Administrative Information

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Student Use

Student Accounts

All students registered for a Rensselaer Troy campus course (both on-campus and distance education students) are automatically given a WebCT account at the start of each semester. The WebCT account is only operational as long as the student is a Troy campus registered student. WebCT class lists are loaded from the Banner registration system based on CRNs associated with each WebCT site.

Student Access to WebCT Courses

All students registered for an Rensselaer Troy campus course that has a WebCT course site have access to that site during the semester that the course is active. Not all Rensselaer Troy campus courses have WebCT sites.

Code of Student Behavior

Student behavior within WebCT courses (including cheating, plagiarism, and copyright use) must comply with Rensselaer's Policy on Electronic Citizenship.

Faculty Use

WebCT Accounts

All faculty and teaching assistants are eligible to have a WebCT student account. Faculty and teaching assistants who request a WebCT course site are automatically given a WebCT student account and a WebCT designer account with access to their course site(s). If a faculty member does not have a WebCT account, he/she can get one by using the WebCT Student Account Utility (requires an RCS id and password). Having a WebCT account does not necessarily mean that a user has access to WebCT courses. However, if you have a WebCT account, a course instructor can give you access to their course site. Instructors can request additional accounts (for guests, graders, designers) for expanding access to their course site(s).

 

WebCT Course Sites

A WebCT course site is only available to students during the semester in which the course is taught. WebCT course sites are available to instructors for development during the semester prior to delivery and during course delivery semester. After course delivery, archive copies of courses are kept for at least of two years. Every semester new WebCT course sites are created for all WebCT course requests. Any instructor or teaching assistant (with the permission of the instructor) may request a WebCT course site using the WebCT Course Request Form. New course sites are created using the Rensselaer or PDE course template unless the instructor specifically requests that the site be based on an earlier version of the course site.

A WebCT course entails:

Charges - There are no charges to Rensselaer faculty, staff and students for the use of WebCT.

Disk Space

Instructors may put all the materials required for their courses on the WebCT servers. Currently, there is no limitation on the use of disk space for legitimate purposes. However, we encourage users to link to files that are already stored on the web (instead of maintaining copies in their course), discourage storing large multimedia files (e.g. video) and reserve the right to limit disk space use (beyond 200 MB). Backups are limited to one per course.

Course Retention

Your WebCT course site content will be available from archive files for two years.

If the course account is used only periodically (e.g. once every two years), or the account is used for development/testing purposes only, your course will be maintained on the WebCT development server. It will be moved to the WebCT production server when it is required for teaching purposes. (Note:  All courses which are actively used for teaching must be located on the production server.)

Service Period

Our WebCT license is an annual license. Periodically we review the suitability of WebCT as the Rensselaer course management system.

System Backups and File Restoration Service

All content on the WebCT servers is backed up (TSM) daily. In addition there are weekly backups of individual course sites to zip files. Should any of your course content be lost through course development or technical problems, there is a good chance it can can be restored within a few business days. If you wish to have content restored, email webct-support@Rensselaer.edu.

System Upgrades

Major WebCT upgrades are done during the summer. Hotfixes are applied during the school year. Developers will be notified of any changes that this might present via the WebCT-support Listserv. Rensselaer support documentation will be updated to reflect any changes.

Computer Ethics

Instructors, course designers and teaching assistants' use of WebCT shall conform to Rensselaer's Policy on Electronic Citizenship.

Use of Copyright Material

The use of copyright materials in WebCT courses shall conform to Rensselaer's policy on copyright. Please note that the fact that WebCT is designed to restrict access to course materials to authenticated users does not make the unauthorized use of copyright text, images, etc. legally acceptable. For more information about copyright see Copyright Law Highlights and "Fair Use" Guidelines.

Student Account Creation and Management Service

For academic course sites, class lists containing registered students' names and their WebCT accounts are automatically loaded into WebCT courses and updated daily based on CRNs associated with each WebCT site. Instructors must specify all course and section CRNs associated with a site when they complete a course request form. If for some reason a student does not have a WebCT account, he/she an create their WebCT account using the WebCT Student Account Utility.

Support

Support for Rensselaer Troy campus courses and users (both on-campus and distance education courses) may be obtained by completing the Rensselaer WebCT Support Form.

Questions about this page may be directed to webct-support@Rensselaer.edu