WASHINGTON, May 23, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- In an effort to
provide its learning community with the best in technology, service
and support, Hillsborough Community
College (HCC) will significantly expand its engagement with
Blackboard Student Services(SM) to provide front-line outreach and
support in a range of areas across the institution, from admissions
and registration to financial aid. As part of that effort, HCC has
also selected Blackboard Learn™ Release 9.1 as its learning
platform following a thorough evaluation, and will leverage
Blackboard Student Services to provide helpdesk support to users on
campus, Blackboard Inc. (Nasdaq: BBBB) announced today.
HCC is expanding its partnership with Blackboard Student
Services for the second time in two years after seeing strong and
consistent results in financial aid, admissions, registration, and
IT service desks, including increases in staff productivity and
student satisfaction. Working with Blackboard in the last year, HCC
has shortened the time between financial aid applications and
awards by 50 percent while increasing financial aid staff
productivity by 56 percent. During the same time, first call
resolution has jumped from 20 percent to 91 percent.
"Today's students expect and deserve real-time services and
support around the clock, which means we must find new technologies
to recruit, educate, retain and build loyalty with students," said
Steve Gorham, HCC's Vice President
of Information Technology. "Supporting every prospect, student and
faculty member in the specific ways in which they want to be
engaged can be financially and technically daunting, particularly
as we face state budget cuts. We believe Blackboard Student
Services will help us build and maintain our competitive advantage
by broadening and enhancing the type of support we provide."
Through deep integration into HCC's student information system,
Blackboard Student Services will provide HCC with a robust
self-service model that lets students get simple but critical
information more quickly without always requiring assistance from a
live support specialist. HCC will also leverage new capabilities
from Blackboard Student Services to enable text and voice messages
that help keep busy students informed.
Serving over 48,000 students throughout Hillsborough County (Tampa), Florida, HCC also selected Release 9.1 to
replace WebCT following a review of other course management
systems. The decision was driven largely by faculty who noted the
superior functionality, ease of use, and Web 2.0 features including
blogs and wikis that come with Release 9.1. HCC administrators also
wanted to leverage the full capabilities of the Blackboard Learn
platform to manage digital content and engage campus communities
and groups, and they valued the possibility of working with
Blackboard in mobile education and academic and institutional
collaboration.
The decision to move to Release 9.1 was also driven by HCC's
confidence in Blackboard's proven and reliable client service and
the company's expertise in hosting, supporting and managing the LMS
over time.
"We're excited to further expand our relationship with
Hillsborough Community College to
provide front-line support for students and faculty across the full
student lifecycle as well as host and manage the learning
platform," said Craig Chanoff,
General Manager of Blackboard Student Services. "With this
partnership we can bring 21st century customer service experiences,
like those pioneered by leading private sector companies, to HCC's
students and faculty while reducing the overall cost of
support."
Launched earlier this year with the acquisition of Presidium
Inc., a leading provider of administrative and academic support
services to hundreds of colleges and universities, Blackboard
Student Services supports all aspects of the student lifecycle,
including admissions and enrollment, financial aid, student
accounts and IT helpdesk support.
For more information about Blackboard Student Services, please
visit http://www.blackboard.com/Services/Student-Services.aspx. For
more information about Blackboard Learn, please visit
http://www.blackboard.com/Platforms/Learn/Overview.aspx.
About Blackboard Inc.
Blackboard Inc. (Nasdaq: BBBB) is a global leader in enterprise
technology and innovative solutions that improve the experience of
millions of students and learners around the world every day.
Blackboard's solutions allow thousands of higher education, K-12,
professional, corporate, and government organizations to extend
teaching and learning online, facilitate campus commerce and
security, and communicate more effectively with their communities.
Founded in 1997, Blackboard is headquartered in Washington, D.C., with offices in North America, Europe, Asia
and Australia.
Any statements in this press release about future
expectations, plans and prospects for Blackboard and other
statements containing the words "believes," "anticipates," "plans,"
"expects," "will," and similar expressions, constitute
forward-looking statements within the meaning of The Private
Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual results may differ
materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements
as a result of various important factors, including the factors
discussed in the "Risk Factors" section of our Form 10-Q filed
on May 9, 2011 with the SEC. In
addition, the forward-looking statements included in this press
release represent the Company's views as of May 23, 2011. The Company anticipates that
subsequent events and developments will cause the Company's views
to change. However, while the Company may elect to update these
forward-looking statements at some point in the future, the Company
specifically disclaims any obligation to do so. These
forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as
representing the Company's views as of any date subsequent to
May 23, 2011.
SOURCE Blackboard Inc.