Dear Colleagues,
With the Spring semester underway, I write to provide updates about the next phase of the migration from Blackboard to Canvas.
The Migration Process
Instructional Development is working with K16 Solutions, a content migration company, to migrate course and organization sites from Maymester 2024 through Spring 2025. K16 will migrate all courses taught during:
- Maymester 2024,
- Summer 2024,
- Fall 2024,
- Winter 2025, and
- Spring 2025
Note: Directed studies, dissertations, independent studies, and master’s thesis courses will NOT be migrated by K16 Solutions. Faculty are encouraged to archive/export these course sites as needed. Blackboard Organization site access and updates will cease at the end of the Spring semester. Learn more about Content Migration Options.
Archiving/Exporting Blackboard Courses
Blackboard offers options to Export and Archive a course under the Course Management tools. Faculty will be responsible for exporting courses that were offered prior to Maymester 2024. The K16 migration will export and then import classes that were offered from Maymester 2024 through Spring 2025, but faculty will need to archive these courses to have a record of grades.
As a best practice and to prepare for the completed migration process, Instructional Development strongly suggests that you export existing Blackboard courses you plan to teach in the future on Canvas.
Export packages from Blackboard include content and any other materials on your course sites that can later be imported into Canvas. Exporting does not include any student information, submitted assignments, or grades.
Archive packages from Blackboard create a permanent record of a course including all content and user interactions available at the time the Archive is created. The grade center feature of any LMS is intended for the publication of grades for students during the semester and should not be used as a long-term repository of grade records. As such, to keep a record of your grades, you must archive your courses, which will include grade information. This archive is essential for educational records and for processes such as resolving incompletes and responding to grade appeals. Faculty should create an archive of all Blackboard courses, including those that K16 will migrate.
Archiving/exporting courses can be done now or any time through May 31, 2025.
- Faculty should export and archive any Blackboard course sites before May 31, 2025.
- Faculty will no longer have access to Blackboard as of June 1, 2025.
Learn how to export/archive a Blackboard site.
Importing Blackboard Courses into Canvas
For courses that will not be migrated via K16 Solutions (those that were offered outside of the semesters listed above), faculty will need to import their Blackboard courses into Canvas manually.
Access to Canvas
All faculty will have access to Canvas by February 21, 2025. All faculty will be automatically enrolled in self-paced training sites:
- Growing with Canvas – Faculty orientation to navigating Canvas.
- Vendor-led Vault – Demonstrations and training of new technology tools in Canvas.
- Passport to Canvas – Student orientation to navigating Canvas for reference.
Additionally, each faculty will have access to:
- One Sandbox site – empty Canvas course site to practice activities outlined in Growing with Canvas and Vendor-led Vault trainings.
- Five Development sites – empty Canvas course sites for designing and drafting upcoming course content. Additional development sites are available upon request via IT Help. Please stay tuned to additional communication about the Blackboard to Canvas migration process from the Provost’s office and the Instructional Development bi-monthly newsletter for helpful resources and next steps.
Thank you,
Shannon Jenkins
Associate Provost for Faculty Affairs and Undergraduate Education