackboard
Our Impact Walkthroughs and OOTB (out-of-the-box) Walkthroughs have been key feature releases this year. Walkthroughs provide step-by-step guidance for users as they work within the LMS. With the previously mentioned limitations regarding element level recognition within the UEF, we were unable to fully realize this feature for Ultra users. However, with the enhancement to identify the presence of elements, we can also now introduce Walkthroughs in Blackboard Ultra environments.
Reporting on the use of third-party tools - LTI
With the help of the Blackboard team, we have received additional event data that we can leverage in order to more accurately track LTI launches and generate reporting.
Identifying when course content has completely loaded in Ultra
This enhancement is important for Impact to properly time the rendering of Impact components such as messages and/or the support center. Previously, this was done with a timer but now with the enhancements delivered by Blackboard for the UEF, we will be able to have a more reliable process of showing Impact content at the appropriate time.

Impact Content for Blackboard

In addition to the product enhancements, our content team has been hard at work to get you the content you need!

Element level contexts
Once the product team has fully implemented the scanning of events for elements within a page (estimated for the end of August), the content team will begin discovery and creation of out-of-the-box contexts and monitors (where applicable). We will release these contexts as part of our 2 week content release cycle that you can follow here. We will start with the core features such as Content, Gradebook, Discussions etc.

Accessible admin support
The content team is committed to ensuring that you do not need to sift through unnecessary content to get the help you need. We will ensure that your support center in your Impact dashboard is up-to-date with all relevant Blackboard guides. By clicking on the ‘Suggest a feature’ button within the Support center, you will be redirected to the Themes and Ideas section of the Instructure Community should you have a feature request. Additionally, we will launch inline messages inside your Impact dashboard to highlight relevant blogs and other important content.

Support Center and Insights
The content team will run regular maintenance to ensure that Support guides area rendering correctly for your end users. In addition, we will create new monitors based on newly released features, as well as run regular maintenance on existing monitors to ensure the insights you receive as an admin are as accurate as possible.

Campaigns and Walkthroughs
The Impact content team will create out-of-the-box campaigns and walkthroughs (when feasible) around Blackboard features upon request. You can submit your requests here and we will let you know whether it is possible or not and the expected time of delivery. We strongly encourage you to submit regular requests to increase the amount of content available to you.

Your CSM Team

What should you expect to see from the Impact CSM team?

Monthly Communication from the CSM Team via the Impact Newsletter (product and content updates, best practices, resources, etc.)

Ensure all Impact admins are subscribed to our newsletter

Monthly Office Hours on the last Wednesday of the month at 8:30am CST and 2pm CST, you can register here.
A CSM team ready to support you if guidance is needed by emailing impactcsmteam@instructure.com.
A dedicated Impact Support Team that is available by emailing support-impact@instructure.com or by clicking the support button within your Impact dashboard.