New Information Screen for Exams and Timed Projects

Students will see a new information window before they take a SIMnet Exam, SIMpath Exam, Test Bank Exam, or Timed Project assignment. The information on the screen includes the Student Name, Student ID, Assignment End Date, the Length of the Assignment and other assignment details as applicable. The details visible to the student and the information within those details vary by assignment type and instructor selection.

For example, if the instructor selects the Allow to Pause Exampreference when creating an exam, the notification for students will say, You may pause or exit this exam and continue at a later time. If the instructor deselects the Allow to Pause Exam preference, the exam notification will say, You must complete this exam attempt in one sitting. If you exit or leave it will automatically be submitted.

For example, if the assignment is organized by dates, the student will see a Complete By line with the End Date. If the assignment is not organized by dates, this line will be absent.

Students will need to check the box to confirm that they have read available student integrity details at their school before they can start their assignment.

Exam Information View

The available details that appear in the exam launcher depend upon the settings for the exam.

For more information on Exam Preferences https://help.simnetonline.com/manager/content/exams/simnet-exam-assignment-prefs

For more information on Timed Projects: https://help.simnetonline.com/manager/content/projects/project-assignment-prefs#2-assignment-preferences and SIMnet Community blog post

New Student Exam Options

The options available to students during an exam have been updated for clarity.

The iExam Info button, or i button, displays the exam details, including the length of the exam, attempts at each question and whether the exam can be paused.

The Submitbutton ends the exam and submits the exam for grading. This button replaces the previous xbutton which had the same function but was not as clear for student users.

If the instructor has selected the Allow to Pause Exam option in the exam preferences, the Pause button will appear. Using this button stops any applicable timers and exits the exam. The exam can then be resumed at a later time by opening the assignment and clicking Take Exam. A paused exam is not submitted until the student submits the exam or the Due Date for the assignment is met.

New Exam Buttons

Instructors can use a new report to view how their students are doing on each Student Learning Objective all on the same screen. This report displays their student’s percent score on each Student Learning Objective (SLO) from each time that objective has been scored in a project across as many projects as the instructor chooses.

For Example, you may want to know how well students did on the SLO IP19-WD-02.1, Format a document by customizing margins, page orientation, paper size, vertical alignment, and page movement across the project assignments in your course. The Project Objective Analysis Report per Student report provides this information.

In the report result, each SLO in each project you select for your report will be displayed in its own column. Each student in each course you select for your report will be displayed in their own row. The percent score represents the total number of times that the student got the question right out of the total number of times that SLO was used in any project that was used to generate the report.

Project Analysis Report per Student result

To create a new Project Objective Analysis Report per Student, navigate to the Reports section of the course manager and select Create on the left navigation. In the Type drop-down menu, select Project Objective Analysis Report per Student. Create your report title. Select the desired Class, Campus, and Project options. Select the Group All Sections of Selected Class Yes radio button if you would like to group the results by class. Selecting this option will display the results of the selected course in all campuses, and will therefore remove the Campus option. Select a specific date range if your course has old sections that you would like to filter out of your results.

Project Objective Analysis per Student report options

Instructors can now set their Project assignments to delay Incorrect Feedback in results provided to students. By default, Incorrect Feedback shows up under each scored step in a project and informs students exactly which steps they got wrong and why they got each step wrong.

Project Assignment Incorrect Feedback

For example, in step 5 above, the student got step 5.b incorrect because they did not appropriately space the noted paragraphs. The student can use this feedback to carefully edit their submission for their next attempt.

Instructors can now decide when to allow students to see Incorrect Feedback. By default, the Delay Incorrect Feedback value is set to after 1 attempt. This means that students will be able to see the Incorrect Feedback immediately after they submit their file for grading. Instructors may change that value to any attempt number, so long as it is within the total number of attempts allowed for the assignment.

Project Assignment Preferences

In the example above, the student will not be able to see any Incorrect Feedback until after their second attempt. Because the assignment is only set to allow for 2 attempts, the student will not be able to use the information in the Incorrect Feedback to edit their attempt.

Project Assignment Incorrect Feedback Delayed

When the Incorrect Feedback option is set to not display for a given attempt, the student receives the message, Feedback is not available for this attempt.

Incorrect Feedback will be displayed for all attempts regardless of the Incorrect Feedback setting after the assignment End Date has passed.

Microsoft recently announced changes to the update channels for Office 365 Apps on Windows. A new update channel has been introduced and previous channels have been renamed.

What are Microsoft 365 Apps?

Microsoft 365 Apps is the locally installed version of Office that’s available through many Office 365 plans and includes all of the Office apps. Microsoft 365 Apps is updated regularly. These updates occur at a different pace depending on the update channel you select.

What are update channels?

Update Channels allow users to choose how they want to receive updates to Microsoft Office. Selecting a more active schedule of releases like Current Channel (Preview) gives users the newest updates as they come available. However, those updates may not be fully tested and may not remain in the program for the long term. The Semi-Annual Enterprise Channel gives users the fewest updates after the longest schedule of testing,

Update channels are essentially different versions of Office 365 Apps. Most students will likely have the Current Channel installed by default. However, because SIMnet follows the Semi-Annual Enterprise Channel for releasing new features, this could cause a discrepancy between what a student sees on their own version of Office 365 and what they see in SIMnet. We advise that you avoid any channels named “Preview” as they may contain features that are not supported in Projects.

