Blackboard – Updating your course description

Students can view a course description on their courses page or by searching in the course catalogue.

These descriptions are not automatically populated, may rollover year on year from a previous version of the course.

You can add some meaningful text here. This might be useful if you have several courses which have similar names. For example, you could:

  • clarify which student cohorts should be enrolled on this course
  • give an impression of what content students can expect to see on this course (or if they should be looking elsewhere)
  • confirm when and where this instance of the course is delivered. Southampton or Malaysia, semester 1 or semester 2?

Examples of course description

List view

Select “More info” to see the course description.

Screenshot of a list view of a Blackboard course, with the "more info" button highlighted.

The example course shows the following description text "This course is delivered in semester 1 for students in Southampton. This Blackboard course contains recorded lectures and course content. You will also need to visit our Teams site for webinars. Assessment takes place in the Blackboard course and also on eassignment."

Tile view

Select the i icon to view course information

Screenshot of a list view of a Blackboard course, with the "1" icon highlighted and the resulting pop-up which appears. The pop-up contains course information such as the course ID and description.

The example course shows the following description text "This course is delivered in semester 1 for students in Southampton. This Blackboard course contains recorded lectures and course content. You will also need to visit our Teams site for webinars. Assessment takes place in the Blackboard course and also on eassignment."

Course catalogue

Search for a course in the course catalogue and the description will appear in the results in the column on the right-hand side.

Screenshot of the results of a search in the Blackboard course catalogue. This is a table with headings Course ID, Course Name, Instructor and Description.

The example course shows the following description text "This course is delivered in semester 1 for students in Southampton. This Blackboard course contains recorded lectures and course content. You will also need to visit our Teams site for webinars. Assessment takes place in the Blackboard course and also on eassignment."

How to update your course description

You must be an instructor on the course.

  • Enter the Blackboard course
  • On the left menu under Course Management/Control Panel, select Customisation
  • Select Properties
  • below the heading Description, update the text as desired
  • Select Submit

Text in square brackets

If you see any text in square brackets, you can delete this. This code was used for a legacy system but is not needed anymore.

The exception is [nosearch] which should not be removed from your course description, if it is present.

Feel free to remove references such as:

  • [AcademicYear=20-21]
  • [Force onto HomePage] 
  • [Programme Information]

This list is not exhaustive. Removing the above text in the square brackets will not change any data associated with your course.

  • Do not remove [nosearch]

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