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Blackboard's Social Bookmarking Service, Scholar, Enables Global Information Sharing Across Academia

Blackboard announces that faculty and students at academic institutions spanning more than 20 countries are connecting and sharing resources through Scholar, Blackboard's social bookmarking service. Customised for education, Scholar is fully integrated into the Blackboard Learning System. It provides a targeted, innovative way for users to store online bookmarks, as well as share resources and expertise with peers and colleagues across institutions located around the world.

Launched in February 2007, Scholar is built on the principles of Web 2.0, delivering cutting-edge functionality through a rich user interface. It enables users to organize and manage their own collection of online educational resources they find valuable, share them among other Scholars and discover more relevant and valuable resources through them. It is also integrated directly into the Blackboard course environment, allowing instructors to supplement course material with rich, dynamic information, while also enabling students to contribute to the course content.

Scholar recently incorporated new social networking functionality so that users can connect in new ways and build relationships and networks within the site. With this new functionality, users can create and manage networks of Scholar Friends, Scholar Favourites and Scholar Fans to share information and resources.

Scholar is the first offering from the Blackboard Beyond Initiative, announced in 2006. A series of centrally-hosted Web properties, the Blackboard Beyond Initiative leverages Web 2.0 technologies to empower the Blackboard community with innovative tools to pioneer the next generation of teaching and learning.

Scholar is available for Blackboard Learning System - enterprise clients at no cost and is delivered via a Blackboard Building Block or Blackboard PowerLink found on the Behind the Blackboard client support site. Scholar comes pre-installed with Release 7.3 and higher of the Blackboard Learning System - Enterprise License.



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