Ultra Updates: Summer 2025
Welcome back to our Ultra Update series, where we will be exploring some of the newest updates for Blackboard Ultra. We’ll be highlighting the most relevant enhancements for our institution, including updates to the Gradebook, instructor Activity Page, and more!
You can review . Please note that not all of the features listed in the official release notes are available to our faculty.
Activity Page Updates
The instructor in Blackboard has been optimized and expanded, following suggestions gathered from Anthology’s global learning community. The goal of this update is to make course management easier and more efficient, particularly for instructors managing a large number of courses.
New features include an institutional announcement feed as well as an enhanced course section. Courses featured here (current courses unless selected otherwise) include integrated shortcuts to key pages that need instructor attention:
- Go to items that need grading
- Find courses with new messages
- Access the Course Activity report directly to review students with alerts
The Activity page is responsive across all devices and can be accessed from both desktop web browsers and the Blackboard app. The activity stream is included with the new Activity page.
Gradebook Updates
This quarterly update brings a spread of small quality-of-life changes to grading in Blackboard to improve instructors' workflow and efficiency.
- Instructors can now remove items from their by selecting “No Category”, making it easier to organize and customize the gradebook.
- QTI can now be imported for use in assessments, with supported question types including True/False, Multiple Choice, Multiple Answer, Fill-in-the-Blank, and Essay.
- Editing grading rubrics with the pop-out rubric is now easier with a “save your changes” prompt before closing and improved keyboard navigation.
- Reviewing and grading group submissions is now more efficient with the addition of Previous and Next navigation controls, creating a smoother grading experience with fewer clicks.
If you need more help regarding the Blackboard Gradebook, you can email the faculty success team at citl@lamar.edu to inquire about additional support or training.
Miscellaneous Updates
Announcements
Instructors can now verify which students have marked an as viewed. By selecting the viewer count on the main Announcements page, instructors can open a list showing who has and hasn’t acknowledged the message.
From this list, instructors can send a message to follow up with students who haven’t viewed the announcement or confirm that key information was received. This helps instructors understand how effectively their announcements are reaching students.
Image Captions
Instructors can now add captions above or below image blocks in Documents. Captions provide context and support understanding, helping students engage more deeply with visual content.
Mathematical Formulas with MathJax
Instructors can now using MathJax, a powerful tool that offers a more precise rendering style often preferred by STEM instructors. When activated, MathJax will automatically render LaTeX code entered directly in the Content Editor across supported areas of Blackboard.
Wiris is still available as the default to render formulas for the Content Editor.
