Overview - Communicating with Students

Instructors have several options for communicating with their students. Depending on what you want to accomplish, and how your class is structured, you may prefer to use one tool over the others. This table covers the four main options for communicating with students and should help you decide which option is best for you.

 

Where to find it

PROs

CONs

 

Where to find it

PROs

CONs

Blackboard Announcements tool

Blackboard > Courses > Open course > Course tools > Announcements

  • Best for communicating with the entire class

  • Message is published to course announcements page

  • If the option to immediately send an email is checked, the announcement will go directly to students' Outlook inboxes

  • Instructor must remember to select the option to send as an email

Course Messages tool

Blackboard > Courses > Open course > Course tools > Course Messages

  • Best for communicating to individual students within Blackboard

  • Saves a history of sent and received messages

  • It can be hard to tell which course a message has been received in

  • Message content isn’t sent in an email. If students aren’t aware they have messages, it may be hard to reach them.

Send Email tool

Blackboard > Courses > Open course > Course tools > Send Email

  • Uses Blackboard’s course roster to send emails to students Outlook inbox

  • You can email multiple students, single student, or entire roster

  • You can send the email to your email address, but otherwise there are no records of emails sent and who received them

myBama roster email

myBama > Faculty and advisors tab > Class Lists and Rosters > Summary Class List > Choose Term > Choose Course

  • Emails are sent through your default email provider (Outlook, Mail)

  • myBama directly opens your email provider and automatically adds student(s) emails to the Bcc field

  • Outside of the Blackboard environment

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