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This month there are several big and small updates coming to Brightspace. Below is a breakdown of some of the main changes and updates you can expect. These updates should roll out to Vanderbilt’s Brightspace overnight Thursday, July 9 into Friday, July 10.

Additionally, it was just announced that the New Content Experience will become the default in Vanderbilt’s Brightspace starting with Fall 2027 courses, and instructors and other course builders can enable it now to experiment or make the switch early. Some of the below updates are only present in the New Content Experience, so this emphasizes our decision to move to that view being the default experience for new courses. For more information about the New Content Experience Transition visit our Transition page here.

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• Assignments – Publisher selection dropdown locks after students begin an activity
• Brightspace – Improved usability of Help text dialogs
• Content – Apply Creator+ Elements with D2L Lumi Remix
• Content – Default border removed from embedded LTI activities
• Content – Manage outcome coverage and alignments from one place
• Groups – Increased limit for groups per category (200 to 1,000)
• Groups – New Manage Groups user interface
• Quizzes – Autosave for Written Response Questions
• Quizzes – Create question variants with D2L Lumi

Assignments – Publisher selection dropdown locks after students begin an activity

After student submissions begin, instructors can no longer change the Publishers setting on the assignment creation page. Previously, instructors could change the Publishers configuration after receiving submissions. Locking the Publishers setting after submissions begin ensures that publishing rules remain clear and predictable during evaluation and publishing workflows. Changing publisher rules after activity is underway can affect who can publish evaluations and may result in conflicts that require additional intervention. This update provides a smoother, more reliable evaluation and publishing experience.

Important: To change the publisher selection after the dropdown locks, instructors must either delete all student submissions or recreate the assignment and ask students to resubmit. To avoid this scenario, review publisher selections during course setup and before the assignment is available to students. For assignments that use Advanced Assessment, confirm which publishers can publish evaluator evaluations before submissions or evaluations begin.

Instructors can use start dates or hide assignments until the required configuration is complete. After submissions or evaluations begin, instructors can still add, update, enroll, or unenroll publishers. Only the publisher selection dropdown is locked.

Brightspace – Improved usability of Help text dialogs

This update improves Help text dialogs in Brightspace. Help text dialogs appear when users click question mark icons in various places across Brightspace. Previously, these dialogs did not automatically resize to fit the screen, which could hide content or action buttons and prevent users from accessing information, closing dialogs, or manually resizing the dialog.

Help text dialogs now automatically resize to fit the screen, ensuring all content and actions remain visible and accessible. Dialogs now display a scrollbar when content exceeds the available space, allowing users to scroll through the full text and access all controls.

 

Before improvement:

Figure: The previous help dialog can only be resized using the highlighted control.

 

After improvement:

Figure: The improved help dialog adapts to the available screen size while preserving access to all content through scrolling.

 

Content – Apply Creator+ Elements with D2L Lumi Remix

To help educators transform learning content into more engaging and interactive experiences, D2L Lumi Remix can now automatically analyze page content and apply Creator+ Elements. This update allows instructors to instantly uplift existing pages with interactive components rather than building them manually.

With this release, Lumi Remix supports the following Creator+ Elements:

• Accordions
• Callouts
• Stylized Quotes
• Tabs

In the Lumi Remix workflow, instructors can select the Apply Creator+ Elements option and click Generate. Once applied, these elements can be further customized and refined using the standard Creator+ authoring tools within the Brightspace HTML Editor.

Note: This release does not include the ability to generate Creator+ Practices.

To learn more about Lumi Pro, click here.

Content – Default border removed from embedded LTI activities

To create a cleaner and more seamless visual experience for embedded learning activities, Brightspace no longer displays the default gray border around Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI) activities like Kaltura videos on Content pages. This update applies to both newly added and existing LTI activities. Removing the border improves visual consistency across platforms and better aligns interactive content with the modern Brightspace experience, reducing the need for custom styling or workarounds by course authors.

Note: This update only affects the visual appearance of the activity border. The way instructors add, launch, and interact with LTI activities remains unchanged, and there is no impact on activity functionality or accessibility.

Figure: An embedded LTI activity displayed in Content with the default gray border.

Figure: An embedded LTI activity displayed in Content without the default gray border.

Content – Manage outcome coverage and alignments from one place

To help instructors and instructional designers manage learning outcome alignments more efficiently, this feature updates the Outcomes Coverage experience in Content with a single workflow for reviewing course coverage and managing alignments. This new workflow is available in the New Content Experience (NCE).

Instructors and instructional designers can now review learning outcome coverage across a course, review alignments by module, and manage activity-level alignments from the same page. This update reduces navigation between separate pages and provides a more streamlined workflow for reviewing and updating outcome alignments.

Previously, outcome coverage review and outcome alignment management were accessed separately. Now, instructors can review coverage across an entire course, examine alignments within modules, and manage activity-level alignments from a single page. Bulk editing is also available for outcome alignments, allowing instructors to make changes more efficiently.

