The CUNY SPS OpenLab is Live!

Decorative banner that reads "OpenLab @ CUNY SPS" in CUNY blue and orange font

Do you need a central hub site for your student club or organization? Planning your collaborative projects? Thinking about what open digital pedagogy tools are available to collaborate, create, and explore? Curious about what digital tools are available at CUNY SPS?

We’re excited to announce the CUNY SPS OpenLab (you’re on it right now!). Visit OpenLab.sps.cuny.edu for details.

Upcoming Events

OpenLab is open for business! Join the OpenLab team this semester to learn about available tools and features, including building your own site, using our awesome new single sign-on plugin, and joining the growing groups and conversations happening with other CUNY SPS community projects!

Please bring your OpenLab questions and ideas for one-on-one support and collaboration. We’re looking forward to helping you bring your ideas to life!

Tuesday February 25, 2025 5-6PM – Registration Link
Thursday March 13, 2025 5-6PM – Registration Link
Thursday March 27, 2025 5-6PM – Registration Link
Tuesday April 8, 2025 5-6PM – Registration Link
Tuesday May 13, 2025 5-6PM – Registration Link

For more information, contact openlab@sps.cuny.edu or OpenLab Manager Jesse Rice-Evans (jesse.riceevans@cuny.edu)

	March 2025
Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
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2	3	4 Humanize Your Online… Humanize Your Online Course with VoiceThread March 4, 2025 4:00 pm - 5:00 pm Creating engaging online courses is not easy. In many text discussion-board based courses, students feel isolated and disconnected from their instructors and classmates. VoiceThread bridges the gaps in social presence typically found in online courses. In this workshop, educators will learn how to establish a social presence and connect with their students using VoiceThread to improve course satisfaction and student learning. We will cover all of the basic VoiceThread features, demonstrate how everything works in D2L Brightspace, showcase a variety of examples from actual courses, and have an open Q&A throughout the training. Tuesday, March 4 at 4:00PM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events •	5 Brightspace: Navigat… Brightspace: Navigating the Gradebook and Grading March 5, 2025 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm In this training we will discuss how to navigate the gradebook and the options for grading in Brightspace. Wednesday, March 5, at 12:00PM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events Brightspace: Managin… Brightspace: Managing Groups (30 mins) March 5, 2025 6:00 pm - 6:30 pm In this training we will discuss how to set up groups, group discussions, and group assignments in Brightspace. Wednesday, March 5, at 6:00PM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events • •	6 Brightspace: Managin… Brightspace: Managing Groups (30 mins) March 6, 2025 8:30 am - 9:00 am In this training we will discuss how to set up groups, group discussions, and group assignments in Brightspace. Thursday, March 6th, at 8:30AM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events Brightspace: Feedbac… Brightspace: Feedback (30 mins) March 6, 2025 9:00 am - 9:30 am There are many options in Brightspace for giving students feedback on their work. In this short brown-bag training, we’ll go over how to give feedback on discussions, assignments, quizzes, and group assignments and show you how students access your feedback so you can guide them to making the most of it. Thursday, March 6 at 9:00AM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events Brightspace: Managin… Brightspace: Managing Dates and Visibility of Items (30 mins) March 6, 2025 6:00 pm - 6:30 pm In this training we will discuss due dates, start and end dates, the calendar, and the date management tool and how the visibility toggle interacts with start and end dates. Thursday, March 6, at 6:00PM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events • • •	7 Open for All Worksho… Open for All Workshop - Community Meeting 1 March 7, 2025 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm Friday, March 7 - Meeting 1: Representation: Where and how do students see themselves represented in your field through your course? Who is depicted in course materials? Who is presented as an authority in the field? See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events •	8
9	10	11 Using Video in Brigh… Using Video in Brightspace (Panopto/Video Notes) March 11, 2025 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm Creating video content for your course can be a little overwhelming with the number of options available. Join this session to learn which tools work best for creating a reusable welcome message or lecture, a weekly update or one-time recordings, like giving feedback to students. In this session participants will be introduced to Panopto, the SPS video platform integrated into Brightspace, which streamlines video production. Participants will learn how to access Panopto and its features through Brightspace, focusing on a workflow to create, organize, and publish video content. The Brightspace platform itself has video tools too. We'll highlight when it's beneficial to use one over the other. Tuesday, March 11 at 12:00PM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events •	12 Brightspace: Managin… Brightspace: Managing Dates and Visibility of Items (30 mins) March 12, 2025 6:00 pm - 6:30 pm In this training we will discuss due dates, start and end dates, the calendar, and the date management tool and how the visibility toggle interacts with start and end dates. Wednesday, March 12, at 6:00PM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events •	13 Anthology Ally: An I… Anthology Ally: An Introduction March 13, 2025 1:00 pm - 2:00 pm Learn how Anthology Ally can increase access and improve the overall learning experience in your course by providing choice and flexibility for how students consume content and access media. We will cover both alternative file formats and the accessibility gauge features that are now available to all in your courses and the support Ally provides in addressing any areas where accessibility can be improved, often very quickly! Thursday, March 13 at 1:00PM (KL) Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events OpenLab Support Hour… OpenLab Support Hours March 13, 2025 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm Zoom OpenLab is open for business! Join the OpenLab team this semester to learn about available tools and features, including building your own site, using our awesome