Starting March 28, 2024, changes (detailed below) were made to new Brightspace courses that faculty should continue to be aware of. While these changes will continue in the Fall 2024 semester, keep in mind that copying courses from older semesters may preserve some of the original settings. Please verify that all settings are as you would like them to be. 
 
Course Template  The Brightspace course template that was automatically applied to all new courses in winter 2024 has not been continued in courses created after March 28, 2024. This helps to prevent duplication of content and structure when courses are copied. This template included the Course Information (Start Here) module as well as sample content modules and submodules. The Course Information (Start Here) module included a link to the Course Outline lookup tool and a link to the Course Feedback Survey. These links have been made available to students elsewhere in Brightspace (detailed below).  
 
Course Feedback Survey Access  Access to the course feedback survey tool is now available to all Brightspace users, including students, faculty, and appropriate staff, through a link in the Brightspace landing page and course navigation bars. This change was also communicated to students.
 
Course Outline Access  Course Outlines can now be accessed in a few different ways. Using the Course Outline link in a specific course’s navigation bar will take the user directly to the outline for that course. All users can access the Course Outline Lookup using the link in the navigation bar on the main Brightspace landing page. Students can also access their course outlines using the My Grades app on their portal. 
 
Navigation Bar  The navigation bar on the main organization page has been updated to include links to the Course Outline Lookup and the Course Feedback. The navigation bars in courses have been updated to include links to the specific Course Outline, the Course Feedback tool, and the Attendance tool. 
 
MS Teams Meeting LTI   We are excited to share that there is a new, simpler way to create online Teams meetings within Brightspace. With the addition of the MS Teams Meeting LTI, course instructors can create, schedule, and share Teams meetings from within Brightspace courses.  To learn more about the Teams Meeting LTI, please visit our CAE help resource. 

   
Brightspace Technical Updates    

Grades – Feedback files are now available in Grades for Assignments, Quizzes, and Discussions This feature allows instructors to ensure that learners can easily review feedback from the Grades tool. Instructor feedback added in Assignments, Quizzes, and Discussions is now visible to learners under Grades. Previously, feedback files were only available to the learner by accessing the activity.  

Assignments – Annotations update This release updates the Assignment Annotations tool. This update fixes several defects; in addition, the icons used in the following areas have received minor updates: Main toolbar, Line tools, Ink tools, Page Layout tools, Sidebar tools, drawing sub-toolbar, Highlighter sub-toolbar, Text Highlighter sub-toolbar, Eraser sub-toolbar, Note sub-toolbar, Textbox sub-toolbar, Line and Arrow sub-toolbar, and Rectangle sub-toolbar.  

Assignments – Google and Microsoft 365 options available in File Upload The option to directly upload a file from Google Drive™ and Microsoft OneDrive® is now available when editing and evaluating an assignment. Users can upload a file by clicking File Upload, and then clicking Google Drive or Microsoft OneDrive in the Add a File window.  

Supported Browsers Update Brightspace’s minimum for supported browser versions increases every January and July. The July update increases the minimum supported browser versions to: Chrome 124+, Edge 124+, Safari 17+, and Firefox 124+.  

Discussions – Reading View improvements | Updated To improve the user experience for learners, this release introduces several updates to the learner Reading View in Discussions. These improvements include the following:
The Start New Thread button is duplicated at the bottom of the page when viewing a topic, eliminating the need to scroll back to the top of the page.
The Add Attachments section is opened by default when creating a new post or new topic. Previously learners had to open the section manually to add attachments.
The Add Attachments section is wider on screen when learners create a new thread.  

For more details about specific updates to the Brightspace you can visit the Brightspace Release Notes Page. 


Microsoft 365

MS Stream Links to Stream (on SharePoint) migrated video On August 21, 2023 videos hosted on Stream (Classic) were migrated to Stream (on SharePoint). During the migration process, links to videos on Steam (Classic) were redirected or re-pointed to same video added to Stream (on SharePoint). These link redirects for migrated videos will be supported until February 15, 2025. Faculty are asked to manually re-link migrated videos ahead of the Winter 2024/25 semester. A reminder will appear at the top of any Stream Classic embedded video or linked video well ahead of the February 15, 2025 deadline.

Add a hyperlink or text callout to a video at specific times
Make your video interactive and more engaging by adding annotations that can include hyperlinks and text. Call out important moments or share documents and other links to additional resources. You can add text and links anywhere in the video timeline to help guide your viewers to the right information. To learn more, see Interactivity in Microsoft Stream – Engage your audience with Callouts and Forms

Add a survey, poll, or quiz to a video at specific times
Make your video interactive and more engaging by adding a survey, quiz, or poll using Microsoft Forms. You can add forms anywhere in the video timeline for videos you own. Go to Microsoft Forms to view responses and share a summary link with answers and scores in Microsoft Forms. To learn more, see Interactivity in Microsoft Stream – Engage your audience with Callouts and Forms

Trim meeting recordings in Stream
If you have edit permissions, you can now trim meeting recording videos in Microsoft Stream. To learn more, see How to trim videos in Stream.  

Teams Meetings Presenter toolbar improvements
When sharing your screen in the MS Teams app, the meeting window typically minimizes and is replaced by a toolbar that appears at the top of your screen. This toolbar can sometimes block elements of your screen in that area. To ensure that users are not inhibited by the toolbar while they are sharing, Microsoft has made the toolbar a moveable object. You can now select and drag the presenter toolbar to move it anywhere on your screen.

Also, users can provide a better video sharing experience in a meeting by selecting Optimize in the presenter toolbar, a new setting that will help your content run more smoothly.

Interact with shared content during a meeting
When someone shares their screen in a meeting, participants can now interact with the content while annotating. They can advance slides, scroll through a document, or resume where they left off without restarting the annotations session. To enable this feature, select Start interacting with background in the annotations toolbar. To learn more, see Use annotation while sharing your screen in Microsoft Teams.
 
Save meeting content with collaborative annotations as a Whiteboard
Collaborative annotations, available now, enable meeting participants with the Presenter role to enable annotations after sharing their screen. This allows everyone in the meeting to draw, add a note, react, highlight text, and more to share their thoughts right on the content, live with everyone else. Now, participants sharing their screen will have the ability to save content with collaborative annotations as a Whiteboard, enabling all meeting participants to revisit this content and continue collaborating after the meeting. 
 
Microsoft Teams: Meeting recap and meeting artifacts automatically shared in chat after meeting
Shortly after a meeting ends, meeting participants will automatically get a set of all the artifacts from the meeting in the meeting chat. Included in this set is a quick entry point to the meeting recap page, the transcript, the recording, Collaborative notes, any files that were shared, a link to any Whiteboard that was used, and the meeting details like date and time of the meeting event. 

MS Teams Chats
Seamless communication across languages in Teams
Intelligent message translation has come to chats. When you receive a message in a different language, Teams will suggest translating it into your preferred language. You can also customize your translation settings to automatically translate messages from specific languages or turn off translation for certain languages. To learn more, see Translate a message in Microsoft Teams.