Instructions for Copying Courses

You can copy courses and use them as a convenient way to reuse and adapt existing course structures, materials, and content.

Prepare your previous Course for Copying

Preparing your previous course content for copying will help eliminate confusion and access to the new course.

Make content unavailable until the new term.
Be sure to delete/update previous due dates and adaptive release settings on content and assignments in the new course as soon as you copy. Failing to do so will cause stress and confusion for your students – and bog down your inbox with questions.
Using Date Management in Blackboard Tools is helpful! 
Do not copy over Course Announcements.

In your previous course:

To prevent your new students from viewing the content until it is updated and the term starts, go into the old course that you intend to copy and edit all the folders and items in the content tab so that they are not available to students.  Then, when you copy the course over, it will copy over as “not viewable” to the new students.  This will prevent students from seeing the material and getting prompts for overdue items.

Copy Course Content

You can copy courses using the Course Copy option, located under the Control Panel section of the course you want to copy from -- i.e. if you want to copy content from your 2023 Spring course into your 2023 Summer course, you want to choose the Course Copy option in the 2023 Spring course.

You'll find the Course Copy option located under the Control Panel of your course and expanding the Packages and Utilities section.
After choosing Course Copy you will notice the option in the Copy Type drop-down list is Copy Course Materials into an Existing Course.  Copying course materials into an existing course will add content to a course, but it will not remove existing content already loaded into the course. You can only copy materials into a course if you have the role of instructor.
In the Destination Course ID field, choose the Browse option to find the course you would like to copy your content into.  In our previous example, this would be your 2023 Summer course.

The list that appears will only contain courses where you are listed as the instructor.
After selecting the course, select the course materials that you want to copy over to the new or existing course. It is best to choose SELECT ALL and uncheck the unwanted items.

When copying a course you MUST uncheck: Start Here, Course Materials, Syllabus, and Campus Labs Rubrics if shown. These should NOT be copied over as they are preloaded into the updated iLearn course menus.

NOTE: If your options include "Home Page" or "Information" you must uncheck them. These should NOT be copied over as they are no longer used.
Scroll Down to Announcements and uncheck - as it often causes confusion for students.
Scroll Down to Discussions area and choose the option to ‘Include only the forums, with no starter posts’. Failure to change this setting will cause a copy of discussion forum posts made in your previous course to your new course.
If you have the option to select Enrollments to copy the list of users in the course. DO NOT CHECK THIS BOX, as it would copy your old course roster into the new course.
Under File Attachments be sure to choose Copy Links and Copies of the Content to ensure all files, labs, and weblinks are included in the course copy.
Click Submit. After submitting, your course copy will be queued.  Depending on the course size, this may take several minutes – wait on completion. If you are not patient and complete another course copy, all content will be copied once more, creating duplicates and a messy grade center. You will receive an email when the copy has completed.
Once content has been copied over DO NOT FORGET to: