Inside Blackboard
July 7, 2026
A Year of Listening: How Your Feedback Shaped the New Gradebook Grid View
# Blackboard LMS
# Gradebook
Gradebook Grid View
Misty Cobb
A faculty member said something that stopped us in our tracks during a campus visit last November.
"It was very useful that you were on campus," she told us. "You being here today proves that you listen to faculty feedback."
That comment captures exactly why we spent the past year rebuilding the Blackboard gradebook from the ground up, and why, on August 6, 2026, the new Gradebook Grid View ships to production for all customers.
What the feedback and data told us
The gradebook is where instructors spend a significant portion of their time in Blackboard. Data collected in the early stages of this project told a clear story: the Blackboard gradebook was generating over 224 million page views per month, with instructors spending an average of nearly 37 minutes per session. This was second only to the Content tab across the entire platform. That data gave us a clear mandate: update the gradebook so that it is faster, streamline key workflows, and reduce context-switching.
A year of listening
We didn't start by designing. We started by listening systematically and at scale.
Our User Experience (UX) and Product Management (PM) team conducted a full usability audit of the existing gradebook, mapping every click path for both instructors and students. We reviewed product usage data to understand where people were spending time and where they were getting stuck. We analyzed over 128 ideas submitted to the Blackboard Idea Exchange, tagging and prioritizing them by theme. We met onsite and virtually with faculty, administrators, and instructional designers across dozens of institutions including the University of Rochester, the University of South Carolina, and campuses in Canada, Chile, and Peru.
By the time we sat down to design, we had a detailed picture of what wasn't working and why.
Back to school
In October and November 2025, we deepened our user research. We held countless online focus groups and then traveled to three institutions for in-person sessions. We conducted 1:1 sessions and small focus groups with faculty, TAs, and administrators across three days.
Across every 1:1 session, more than 75% rated the proposed gradebook higher than the one they use today. The current gradebook averaged 6.2 out of 10; the proposed design averaged 7.9. For the onsite visits specifically, the jump was even sharper: from 6.1 to 8.0 â nearly a full two points. The larger jump onsite points to something simple: first-hand experience with the gradebook drives positive perception among faculty.
What drove those numbers? In the facultyâs own words:
"Really easy, less clicking, cleaner looking, looks very easy."
"These little things are going to save me so much time."
"It is definitely simplified but not losing functionality."
Then we opened it up for a technical preview
In May 2026, we invited a broader group of institutional partners to test an early build in a dedicated Technical Preview environment. Ultimately, 336 participants registered across 17 countries. Participants received a realistic course pre-loaded with student data, selected, and attended one of three kickoff sessions offered. We offered more than 40 one-to-one sessions and conducted 22 individual feedback calls. Seventy-nine participants completed a detailed survey, and 91% of participants spent 30 minutes or more hands-on with the product.
The response reinforced what we'd heard on campus, with an important nuance: instructors who used the gradebook themselves gave it a Net Promoter Score1 of +29.
The highest-rated features among instructors were the gradebook filter (6.57/7), grader notes (6.43/7), and the ability to add gradebook columns (6.29/7). The To Do panel was unanimously praised in feedback calls and named as a standout improvement across sessions.
"I don't see it being a hard lift to 'sell' it to most faculty as there are a lot of advantages â lots of streamlined processes that they will reap the benefits of."Â
â Instructional Designer, Technical Preview Participant
Examples of what we refined along the way
The feedback calls and survey weren't just validation. In a way, they were a working session. For example, two changes were made directly in response to what we heard:
- the overall grade calculation link has been restored for easier access
- download/upload gradebook options were moved higher up in the gradebook settings panel to a more findable location
What's new
The changes reflect exactly what faculty told us mattered most.
Everything in one place. The new Grade Details panel opens alongside the gradebook when you click on any student's cell, surfacing submission details, assessment feedback, grader notes, accommodations, and posting status without navigating away. The Assessment Details panel does the same for column-level information.
Grade entry that flows. Hover to the top of any column, click the pencil icon to enter edit mode, and move through students with the Enter key. The sticky pencil icon, which follows you as you scroll, was specifically called out by participants managing large courses as a meaningful improvement over the current experience.
More control over student display. Choose first-name-first or last-name-first. Toggle the student ID column on or off. Sort by name, ID, overall grade, or any gradebook column.
A smarter To Do panel. The replacement for the old Overview tab keeps you in the context of the gradebook while surfacing exactly what needs attention: ungraded submissions and unposted grades, organized by assessment. Unanimously praised in feedback sessions.
What this means for your institution
For administrators and faculty: no action is required. The new Grid View appears automatically on August 6. Gradebook data, grade calculations, schemas, and course settings are completely unaffected.
Your institution's test and stage environments will have access starting July 7.
What's next
The August 6 release is the foundation. Just as we reported on the navigation UI results earlier this year, we'll follow up with data on how the new gradebook performs once it's in the hands of the full user base.
To the 336 people who registered for the Technical Preview, the 75 who completed the survey, the 21 who joined feedback calls, the faculty who let us sit with them on campus last fall, and all of the people who have taken time to meet with us since last yearâs conference: this release is the direct result of that investment. We're glad to be proving that weâre listening one visit and one survey at a time.
For more information, visit the Gradebook Grid Resource Hub or contact your institution's Blackboard team.
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š Net Promoter Score (NPS) measures likelihood to recommend on a scale of 0â10. Respondents scoring 9â10 are Promoters; 7â8 are Passives; 0â6 are Detractors. NPS is calculated by subtracting the percentage of Detractors from the percentage of Promoters, producing a score between -100 and +100. A score above 0 indicates more promoters than detractors.
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