DISASTER RECOVERY INFORMATION

How to prepare for disastrous system disruptions:

 

FACULTY:

·         Keep copies or originals of your course materials available locally (or on an alternative site): assignments, discussion board questions, even wiki and blog assignments should be retained off site.

·         Archive your course: use Control Panel, then Archive Course. There is a free reader called bFree that you can install in order to access your course archive (http://its2.unc.edu/tl/tli/bFree ). Note, however, that this utility does not give access to the Grade Center.

·         Grades and copies of student work are also best kept off site, on a local computer or flash drive.  Download the Grade Center regularly, .To DOWNLOAD your grades to an Excel spreadsheet, go to Grade Center, move your cursor to Manage, and choose Download.

·         Keep a list of the students in your section(s) and their emails.  If you do not have this, you can get a list from Steve Castellano (stephen.castellano@lehman.cuny.edu) if you provide him with your course and section number.

STUDENTS:

·         Keep the emails of your Instructors up to date.

·         Keep copies of all the files and other projects that you have submitted through Blackboard.

·         Keep a copy of your grades, and even, if appropriate, contributions to Discussion Board Forums and Blogs or Wikis.

Tips for what to do when Blackboard becomes unavailable:

 

STUDENTS:

·         Email your instructor for directions on how to continue your work in the course.

FACULTY:

·         Send an e-mail message to the students in your class and let them know about extended deadlines and other changes in your class schedule (if any). 

·          Also, consider attaching important files (like reading assignments) to this message.

·         OR, rather than e-mailing important files to your students as attachments, put these files on an alternate server such as

o    personal server space which comes with most personal or home ISP (Internet Service Provider) contracts

o    (free) personal server space provided by various organizations/vendor including Google Documents

o    shared folders provided by file synchronization services like Sugarsync (free 45 day trial) or Dropbox (first two 2GB are free)

(Thanks to Manfred Kuechler and the Hunter College Bb Information system, http://bb.hunter.cuny.edu/, for tips and information!)