Questionmark and Blackboard Release Building Blocks Bridge; System Links Perception Assessments With the Blackboard Learning System.Business Editors/High-Tech Writers STAMFORD, Conn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 18, 2002 Questionmark, providers of testing and assessment software, and Blackboard (1) See Blackboard Learning System. (2) The traditional classroom presentation board that is written on with chalk and erased with a felt pad. Although originally black, "white" boards and colored chalks are also used. Inc., the leading software company for e-Education, today announced the release of a software bridge that links the Blackboard Learning System A widely used education system from Blackboard Inc., Washington, D.C. (www.blackboard.com). Part of the company's Blackboard Academic Suite, it includes course management, content authoring, collaborative discussions, virtual classrooms, as well as testing and grading. (TM) to the Questionmark(TM) Perception(TM) assessment platform. The bridge, which was beta tested A test of new or revised hardware or software that is performed by users at their facilities under normal operating conditions. Beta testing follows alpha testing. Vendors of packaged software often offer their customers the opportunity of beta testing new releases or versions, and the in the United States United States, officially United States of America, republic (2005 est. pop. 295,734,000), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. and Europe, allows students and instructors to seamlessly link to Perception within the Blackboard Learning System. This means institutions can maintain student and instructor profiles within one system while taking advantage of the powerful assessment features of Perception. Questionmark and Blackboard are committed to working with industry leaders to create interoperability and common functionality. Now instructional designers and instructors who need comprehensive question types, such as drag-and-drop and hot-spot, with a pedagogical ped·a·gog·ic also ped·a·gog·i·cal adj. 1. Of, relating to, or characteristic of pedagogy. 2. Characterized by pedantic formality: a haughty, pedagogic manner. focus, can provide all styles of assessments within their course. Results are not only maintained within Perception for item analysis, but the high level results are also stored within Blackboard's grade book for easy access by students and instructors. "We are delighted with the response our beta testers have had to the bridge," said Questionmark President Eric Shepherd. "Working with Blackboard has been a pleasure, as the relationship is truly synergistic synergistic /syn·er·gis·tic/ (sin?er-jis´tik) 1. acting together. 2. enhancing the effect of another force or agent. syn·er·gis·tic adj. 1. and brings real value to our mutual customers." Beta tester Carlo van Haren of the Stoas Group, a large knowledge management and educational consulting company Noun 1. consulting company - a firm of experts providing professional advice to an organization for a fee consulting firm business firm, firm, house - the members of a business organization that owns or operates one or more establishments; "he worked for a in the Netherlands, stated that "the bridge brings two of the most user-friendly educational systems together, in an easy-to-use manner. It enables instructors to make the Questionmark system available to students in the Blackboard environment without the assistance of system administrators. Even in the early days of beta testing (programming) beta testing - Testing a pre-release (potentially unreliable) version of a piece of software by making it available to selected users. This term derives from early 1960s terminology for product cycle checkpoints, first used at IBM but later standard throughout the the bridge ran well, and it performed consistently well regardless of the security settings we tried out." "The integration of Questionmark Perception assessment platform with the Blackboard Learning System through Building Blocks is of significant benefit to our clients," said Dan Cane, Senior Vice President at Blackboard. "Clients seeking Perception's unique assessment capabilities now have the means to easily integrate with their existing Blackboard installation. Through Building Blocks and applications like Questionmark Perception, we are able to offer clients maximum choice, but still protect existing investments in core e-Education technology." About Blackboard Inc. Blackboard Inc. was founded to transform the Internet into a powerful environment for the educational experience. The company offers a complete suite of enterprise software products and services that power a total "e-Education Infrastructure" for schools, colleges, universities and other education providers. Blackboard solutions deliver the promise of the Internet for online teaching and learning, campus communities, auxiliary services and integration of Web-enabled student services and back office systems. Blackboard's Learning, Community Portal and Transaction Systems are consistently ranked by industry analysts as the market share and customer satisfaction leaders for thousands of academic institutions and a leading number of the Internet's most popular consumer education sites. The company is headquartered in Washington, D.C., with offices and staff across North America North America, third largest continent (1990 est. pop. 365,000,000), c.9,400,000 sq mi (24,346,000 sq km), the northern of the two continents of the Western Hemisphere. , Latin America Latin America, the Spanish-speaking, Portuguese-speaking, and French-speaking countries (except Canada) of North America, South America, Central America, and the West Indies. , Europe and Asia. Blackboard's Building Blocks Initiative (B2) provides an open set of Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) and developer services for creating extensions to Blackboard. Please visit www.blackboard.com for more information. About Questionmark: Questionmark has been producing testing and assessment software since 1988, enabling educators and trainers to write, administer, and report on tests and surveys securely using individual PCs, local networks, the Internet, and intranets. Perception users can categorize cat·e·go·rize tr.v. cat·e·go·rized, cat·e·go·riz·ing, cat·e·go·riz·es To put into a category or categories; classify. cat their question banks into topics and sub-topics from which to assemble tests and surveys. They can shuffle questions and answers for each participant and preview assessments to see how they will appear post-deployment. They can present questions with videos, graphics and a wide variety of styles. Participants receive feedback as specified by the author. Answers are saved to an encrypted en·crypt tr.v. en·crypt·ed, en·crypt·ing, en·crypts 1. To put into code or cipher. 2. Computer Science file for scoring and analysis in a variety of report formats. Businesses, governments, schools, colleges, and universities in more than 50 countries use Questionmark software. Typical applications include exams, quizzes, study aids, diagnostic tests, pre-course skills assessments, and course evaluations A course evaluation is a paper or electronic questionnaire, which requires a written or selected response answer to a series of questions in order to evaluate the instruction of a given course. . Questionmark has offices in the United States, England, and Belgium, with distributors worldwide. Call 800-863-3950 or visit http://www.questionmark.com for more information. |
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