Post an Announcement in Blackboard

Announcements enable staff to send notifications to everyone enrolled on the unit. This is a straightforward communication tool which can be used to announce, for example, when new learning materials are uploaded, to remind students of any upcoming due dates or to quickly communicate any changes to their schedule. 

In the Announcements tab of your Blackboard course, you can:

  • Create announcements.
  • See a breakdown of how many announcements are posted, scheduled and drafted.
  • Search your announcements.
  • Check how many students marked their announcements as read (see the Viewers column).
  • Edit, copy and delete announcements.
A screenshot showing the Announcements overview

Announcements can include text and images as well as audio and video content which will be automatically captioned for accessibility. You can also choose to:

  • Send an email copy of the announcement
  • Schedule the announcement to show and/or hide on specific dates
A screenshot showing the additional announcements options

Students’ experience

Students will be able to view all of their announcements in the Activity Stream on their Blackboard landing page as well as the Announcements tab in specific courses. When a student enters a unit which has a new announcement, it will create a pop-up for the student to view. Students can also mark the announcement as read.

Screenshot of the Mark as Read option in Announcements.

See more about Announcements in Blackboard

Send messages in Blackboard

Messages can be used to contact students and staff directly from Blackboard, without having to use an external messaging system. This functionality enables you to send communications to:

  • specific users (students and staff enrolled on the course)
  • groups created in the course
  • all instructors on the course
  • all students on the course
  • all course members

You can send and access your messages via the Messages tab located on the top menu. The number of unread messages that you have will be indicated with a purple circle.

A screenshot of the top bar showing the Messages tab.

In addition to the Messages tab, you can also send messages from various areas inside the course:

  • Gradebook > Students tab > click on a student > Send Message (top right)
  • Discussions > click on a Discussion > Student Activity > Envelope icon (top right)
  • Gradebook > Markable items > click on an item > Send Message (top right)
  • Analytics tab > Send Message (top right)
  • Groups > three dots next to a group > Send message
  • A submission point in a unit content area> Submissions > Send message (top right)
Screenshot of the messages functionality in the Analytics tab.
An example of the messaging functionality located in the Analytics area

You can choose to send a Message as an email and allow replies.

Screenshot of the 'allow replies' and 'send this message via email' options when authoring a message in Blackboard.

Students’ experience

As a default, Messages in unit courses are set to ‘Learners can only reply to messages’ but you can change this for one of the following options in the Course Settings (see the top right corner of your unit page):

  • Learners can message anyone in their course
  • Learners can only message staff and learners in their groups
  • Learners can only message staff
  • Learners can only reply to messages

If you enable one of the options allowing students to message staff, envelope icons will appear next to staff’s name in the Course Staff register.

Course staff box with an instructor listed, an envelope is next to their name.

In the Course Settings, you can also turn off Messages completely which will make the Messages tab disappear from the top bar of your course.

Messages setting which allows course messages. When turned off, messages will be sent via email only.

Note: To disable the Messages tab as well as the envelope icons in the Course Staff box, you need to have the Messages set to ‘Learners can only reply to messages’ and only then switch them off.

As different teaching teams have their preferred modes of communication, it is essential to agree on a consistent communication strategy and make it clear to students.

See more about Messages in Blackboard Ultra