Sakai Update: Getting ready for Fall 2012

Fall 2012 course data is now available in Sakai. Faculty and instructors: choose Fall 2012 from the drop-down menu that appears during the course creation process.

IMPORTANT TIP: If you plan on re-using your Sakai content from Fall 2011 to Fall 2012, you should be aware that Sakai handles course copying differently than Blackboard did. While the process is similar to what you may be used to in Blackboard, the ability to link to many different resources and tools in Sakai means that you should also check and re-apply your hyperlinks in re-used courses, since they may be linking back to the previous semester’s course content instead of your current semester’s.

For example, you may have created a syllabus using the Sakai syllabus tool in which you linked to several PDFs stored in your Resources section. When you import this content (the syllabus, the Resources, etc) into your new Fall 2012 course, the links you created in the syllabus tool will still be pointing to your old Fall 2011 course. Your new students won’t be able to access these links, since they were not enrolled in the old Fall 2011 course – only in the Fall 2012 course. We strongly recommend carefully examining all your links to files stored in Resources and other Sakai tools, and making sure that you re-apply the links to the current semester’s course. For more information on re-using course content, and other tips to help you make the most of Sakai for commonly re-used materials, see our guide on re-using Sakai course content.

Templates for Duke professional schools: Law, Nursing, Divinity and Fuqua – coming soon!

Duke Law, Nursing, Divinity or Fuqua faculty might want to wait for the release of Sakai templates for your school (expected by April 6th or sooner) . These templates automatically apply a set of pre-selected tools, links to additional information and school-based support, and offer a school-specific branding for your Sakai course site. Faculty not teaching in the above schools should choose the normal ‘Duke Default Template.’

Blackboard is going away soon – don’t forget to save your stuff!

With every month that passes, we’re getting closer to June 30, 2012 – when Blackboard is officially decommissioned and all access to Blackboard ends. Even though the Duke Sakai team has migrated content from Blackboard into Sakai, there’s still some content that couldn’t be migrated that you may still want to save or access. In particular, student data (such as the Grade Center, Discussion Board postings, Assignments that were turned in, etc) DO NOT migrate to Sakai, and need to be manually saved prior to June 30, 2012 if you ever think you’ll need to access them again. Learn more about what migrates and what doesn’t and learn how to save additional content.

CIT offers several training opportunities!

If you need more information on re-using your old Sakai content – or want to know how to archive your Blackboard materials – consider attending a Sakai workshop. In April, we’re offering several Introduction to Sakai for Teaching sessions, as well as a new workshop focused solely on helping you save your Blackboard content and working with that content in Sakai.