LMS Weekly Update: A few Tips for the 2020 Winter Beginning of Semester

Posted on Friday, January 10th, 2020


Combined Courses

When asking for combined courses, please make sure you give us the complete course code (include section numbers, too), the option you would like us to use when we combine them (into an existing shell or into a new one – read here details on this), and also if you would still need to keep the individual sections available to you and students.

Course Copy

Click here for details on how to copy the entire curse content or just selected areas of the course.

Important: Existing Announcements are Also Sent as Emails during the Course Copy!

Whenever you are performing a complete course copy into an active course, be aware that all the announcements that are getting copied over into the new course will also automatically be sent as emails to all the students enrolled in your new course, as expected with announcements in Brightspace.

To avoid this, you could make the course temporarily inactive (Tools/Course Admin/Course Offering Information) for the duration of the course copy or use the Select Components button when doing the Course Copy and exclude the announcements from the list of course components to copy.

Course Calendar Events

If your Brightspace Calendar is populated with events from older courses or other courses that you have been enrolled in (for instance, the Exemplar Template courses), please note that you can remove them from your list of courses displayed in the Calendar list. In the Calendar tool view, the drop down list will display ALL your courses. Clicking on the X beside the course code, will remove those course calendar events from your main calendar.

How YOU Can Get Help with Brightspace

As the semester start is always a busy time for our LMS Support Team, please learn about all the multiple resources available to assist you:

  • Brightspace Essentials for Faculty course has tons of video tutorials, step-by-step instructions and many tips that will help you get acquainted with Brightspace and its many capabilities. Send an email to us if you don’t have access to this course in Brightspace.
  • Brightspace training sessions: New sessions will be offered starting in a couple of weeks, keep an eye on the Professional Development Registration System for details of upcoming sessions.
  • Open a case by emailing us at brightspace@algonquincollege.com.
    • Please make sure to include all the relevant information.
    • Avoid CC-ing people as this potentially creates duplicate cases.
    • When you require approval for a request, open a case first. You will get an automated email indicating that your case has been received. You can include other people when replying to this email to add them to the case.
  • We recommend booking a 15-minute appointment with us. Appointments are limited to 15 minutes in order to help as many people as we can. You are always welcome to use the ELX as a workspace, and we’ll happily answer quick questions in between appointments.
  • Walk-ins are always welcome and will be assisted on a first-come, first-served basis between appointments.
  • Finally, you can call us at (613) 727-4723 ext. 6943. If we are available we will take your call right away, but you may be asked to leave your name and number for us to call you back. You can also use the appointment booking form to setup support by phone – leave your details and we will call you back at the chosen time for a 15 minute session

The LMS Support team is available to help you between 8:00 am and 5:00 pm, Monday to Friday. When the ELX has extended hours, basic Brightspace help is offered at the front desk.

Have a Wonderful Semester!


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