Attention eClass Users,

Please be aware that in July 2015, we will be performing a major version upgrade to eClass. This upgrade will introduce major functional and usability improvements to the gradebook and quiz as well as a large number of feature improvements across the site.

The upgrade will require a full system outage, which has been scheduled for Saturday, July 4th 2015.

The main system features that will change in the new version of eClass are listed below.

• New login portal

• The eClass login portal will be have a new look and feel, with optimization for mobile users

• Gradebook

• Improved gradebook user interface which uses the whole window, allows stable scrolling in all directions with locked column and row headings, and adds support for mobile devices

• Instructors can now filter by student name

• New gradebook ‘Single view' to view any column (grade item) or row (single student) - a great improvement for simplifying grade entry for a single activity and for performing bulk actions

• Inclusion of a new aggregation method –  ‘Natural Weighting’ – that replaces 'Sum of grades' with better support for weightings, extra credit, excluded grades, and hidden grades

• New Grade History report which lists the full details of all grade changes

• Simplified design and clearer terminology for gradebook construction

• New design of User Report with clearer layout and better breakdown of grade calculations for students

• New option to import grades via copy/paste of data directly from spreadsheet

• Improved system handling of gradebook imports (better error messages for null or bad data; protections for locked grade items)

• Quiz

• New question strikeout feature for multiple choice questions enables students to eliminate distractors in multiple choice questions

• Quiz construction interface is streamlined and more clear

• Question bank interface improved allowing for easy duplication of questions and drag and drop reorganization

• Improved quiz reports

• Essay questions can require an attachment with optional text

• Random short-answer matching question type has returned

• Instructors can view all tries in the responses report

• Forum

• Improved navigation

• New option to subscribe to individual discussions in a forum

• New discussions now display in recent activity report

• Attachments are now displayed in the same order they were uploaded

• Assignment

• Instructors can now edit or delete student submissions

• Assignment submission notifications are now only sent to specific roles

• Instructors can now enable a setting to provide inline feedback by directly marking up online text assignment submissions.

• Word limit setting added to online text assignments

• File upload built into assignment description

• Instructors can customize which roles in their course receive notifications

• Groups

• Instructors can now ignore users that are already in groups when auto-creating groups

• Instructors can now auto-create groups based on an existing group or grouping membership

• Misc.

• New default HTML Editor (Atto) featuring automatic text saving

• New restrict access settings  to allow conditional release of resources and activities based on more complex Boolean combinations (ie. OR and NOT statements).

• One-item scales have been added to eClass (instructors can now add a ‘Like’ dropdown rating to Forums)

• Instructors can now enable Choice activities to allow students to make multiple choices

If you have any questions about this upgrade, please contact us at eclass@ualberta.ca.

Regards,

IST eClass Support