Figure: Use the Edit Outcomes Coverage view to review outcome alignments across course modules, identify coverage gaps, and evaluate overall alignment progress.

Discussions – Anonymous Discussion posts are visible when assessing students and viewing statistics

With this update, instructors can view anonymous posts when assessing individual students in Discussions. Anonymous posts display an Anonymous post label to indicate that the student posted anonymously.

Previously, instructors could reveal a student’s name on an anonymous discussion post, but they could not see anonymous posts when assessing students or view discussion statistics that included anonymous posts.

Figure: Instructor view of an anonymous discussion post, showing that the student’s name is visible to the instructor but hidden from other students.

Discussion statistics now include anonymous post counts for roles with permission to see anonymous post author information. Statistics include counts only for anonymous posts created after this feature is introduced.

When students view linked discussion activities in Content, the My Work area now includes their anonymous posts. These posts are labeled Anonymous post.

Figure: Student view of an anonymous discussion post, showing the Anonymous Post label and tooltip explaining how anonymity applies to classmates and instructors.

Groups – Increased limit for groups per category (200 to 1,000)

Group Categories that allow instructors to specify the number of groups now support up to 1,000 groups. Single-user, member-specific enrollment type groups also support up to 1,000 groups per category.

This update makes it easier to create larger group sets in high-enrollment courses.

The 1,000-group limit applies to all group creation methods and cannot be exceeded. This includes creating groups on the Manage Groups page, creating groups using the API, and automatically creating groups when enrollment capacity increases.

Previously, instructors could create up to 200 groups per category.

Groups – New Manage Groups user interface

This release introduces a new Manage Groups interface that helps instructors and administrators manage course groups more efficiently. The updated interface supports larger class sizes by making it easier to manage more groups in a single category, reducing the need to spread small-group activities across multiple categories.

Figure: Choose whether to enable the new Manage Groups experience from the opt-in banner displayed above the current Groups interface.

After instructors opt in, they can view all group categories on a new page. This page helps users quickly validate group setup by showing existing categories and their configurations. Instructors can view each category’s enrollment type, number of groups, and associated activities. Each activity links to its related locker, discussion, or assignment.

Figure: The new Manage Groups interface displays group categories in a table with the number of groups, enrollment type, and associated activities for each category.

From each category context menu, instructors can edit the category, add a group, manage members, import users, export member details, email the category, or delete the category. Access to the Recycling Bin remains available. However, the Import and Export buttons are no longer on the Manage Groups page; they are now available from each category’s context menu.

To view and manage individual groups in a category, instructors can select a category to open a details page. This page shows each group’s name, code, number of members, associated assignments, discussions, and lockers. Instructors can edit each group’s name and code, manage members, export members, email the group, or delete the group.

Figure: The group category details page lists individual groups and provides actions to manage the category, add groups, and access each group’s assignment and locker files.

Note: In the new Manage Groups experience, the Enroll Users option is renamed to Manage Members. Currently, both terms appear in the Groups tool. Future updates will align this language across the Groups tool pages.

 

As part of the improved Manage Groups experience, the Recycling Bin page presents visual updates, including new filtering and search options. These updates do not change how instructors delete or restore groups and categories.

Figure: Recycling Bin lists deleted group categories and groups, with options to search, filter by item type, select items, and restore selected items.

 

Quizzes – Autosave for Written Response Questions

This release adds autosave every minute to Written Response quiz questions that use the HTML Editor. Previously, autosave every minute was available only for Written Response questions that did not use the HTML Editor. This update helps ensure that student responses are saved in case of accidental disconnect or auto-submission when the time limit is reached.

 

Quizzes – Create question variants with D2L Lumi

To help educators create diverse question sets that assess the same concepts in different ways, D2L Lumi Quiz can now generate variants of existing questions. Previously, Lumi Quiz could generate questions only from existing content or free-text input. This update helps instructors reinforce learning and promote assessment fairness by presenting concepts through different question types and formats.

Instructors can generate variants from the Question Library using the following methods:

• Generate Questions split button: From the split button at the top of the Question Library, click Generate Questions and select Generate Question Variants.
• Context menu: Choose a question, open its dropdown menu, and select Generate Question Variants.

Figure: In the Question Library, click Generate Questions and select Generate Question Variants to generate new question variants using D2L Lumi.

Figure: In the Question Library, click the context menu arrow and select Generate Question Variants.

When generating variants, instructors can:

• Choose the number of questions to generate (1–10).
• Specify question types, including Multiple Choice, True or False, Written Response, Multi-Select, and Short Answer.
• Provide custom instructions.
• For questions aligned to learning outcomes, focus generation on specific outcomes.

Note: This release does not include the ability to generate an actual question pool, as question pools are not supported within the Question Library.

 

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