February 2025 Release Overview

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This post provides a summary of the upcoming changes including those features which we have highlighted due to their impact. This release is subject to change and we will do our best to keep the information up to date before the release to live on the evening of Thursday the 6th February 2025. For more in depth technical detail additional details are available on the release page.

Change folders to learning modules or learning modules to folders

Instructors can now change a folder to a learning module or a learning module to a folder. Benefits of changing a folder to a learning module include:

Thumbnail images: Learning modules come with thumbnail images, which provide a visually appealing course experience.
Forced sequencing: Instructors can force students to navigate learning modules in linear paths.
Progress bar: Learning modules have a progress bar for students that highlights the number of items that they need to complete and their progression on those items.
Previous and next navigation: Students can quickly navigate to the next or previous item in a learning module.

You can also change learning modules to folders. However all learning module functions are removed when converting a learning module to a folder.

Conversion of existing assignments to the new assignment workflow

Back in August 2024 Blackboard made changes to the way that Assignments are created to create a distinction between Assignments and Test. Prior to that release Assignments and Tests had the same settings and no functional separation. As part of this February release any existing Assignments will be converted so that they display the correct settings, the changes will not impact any existing submissions.