new single sign-on plugin, and joining the growing groups and conversations happening with other CUNY SPS community projects! Please bring your OpenLab questions and ideas for one-on-one support and collaboration. We’re looking forward to helping you bring your ideas to life! Thursday March 13, 2025 5-6PM - Registration Link See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events Brightspace: Navigat… Brightspace: Navigating the Gradebook and Grading March 13, 2025 6:00 pm - 7:00 pm In this training we will discuss how to navigate the gradebook and the options for grading in Brightspace. Thursday, March 13 at 6:00PM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events • • •	14 Open for All Worksho… Open for All Workshop - Community Meeting 2 March 14, 2025 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm Friday, March 14 - Meeting 2: Inclusion & Accessibility: How do students access content? How do they access concepts? Does everyone have equal and equitable access to the full range of materials and ideas in your course? See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events •	15
16	17 Using ePortfolio in … Using ePortfolio in your Course March 17, 2025 1:00 pm - 2:00 pm In this session, you will explore the structure of ePortfolio and learn how to use the platform from the instructor view. You will learn how to navigate the Digication in Brightspace, review your students' signature assignment submissions, and share the various support resources available for both students and instructors. There will also be time to answer any questions you might have about ePortfolios at CUNY SPS. Monday, March 17 at 1:00PM (Karen) Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events •	18	19 Brightspace: Navigat… Brightspace: Navigating the Gradebook and Grading March 19, 2025 10:00 am - 11:00 am In this training we will discuss how to navigate the gradebook and the options for grading in Brightspace. Wednesday, March 19, at 10:00AM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events The Pedagogy of Soci… The Pedagogy of Social Annotations March 19, 2025 6:00 pm - 7:00 pm Social annotations can radically change the way your students engage with your course materials, each other, and you, combining the benefits of annotation, dialogue, accessibility, and digital accountability. In this one-hour workshop, we’ll look at social annotations across a range of disciplines, platforms, and assignment types, and discuss how this practice can build students’ skills, foster community, and promote intellectual growth. Wednesday, March 19, at 6:00PM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events • •	20	21 Open for All Worksho… Open for All Workshop - Community Meeting 3 March 21, 2025 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm Friday, March 21 - Meeting 3: Student Voice and Choice: How are students invited to represent themselves within the course? Within the field? How can they be given the chance to contribute to the knowledge community of the classroom and of the field at large? See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events UDL Collaborative at… UDL Collaborative at CUNY SPS March 21, 2025 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm Zoom UDL Collaborative at CUNY SPS Join us for the February meeting of the UDL Collaborative at CUNY SPS. We are a community of practice exploring best practices, answering your questions, and brainstorming solutions. All faculty and staff are welcome! Friday, March 21st at 12:00pm - Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events • •	22
23	24 The Pedagogy of Soci… The Pedagogy of Social Annotations March 24, 2025 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm Social annotations can radically change the way your students engage with your course materials, each other, and you, combining the benefits of annotation, dialogue, accessibility, and digital accountability. In this one-hour workshop, we’ll look at social annotations across a range of disciplines, platforms, and assignment types, and discuss how this practice can build students’ skills, foster community, and promote intellectual growth. Monday, March 24, at 12:00PM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events •	25	26 Advanced Panopto for… Advanced Panopto for SPS Faculty March 26, 2025 11:00 am - 12:00 pm As many of us have learned, Panopto is a handy tool to create video in Brightspace. But many of us have yet to unlock the powerful features inside it. In this session, participants will learn how to access the robust analytics showing us who watched a video and for how long. They will see how faculty can leverage the power of a low-stakes quiz with the in-video quiz tool. A video quiz can be automatically graded and mapped to your grade book. Finally, we'll demonstrate how a regular assignment can be turned into a video assignment with students as the media creators. It's all part of the Panopto platform built into Brightspace. Wednesday, March 26 at 11:00AM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events •	27 Brightspace: Notific… Brightspace: Notifications and the Pulse App (30 mins) March 27, 2025 9:00 am - 9:30 am Brightspace Pulse is a mobile app that can help users stay connected with their courses in Brightspace through a quick view of announcements, grades, course calendars and content. Learn what Brightspace features are and are not available through the app, and how to enable and view Notifications to enhance the app’s functionality. Thursday, March 27 at 9:00AM Register Here See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events OpenLab Support Hour… OpenLab Support Hours March 27, 2025 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm Zoom OpenLab is open for business! Join the OpenLab team this semester to learn about available tools and features, including building your own site, using our awesome new single sign-on plugin, and joining the growing groups and conversations happening with other CUNY SPS community projects! Please bring your OpenLab questions and ideas for one-on-one support and collaboration. We’re looking forward to helping you bring your ideas to life! Thursday March 27, 2025 5-6PM - Registration Link See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events • •	28 Open for All Worksho… Open for All Workshop - Participant Presentations March 28, 2025 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm See more details OFDIT Faculty Development Events •	29
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SPS Faculty Community Hub

Upcoming Events

Welcome to the CUNY SPS OpenLab!

Support

Welcome to the CUNY SPS OpenLab!

Support