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• The NEW Illinois Compass
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• New Features and Enhancements in the NEW Illinois Compass
• Orientation to the New Illinois Compass
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Read Newsletters & Articles :: Feature Articles

The NEW Illinois Compass

by CITES EdTech Staff

Between May 21st and mid-June (2007), Illinois Compass will be shut down. (Instructors teaching during Summer I and Summer II as well as continuing courses can get course sites on our "Pilot" Illinois Compass system that has been running with limited users since January 2007.) During that time, we will be transitioning to new and improved hardware for Illinois Compass, and upgrading from WebCT Vista 3 to Blackboard Enterprise Vista 4. This Illinois Compass Upgrade offers an improved look and feel, smarter navigation, and new teaching and learning tools and options, as well as a more robust and powerful backend. The transition should be relatively seamless for students, but instructors and designers are encouraged to learn about the new system through at least one other method beyond self-guided clicking around. Instructors and designers using Compass can request individual consulting, attend a 50 minute Orientation Session, explore our soon-to-be-revised online documentation, or attend formal, hands-on training, beginning mid-June.

Just like moving from one home to another, our move to a new Compass home means that we have to decide what stuff we need to throw out, recycle, give away, and actually take with us. The "movers" (CITES) will automatically move over all Compass timetable courses from Fall 2005 to Spring 2007.

Older courses, non-traditional courses, as well as development or practice courses will not be automatically included in the move. IMPORTANT NOTE: Development courses and practice courses ("Designer and Instructor Experience Course for . . . [your name]") will no longer be available once the new system is online. For these courses we encourage owners to back-up old grades, and download files, assessments, and learning modules. If you need help saving old course material, contact CITES EdTech.

For those who can't wait until May to see the latest version of Illinois Compass, we will have several demonstration sessions in April and May where we will preview some of the interface changes and new features in the upgrade. For those who will be teaching in the Fall 2007 semester and want to develop their courses before the system upgrade, please contact us to set-up a consulting appointment.

Illinois Compass Upgrade FAQ

What about my course sites?

• Compass course sites taught from Fall 2005 to Spring 2007 will be migrated to the new system.
• Non-time-table courses that are not associated with on-campus, semester-based instruction (VetMed Online, Guided Individual Study, Staff Training, and so forth) that hope to remain active after May 21st MUST be added to our "moving list." If this non-time-table course must be active during the May 21st to the mid-June downtime, then that course will need to be moved to our Compass Pilot System.
• Compass course sites taught prior to Fall 2005 will NOT automatically be migrated. Here's what you can do with older courses:
• Grades from these courses can be exported to a spreadsheet, such as Excel, for archival purposes (See: Exporting Student Grades)
• Content in the course file manager can be downloaded to your computer (See: Downloading Content from the File Manager)
• Assessments can be exported from Compass or downloaded using Respondus and be imported into new course sites (See: Exporting Assessments)
• Learning modules can be exported from Compass and be imported into new course sites (See: Exporting Learning Modules)
• Practice ("Instructor and Designer Experience Courses") will not be moved to the new system - contact EdTech about getting a practice course on the new system.
• Development courses will not be moved to the new system. Development courses on the new system can be requested via the course site request form.
• If you have concerns, contact us at: edtech@illinois.edu

What do I need to know about the new Compass?

• The hardware is more robust and the software offers new teaching options (See: New Features and Enhancements in the NEW Illinois Compass).
• Changes and improvements in the new Compass are significant enough that all instructors and designers would benefit from attending our Orientation to the New Illinois Compass training session.
• You can contact EdTech to arrange a private or group consultation (designed for your department or group) introducing the new Compass.

What's in Store for the Compass Upgrade?

You may well be wondering what enhancements you can look forward to with this upgrade. Here's a sampling of some of what's in store:

• Expanded possibilities for student contributions to the course site, including adding annotated web links, journal entries, blog-style postings, and feedback on discussion postings.
• The ability to create grading rubrics to be attached to assignments and discussion topics.
• Increased ability to move/share content between course sites.
• Enhanced file management including the ability to move/rename folders, filter by file type, and improved WebDAV (drag-n-drop) access.
• Display of the maximum number of points possible in the My Grades tool for students.
• Display of instructor comments from assessments and assignments in the My Grades tool for students.
• Option of creating pages available to the public, not just enrolled students.
• Option to display a table of contents as the first page in a learning module.
• Improved flagging of when new content has been added to a course site.
• More consistent navigation and tool access.

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