Keep your old course

Blackboard courses are retained on the server for 2 years after the end of the semester in which they are taught. A course taught in the fall of 2014 will be retained until after the Fall 2016 semester.

We know there are courses that fall outside this retention window that faculty wish to keep and to facilitate that we mark the courses we intend to delete and then give faculty the chance to indicate the ones that should not be deleted.

This year, the courses that have been marked for deletion have TO_DELETE in their title and a category of TO_REMOVE_20181014.

Saving your Course

If one of your courses has been marked for deletion, you can still save it.  There are 2 ways this can happen.  You can either take an export of the course and save it on your own computer or remove the TO_REMOVE_20181014 category from the course which will leave it on the system for another semester (in which you would have to repeat this process).

Export Your Course

Basic instructions below or view the Detailed Instructions.
  • Open your course in Blackboard.
  • From the Control Panel under Packages and Utilities, click on Export/Archive Course.
  • Click on the Export Package button.
  • Select all of the course materials that you would like to keep.
  • Click on Submit.
The export does not happen immediately and can take some time, depending on the size of the course.  Once it has finished, you will receive an email.  To download the export of the course:
  • Open your course in Blackboard.
  • From the Control Panel under Packages and Utilities, click on Export/Archive Course.
  • You should see a link with your exported course.
  • Clicking on the link will download the file to your computer.

Removing the Category to keep the Course in the System

In order to keep the course on Blackboard, you will have to remove the TO_REMOVE_20181014 category from the course.  Basic instructions below or view the Detailed Instructions.
  • Open your course in Blackboard.
  • From the Control Panel under Customization, click on Properties.
  • Scroll down to section 5, Categorize Course.
  • On the right hand list box (Selected Items), click on the category, TO_REMOVE_20181014.
  • Click on the arrow (less than sign) pointing to the list box on the left.
  • Click on Submit.
This next step is for those users who wish to change the course title back to what it was (without the TO_DELETE).  Also, if you use Panopto for this course you will need to complete this step if you would like to keep this course associated with the content from Panopto.  Your content will still be present on the Panopto server, just this course will not have access to it.
  • On the same properties page as changing the category above, remove the TO_DELETE from the course title under Section 1 Name and Description. 

Removing other Courses

If there are other courses that you would like to remove, that have not been automatically marked for deletion, you may do so.  While you are able to remove courses in the current term, they will be recreated in the system based on the Enrollment Population schedule.  Basic instructions below or view the Detailed Instructions.

Marking a Course for Removal

  • Open your course in Blackboard.
  • From the Control Panel under Customization, click on Properties.
  • Scroll down to section 5, Categorize Course.
  • On the left hand list box (Items to Select), click on the category, TO_REMOVE_20181014.
  • Click on the arrow (greater than sign) pointing to the list box on the right.
  • Click on Submit.