Leeds Beckett University - City Campus,
Woodhouse Lane,
LS1 3HE
MyBeckett Communities  | Ultra
Page last updated:
This staff guide explains how you can use MyBeckett Ultra communities for communication and collaboration with students.
Course communities provide an online space in which you can add content and communicate with a large number of students on the same course.
Course communities are ideal for managing extracurricular content, as this allows you to do everything you can do in a module, with the flexibility of reaching an entire course, or specific levels of a course. For example, you might have an all levels course community, and separate course community for the different levels that you teach.
How do staff access course communities?
- Staff may need to self-enrol on course communities in order to view and use them.
- Staff can find course communities in the Communities section in MyBeckett.
How do students access course communities?
- Students are automatically enrolled on course communities. The student record system (Banner) sends their course enrolment data to MyBeckett. If a student is not enrolled on the correct course community, it's because they're not enrolled on the correct course in Banner.
- Like staff, students can find course communities in the Communities section in MyBeckett.
You can use course communities to share information such as:
- Course Level announcements and email or whole school communication
- General course information
- Induction information
- Placement information
- Employability information
How can I communicate with communities?
Like modules, you can send announcements and emails from within an individual course community. Instructions are available in our guide to sending announcements and emails.
What else can I do to share information with course communities?
You may also wish to post items of interest such as conferences and opportunities, or embed content such as slides and videos to vary your content and provide a slicker user experience.
You can use communities to encourage interaction across course levels, by providing spaces in which they can connect, communicate and collaborate.
You may wish to set up discussion areas for students such as:
- A place to say hello, introduce themselves and get to know other students studying on their course
- A dedicated place for students to buy and sell textbooks they no longer need
Read our guide to creating discussions to find out more.
You can use communities to help students feel like part of your School / Course, beyond interaction on their individual modules.
Some ideas and examples from existing communities include:
- Add a welcome message to the Group Welcome content area. Think about defining the purpose of the community. What is it for? How would you like students to use it?
- Introduce your team so that students can get to know who they might be working with during their studies. You might want to include photos, an introductory video, or your office hours.
- Set expectations regarding facilitation and interaction. Will tutors be participating in the discussion forums or should students get in touch with questions via email?
- Customise the look and feel of the community. You could add a banner image.
- Promote optional schemes, such as peer mentoring.
Other guides that you may find useful:
