Supplementary Courses now available in OWL Brightspace

As part of the migration to OWL Brightspace, staff and faculty can now request a new Supplementary Course in OWL Brightspace.

What is a Supplementary Course?

A Supplementary Course is a type of course in OWL Brightspace used to host and/or manage content such as prototype courses, training courses, shareable learning modules, and supplementary academic content.

Supplementary courses can be used for the following use-cases:

• Training
  • Create training courses for Western students, staff, and/or faculty.
• Learning modules
  • Share and distribute learning modules for use in academic courses.
• Content development
  • Develop the content, assessments, and structure of your academic course or program in a central template to copy to academic courses.

What's the difference between requesting a new Supplementary Course and Requesting Migration?

You should request a New Supplementary course if:

• You did not previously use OWL Sakai to host this content OR
• You do not need to migrate any content from OWL Sakai*

You should request migration from OWL Sakai to OWL Brightspace if:

• You currently use OWL Sakai to host this content AND
• You meet the eligibility requirements to migrate AND
• You need to host this content in a learning management system rather than another solution.

*You still need to claim the original project site or delete it.

Both Supplementary Course Requests and Requests to Migrate are subject to eligibility. Your request will not be approved if you do not meet the requirements.

What are the requirements to request a Supplementary Course?

1. Technical requirements:
   1. The course is used by Western users with a Western or Western Continuing Studies account. Guest users will need to obtain a Western account to use OWL Brightspace AND
   2. OWL Brightspace has the tools or features needed to facilitate the course AND
   3. There is no alternative solution or tool that offers a better user experience
2. Content requirements:
   1. The content is aligned with the academic mission and relevant to Western’s academic goals, values, and strategic priorities AND
   2. The ‘course’ is not an officially recognized academic course[1] AND
   3. The ‘course’ serves as a structured[2] resource for academic or professional development, such as training or skill-based modules tied to academic programs or academic courses AND
   4. Registration and/or completion of the ‘course’ needs to be documented or tracked.

[1] Academic courses at Western (Undergrad, Graduate, Professional) typically include the following features: credit value, course code, delivery mode defined, assessments and learning objectives.

[2] “Structured”—content is intended to be delivered in a prescribed manner that guides the learner through the content and not just a file storage solution. For example, sites with predominantly text in Lessons pages or files in Resources do not meet the requirements.

How do I request a new Supplementary Course?

To request a new Supplementary Course, submit a Jira Service Desk ticket and complete the required form.

Your request will be reviewed to ensure it meets the eligibility requirements. If approved, your course will be created, and you will be enrolled as a Maintainer. Once you have access to your course, you can start building your content and enrolling other users.