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What's New?
On this page, we share significant changes or updates that are taking place in OWL Brightspace.
In addition to the work our team does to action your feedback into system enhancements and improvements in our resources and training, Brightspace performs system updates monthly. These updates happen automatically and include fixes to security vulnerabilities, new features, and improvements.
New updates and all other significant changes will be visible in your courses by the third Thursday of the month. Please note that all updates scheduled for future dates are subject to change. There may be months without updates, and in such cases, those months will not have a tab for viewing.
Monthly Updates
Admin Tools (Gear Icon)- Enhanced user experience
Details: Previously, when users clicked on the Admin Tools menu (the gear icon located in the top right corner of OWL Brightspace), all tools were displayed in a single window. This required users to use Ctrl+F to search for and locate specific items. With the recent update, the Admin Tools menu now allows users to search for items directly and pin their favourites for easier access.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Course Admin, Maintainer
Grades – Bulk edit now supports excluding items from the final calculated grade
Details: Previously, users could only exclude a grade item from the final grade while editing individual grade items. Now, using the Bulk edit functionality, users can exclude a grade item from the final grade calculation, but this can only be done with the Points grading system.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Course Admin, Maintainer
Announcements – Email a copy of an announcement to your Classlist
Details: Previously, when instructors sent out announcements, users who had disabled their announcement notification settings did not receive email notifications, regardless of the announcement's importance. Now, with the "Send email copy" feature, instructors and related roles can send an announcement along with a copy to every user in the classlist. This means that even those who have turned off their notifications will still receive an email copy of the announcement.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Course Admin, Maintainer
For more information on November updates, please see this page.
Grades – Comments and Assessments column is now always visible to learners
Details: Previously, learners could only see the Comments and Assessments column in the Grades section when feedback was provided for a grade item. Now, this column is consistently displayed for all learners in Grades, regardless of whether feedback is available. Additionally, learners can access related links from tools such as Rubrics, Assignments, and Quizzes.
Role(s) Affected: Learner, Participant, Member.
Media Library– Improved to help organize and manage course assets
Details: Previously, instructors were limited to adding only video or audio files to the Media Library. With the latest update, instructors can now upload Images, Office Documents, PDFs, and SCORM packages directly to the Media Library for use across multiple courses. Additionally, these files can now be organized into folders for easier access.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Course Admin, Maintainer
For more information on October updates, please see this page.
Quizzes – Print your quiz
Details: In the past, instructors had to contact WTS to obtain a PDF version of their quizzes for printing. However, instructors can now print offline quizzes that support all Brightspace quiz question types, along with an answer key.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Course Admin, Maintainer
Groups – Enrollment limit increase
Details: To accommodate larger class sizes, the Groups tool now supports the enrollment of up to 3000 users per group within a group category. The previous limit was 200 users per group.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Course Admin, Maintainer
Class Progress (Statistics) – Learners can now see their class progress in a course
Details: Previously, only instructors could view a student's progress in various tools such as quizzes, content, and assignment completion. Now, this feature is accessible to students through their navigation bar, allowing them to view their progress and related statistics for each course.
Role(s) Affected: Learner, Participant, Member
For more information on August updates, please see this page.
Archive
July
Assignments – Flexible text or file submission options for enhanced learner choice
Details: Instructors can now choose either "File or text submission" as a submission type when creating new assignments. This option is available in the Submission & Completion panel on the assignment edit page. Allowing these choices gives learners more flexibility in how they demonstrate their learning through their submissions.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Teaching Assistant, Course Admin, Maintainer, Learner, Participant, Member
Groups – Bulk enroll and unenroll users by CSV file import
Details: Instructors can now bulk enroll or unenroll learners in existing groups using a comma-separated values (CSV) file in the Groups tool. This feature adds a new Import button to the Manage Groups page and an Import option in the Category drop-down menu.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Course Admin, Maintainer
Quizzes – Reopen a submitted quiz attempt
Details: Previously, instructors could not reopen a submitted quiz attempt. Instructors can now reopen a submitted quiz attempt, allowing learners to resume from where they left off. The new feature supports scenarios where learners run out of time or pass the quiz end date. This update introduces the ability to return quiz attempts to an unsubmitted state and adjust time limits if needed.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Course Admin, Maintainer
Rubrics – Options to improve rubric management
Details: Previously, to modify scoring, instructors had to manually clear each rubric level. Instructors can now clear an entire rubric's scoring using the new Clear Selections option in the Rubrics tool. This update supports instructors who need to reset scoring and start from scratch.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Course Admin, Maintainer
For more information on July updates, please see this page.
June
Awards – Replacement strings for award issuer on certificates
Details: Instructors can now customize certificates and their templates in the Awards tool using the replacement strings {IssuerFirstName} and {IssuerLastName}. These strings automatically insert the first and last names of the user who manually issues a certificate to a learner and only apply to certificates that are manually issued.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Teaching Assistant, Course Admin, Maintainer
Course Information – Course names and codes have been updated for easier navigation
Details: For courses starting in Fall 2025, course names now contain the component (e.g. LEC, LAB, TUT) and term. Course codes contain the career, term, and class number. This update only affects OWL Brightspace.
Role(s) Affected: All roles
For more information on June updates, please see this page.
May
Groups- Export group enrollment data
Details: Instructors now have the ability to export enrollment data from the Groups tool. Instructors and affected roles can use this button to save group data as a CSV file.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Course Admin, Maintainer
Assignments- Retract feedback in bulk on the Submissions page
Details: The Assignments tool's Submissions page now enables instructors to retract feedback in bulk. This bulk Retract Feedback option allows instructors to select how many learners' published feedback to retract at once.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Teaching Assistant, Course Admin, Maintainer
Quick Eval- Evaluate learners across Assignments, Discussions, and Quizzes
Details: In the past, instructors needed to click on each submission individually to view the evaluation, then select "Back to Quick Eval" to return to the Submissions view before locating the next submission to assess. With this update, instructors will now easily navigate to the next/ previous evaluation, even if the submissions come from different activity types or courses.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Teaching Assistant, Course Admin, Maintainer
For more information on May updates, please see this page.
April
Grades - Access Quiz Feedback
Details: Previously, learners could only view quiz attempt feedback in the Quizzes tool. This option remains available, but now learners can also access quiz feedback from the Grades page.
Role(s) Affected: Learner, Participant.
Quizzes – New Quiz Evaluation Experience transitioning to default
Details: In the past, instructors and affected roles had to manually activate the new Quiz Evaluation Experience when grading quizzes. Now, this new Quiz Evaluation Experience is enabled by default for all roles authorized to grade quizzes.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Teaching Assistant, Course Admin, Maintainer
Assignments and Discussions – Bulk feedback for instructors
Details: This feature allows instructors to provide bulk feedback to all learners simultaneously for assignments and discussions within a course through the assignment submissions and assess topic pages, respectively.
Role(s) Affected: Instructor, Facilitator, Teaching Assistant, Course Admin, Maintainer
For more information on April updates, please see this page.