Blackboard Offline (Ultra): 3: Administration

Posted on by peter.peasey

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When students have submitted and you are ready to download the assignments,

  1. Open the relevant course.
  2. Click on View course & institution tools under Course Tools in the right-hand Details and Actions menu and then Marks and Feedback.
  3. In the Assignment List find the assignment you wish to download.
  4. Click on the Download button for the row to access the Download Submissions This screen may take a while to load.Download submission screen - Screenshot of the Download Submissions screen in the Marks and Feedback tool. Assignments are listed in rows, and each row has a Download option.
  5. Select the student submissions you wish to download by clicking on the tick-box to the right of each submission.
  6. Scroll down to click on Submit.

    Info: Blackboard will download the most recent attempt for each student
    1. If the files you are downloading are small, you will see a message saying Process has completed successfully after a brief pause. Click on Click here to download and save the .zip file.
    2. If the file you are downloading is large, you will see the message The download process is taking longer than usual. Wait for a completion message. Once processed, you can access the file through the Download screen, by clicking on the View button under Previous Downloads. Click on the File name to download.
  7. Navigate to your computer’s Downloads
  8. Locate and right-click on the downloaded zip file and select Extract all.
  9. Browse for the shared folders you created in Preparations Outside of Blackboard and SITS. Locate and enter the Downloaded Assignments
  10. Click Save/Extract.
  11. Markers should then be instructed to mark their work and save information as per the guidance in Marking and Moderation.


When students have submitted and you are ready to download the assignments,

  1. Open the relevant course.
  2. Click on View course & institution tools under Course Tools in the right-hand Details and Actions menu and then Marks and Feedback.
  3. In the Assignment List find the assignment you wish to download.
  4. Click on the Download button for the row to access the Download Submissions This screen can take a while to load.Download submission screen - Screenshot of the Download Submissions screen in the Marks and Feedback tool. Assignments are listed in rows, and each row has a Download option.
  5. Scroll to the bottom of page and select the first marker group you wish to download. All groups on the Blackboard course are displayed here, including those not pertinent to this assessment. To help locate your marker groups, these should have been named so that they obviously pertain to a particular marker (see the example below):Select marker - Screenshot of groups listed in the Marks and Feedback tool. The group called 'Marker 1' is highlighted in red.

All of the students who have submitted within this marker’s allocation should be automatically highlighted.

  1. Click on submit.


    Info: Blackboard will download the most recent attempt for each student.
    1. If the files you are downloading are small, you will see a message saying Process has completed successfully after a brief pause. Click on Click here to download and save the .zip file.
    2. If the file you are downloading is large, you will see the message The download process is taking longer than usual. Wait for a completion message. Once processed, you can access the file through the Download screen, by clicking on the View button under Previous Downloads. Click on the File name to download.
  2. Navigate to your computer’s Downloads
  3. Locate and right-click on the downloaded .zip file and select Extract all.
  4. Browse for the shared folders you created in Preparations Outside of Blackboard and SITS. Locate and enter the folder for the marker that corresponds to the assignments you have just downloaded and then click Save/Extract. For example, if you have just downloaded submissions by clicking on “Select Marker 1”, navigate to the Downloaded Assignments folder contained within the “Marker 1” folder and extract the files there.
  5. Click Save/Extract.
  6. Markers should then be instructed to mark their work and save information as per the guidance in Marking and Moderation.



  1. Navigate to the Gradebook
  2. Select Markable items.
  3. Drag and drop rows to reorder them by clicking on the Move Total arrows ‘↑↓’ at the end of the item you wish to reorder.


  1. Navigate to the Gradebook
  2. Navigate to the Marks view by clicking on Marks in the top-left section of the Gradebook.
  3. Click on the ↑↓ icon in one column:
    1. Once to organise the data by ascending marks
    2. Twice to organise the data by descending marks
    3. Thrice to remove the ordering of data.
  4. Navigate to the Students view by clicking on Students in the top-left section of the Gradebook.
  5. Click on the ↑↓ icon in one column:
    1. Once to organise the data by descending number order/alphabetically
    2. Twice to organise the data by ascending number order/reverse-alphabetical order.
    3. Thrice to remove the ordering of data.



Warning:THE USE OF MESSAGES TO STUDENTS VIA BLACKBOARD IS NOT RECOMMENDED AND EMAILS SHOULD BE USED AS A STANDARD FOR ALL CRITICAL INFORMATION PERTAINING TO ASSESSMENTS. Whilst the messaging system provides some initial convenience to the sender, it may inhibit the recipient student’s ability to reply to communications, lead them to missing key information, leave them uncertain who they should respond to, leave their response unchecked, or inhibit the accessibility of the communication depending on the student’s needs and equipment. Consequently, guidance on this aspect of Blackboard has not been provided in full. If messaging is used at all, it is strongly recommended that:

  1. The option to “Send an email copy to recipients” is ALWAYS used.
  2. The email address of the sender is ALWAYS included alongside a message to respond via that address.
  3. Messages include a note to NOT email a response (as the email is sent from a no-reply email address).
  4. The option to “Allow replies to this message” is NEVER used (as these messages may not be immediately received, depending on the settings of the individual user)



Warning: Checking who has not submitted should only be done either where anonymity is not applied or by a member of staff unto whom anonymity restrictions do not apply (eg, not a marker).
  1. Navigate to the Gradebook and select Markable items.
  2. Find the relevant assessment and click on its name.
  3. Click inside the Student status box at the top of the page to sort the list of students by status. For those students who have submitted, the date and time of the attempt appears underneath the student’s name.



Info: When arranging extensions for students during an offline marking process, you should be mindful of how you release marks and feedback to students. Marks and feedback will be visible to students if they have been uploaded in a .zip file, released in the Marks and Feedback tool (in View course & institution tools under Course Tools – Marks and Feedback – Assignment list menu) and the submission point is visible to students. This means that how marks and feedback are released to late-submitting students (including those with extensions) may need further consideration. For more information, please refer to the Mark and Feedback Release section.


  1. Navigate to the Gradebook.
  2. Click Students.
  3. Find the student you wish to allow the additional attempt to and click on their name to enter their record.
  4. Click on the …icon next to the relevant assessment and select Add or edit exceptions.
  5. Change the number of attempts permitted to allow the student another attempt, if required.
  6. Alter the due date and time, if required (for an extension).
  7. If you have used any release conditions or prevented late submissions, you may also need to adjust the show on and hide after date/times to allow the student access.
  8. Click save.


Warning: If you have prevented submissions after a specific date and students have already submitted, you will not be able to allow additional submissions. Preventing late submissions is not recommended.


  1. When students have submitted and you are ready to download the assignments, open the relevant course, click on View course & institution tools under Course Tools in the right-hand Details and Actions menuand then Marks and Feedback.
  2. Click the Download button next to the relevant assignment.
  3. Click on Show All on the right-hand side of the page.
  4. Scroll to the bottom and click Select Late Submission and then Submit.


Warning: If you are using a distributed marking approach, you will then need to allocate these late submissions to specific markers within the off-system folder structure.