December's Ultra update brings overall enhancements to core functionality

This month's update to Ultra provides new and updates indicators for core functionality in Ultra courses including discussions, grading, and reports. 

Two improvements to Ultra focus on the AI Course Design Assistant and the Blackboard mobile app:

• The AI Course Design Assistant is optimized for complex rubric outputs. Instructors can expect better rubrics, even for complicated assessments. The AI Course Design Assistant should also work faster.
• UMBC can define the maximum length of time a user can access the Blackboard mobile app before they are required to login again, which will be about 2 weeks if the session hasn't expired. This should address a student concern that the mobile app was frequently logging students out.

Additional improvements in December include:

• A "new" indicator will display next to discussion posts and replies that a user has not accessed yet, making it easier to find.
• Late submissions will have a "late" indicator within the Flexible Grading interface.
• Instructors will see "Override" for discussion grades that meet this criteria with a new Undo Override workflow.
• Instructors can go directly to an attempt log for any test or assignment from the activity log for any student in an Ultra course.
• Blackboard improved performance so saving groups is now 80%-90% quicker.
• For easier navigation, students can now select arrows to the left and right of LTI or SCORM items to move through learning modules. 

Faculty should see the latest updates in their Ultra courses around December 5-6, 2024. The next update to our Ultra test environment will take place on December 10, 2024; release notes are posted to the What's New in Ultra that same week. Faculty who are interested in test driving new features before they are released to production should open an RT ticket to request early access. Please watch the FAQs, including the What's New with Ultra page, and myUMBC for additional information about Ultra.

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