What's New For Faculty

This knowledge base guide introduces an essential article designed for faculty members seeking to enhance their Academic Technologies skills and stay up-to-date with the latest features and improvements within the MyCourses learning management system. The article provides comprehensive insights into the innovative techniques and updates that can transform the online teaching and learning experience.

Spring Semester March 2024

Improved Experience Exporting a Quiz Report

Consistent Experience Creating and Targeting Links

Schedule a 1:1 with MyCourses4Faculty - If you want to schedule to talk with someone from the MyCourses4Faculity Team, you can now schedule a 1:1 meeting. 

Spring Semester January 2024

New Improved Tooltip:

When grading an assignment, if the feedback area exceeds 300,000 characters, there will now be a new Tooltip that will appear that reads, There are invalid grades on this page". The actual error will not be listed, faculty are encouraged to review the evaluation. 

To view more click here:

Grade a Discussion from the Gradebook             

Grade Discussions from Submission Review

Export Awards Earned:

Learners can now export their earned awards using a new Export Digital Credential option. This new feature allows learners to keep their Badges to share and for their own record-keeping. 

To view a detailed example click here

Ungraded Written Response Questions - Show to Students as Pending:

Beginning late January 2024, any ungraded written response questions will remain as pending until the instructor manually grades them. The learner will see - "This question has not been graded" until the instructor grades the question.

To read more click here

Insert Stuff - Update

When adding new content the insert dialog box the Insert Stuff icon now allows for Drag & Drop of files. 

Click here to read about this topic

Click here to watch a quick video to learn more

Assignments & Discussions Now limited to 300,000 characters:

Click  here to learn how to Incorporate Rubric Results into a Discussion Topic's Grade

Click here to learn how to Grade Discussion's from Submission Preview

Calendar:

Beginning late December 2023, when you add both a Start and End Date, you can select Add Availability Dates to Calendar and both dates will be displayed in the Calendar tool as separate events. Previously only one event was displayed, showing when the availability of the quiz ended. 

Click here to learn how to add Start and End Dates to a Quiz 

Better Identified Bonus Questions:

MyCourses now added a new feature so that students can better identify bonus questions inside quizzes. Now any Bonus questions that exist inside a quiz will be clearly marked.

Click here to learn how to view how Quiz Bonus Questions are better identified

Rubrics – Grades Tool Now Consistent:

Now rubrics attached to assignments and discussions will be consistent across MyCourses and will no longer have a Rubric pop-out.

Three Important Pieces of Information About Simple Syllabus:

1. If you are using Simple Syllabus for your spring courses and you do not see the Syllabus tab on the Navigation Bar, follow the steps below:

• Click Faculty Tools (wait for them to load)
• Click More, then click Simple Syllabus to activate the Syllabus Tab on the Navigation Bar.
  (Note: Simple Syllabus and PeopleSoft sync each night, so if you were added to a section in PeopleSoft, you will not have access to the Simple Syllabus until the next day. The same is true for merged sections – you will not be able to access the Simple Syllabus for merged sections until the day after the merge happens in MyCourses.)

When you click on the Syllabus tab, If you have used Simple Syllabus in a past course, it will populate into the current course automatically. If the incorrect syllabus is copied, use the “Replace with a different syllabus?” button to import the syllabus you want.

2. Keep in mind the MyCourses course copy function does not copy your Simple Syllabus over. The MyCourses course copy and the Simple Syllabus copy are not connected to each other. You will need to use the “Replace with a different syllabus?” button inside of the Simple Syllabus editor to copy over the syllabus you desire (if it does not come over automatically).

3. There is a new component that has been added for Spring called Communication Plan.
Note: Although this component has prepopulated information inside it, you will need to fill in the information that applies to your course.

Click here to visit the most up-to-date Guide for Simple Syllabus FAQ’s

End of Fall 2023

Registration Tool Reminder

Faculty can now send their students a registration reminder text  &/or email right from the course home page. The registration reminder tool will appear at the start of week 12 of the 16-week semester. It will be available for faculty to use until the end of the semester. You can click the tool and non-registered students will appear and faculty can send a prepopulated text &/or email or edit the default one provided. 

Click here to view an overview guide about how to get started with the Registration Tool Reminder

Respondus LockDown Browser & Respondus Monitor

Beginning Spring of 2024, we will be replacing Honorlock for proctored testing with Respondus LockDown Browser & Respondus Monitor. Respondus Monitor^® is the leading remote proctoring solution for higher education. It allows students to take online assessments from a remote location - all while ensuring the integrity of the exam process. Students that take quizzes inside MyCourses will no longer have to pay to like they did with Honorlock. It's FREE for students. 

Click here to view an overview guide about how to get started with using Respondus in your courses

Copy Announcements to Other Courses

You can now copy announcements across multiple courses that you teach with just a few clicks.

Click here to learn how to Copy Announcement to Other Courses 

Faculty Tools - Grade Check and Grade Check Scale

Grade Check tab has been updated to include the Grade Check Scale, which is a new tool created by our developers to help the faculty assess student progress and possible grade outcomes. This new tool connects to Quick sParC text messaging in Faculty Tools for easy student communication. Grade check is determined by the confirmed Grade Scheme of the course. 

Click here to learn more about Grade Scale and grade Check

Note: Grade Scale feature is only available to courses with a points based gradebooks that drop ungraded items at this time. The Academic technology team is working on releasing this feature for all gradebooks in the future.

Faculty Tools - Quick SParC

Quick SParC, built within Faculty Tools on your course home page, is a way to send a student(s) a SParC (text) quickly. We have recently added two new features to the Quick SparC tool,

Click Here to learn more about Quick SParC

1. We have added a text all students in course button.


2. We have added a tab in Student Tools that appears to students who have opted out of Quick SparC that displays SparC Text Messages that were sent from the instructor to the entire class.

Here is a screen shot of what the student see's when a text message is sent to the entire class roster but they have Opted out.

Summer 2023

Setup Asynchronous Quiz Click Here

Instructors can now choose to have quizzes automatically submit learner work when the quiz time limit is up. When the time limit expires the learner sees a page letting them know their quiz is being submitted, followed by the Quiz Results Display page.

Synchronous Quiz Setup Click Here

With this setting, instructors can facilitate quizzes where learners take their attempts simultaneously, which is convenient for in-class sessions. The quiz timer then ends for all learners at the same time.

Have Questions? Contact the MyCourses Support Team by email at  MyCourses4Faculty@spcollege.edu or by phone at 727-341-3500 (Hours: Monday - Friday 8:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m. EST).

After-hours or weekend assistance? Contact the SPC Helpdesk at 727-791-2795 or onlinehelp@spcollege.edu

Want to Schedule a One-on-One or Group Session on MyCourses or other instructional technology issues or opportunities? Complete the Schedule Instructional Support form and one of our team members will be in contact during regular business hours.