Update channels are specific to the device being used and is set when Office 365 Apps is installed. For example, lab computers may be set to run on a different channel than a student’s personal computer. Each Office 365 subscription is subscribed to a default update channel but can be changed. Refer to Microsoft for more information.

How does this affect SIMnet?

In SIMnet, the simulation interactivities such as Exam Questions, Show Me, Guide Me, and Let Me Try exercises are updated following the Semi-Annual Enterprise channel releases in January and July. For projects, alternate instructions are added for changes that appear in the current channel but have not yet been released in the Semi-Annual Enterprise channel.

How do I know which version of Microsoft 365 Apps I have?

If you are unsure which version of Office you have, open any Office file (or create a new blank file). Click theFiletab to open Backstage view. ClickAccountorHelpfrom the list at the left of the screen. Your Office installation information will be listed on the next screen. Click the Update Options button to show the available options and select the right choice.

For more information about reviewing your Microsoft Office version, view our help topic https://help.simnetonline.com/students/assignments/projects/your-office-version

Mac Update Channels

Mac users have fewer update channels but they follow the same basic structure as Windows users.

To view your Mac Update Channel, open an application, like Word. Click Help in the top menu. Select Check for Updates and click the Advanced button. Select your channel from the Update Channel drop-down menu.

NEW: Custom Branding Homepage and Credentials; Gradebook Sync Update

NEW: Custom Branding

Administrators will see a new option in the Administration section of the left menu in the Course Manager. The new section is called Branding.

Branding Heading

This section allows for two new custom branding options for your school to add its logo to the SIMnet login page and to all Digital Credentials earned by your students in SIMnet.

Custom Homepage Logo

By editing the Custom Homepage Logo, your school’s logo can appear in the upper right corner of the SIMnet login page. Here, the Custom Logo is displayed next to the school name, “University of Triad.” (Note: to edit your school’s name, please contact your McGraw-Hill representative with the specifics of your desired edits)

SIMnet homepage with custom logo

To add your Custom Homepage Logo to SIMnet, navigate to the Branding section of the Administration Settings section of the Course Manager. Select the Yesradio option for Include Custom Logo. Once the option has been selected, the Upload Custom Logo (.jpeg or .png) button will become available. Click the button to upload your image to the image window.

Custom Homepage Logo options

Your custom logo must be able to fit within one of the pre-defined aspect ratios provided in the Crop Image window. You may crop your image by dragging within the image window or by entering precise height or width values within the Crop Image window. The aspect ratio will automatically keep your height and width pixels the right size to meet your selected aspect ratio. You may click the Link button, next to the Height and Width text boxes to break the locked aspect ratio for your height and width. Doing this will cause the final logo to stretch to meet the requirements of the homepage logo.

Crop Image window

Your custom logo will be resized during saving to the required dimensions to display on the SIMnet Homepage.

Digital Credential Branding

The Digital Credentials earned by your students can now display your school logo, your school name, and the name of the course in which the student earned the credential. To enable custom branding, click the Enable Custom Branding Yes radio button. Clicking the radio button will enable the Include Custom Logo and Include School Name radio buttons. If you elect to include the school name, the Enable Course Name radio button appears.

Digital Credential Branding options

You will need to set up a separate Custom Logo for the digital credential regardless of whether or not you have set up a custom homepage logo.

Below is an example of a Digital Credential Branding for Triad University. The logo is in the lower left corner, accompanied by the School Name, “University of Triad,” and the Course Name, “CIS102 – Introduction to Computer Information Systems.”

Digital Credential Sample with branding

Gradebook Sync Update

For MH Campus Classic integration users (not Deep Integrations) there is a new LMS Sync option in the SIMnet Gradebook. This option allows the instructor to control which category SIMnet sends to the LMS upon assignment sync.

By default SIMnet will use the Group Title the assignment belongs to. The new option, Default Title, will allow instructors to send SIMnet as the category for all assignments, regardless of organizer groups.

Gradebook Sync Options

NEW Office Online Projects

SIMnet is releasing a suite of Microsoft Office Online compatible projects. These projects have been designed and tested using Microsoft Office Online, the free online version of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. These projects can be used by any subscriber to Office 2019/365 in their web browser.

Note: The Office Online Projects use the same base project as the previously available projects that were designed for the fully installed version of Office for Windows and Mac but they are not the same projects. Online Office does not have the full suite of options available with the locally installed version. Therefore the Office Online Projects have fewer points and do not include all of the same steps. You will need to assign Office Online Projects separately. To view the exact changes involved in each project, view the .

Assigning an Office Online Project is the same as assigning any other project in SIMnet. However, the Office Online Projects are collected in a separate textbook. Navigate to Projects on the left navigation and select the A Skills Approach – Office Online 365/2019 – Manning Swinsonor In Practice – Office Online 365/2019 – Nordell, Graves, Stewart depending on which book series you are using or would like to assign to your students.

Available Office Online Projects

Word

The following Skills Approach series projects have been adapted to Office Online Projects:

• Challenge Yourself 1.3

• Challenge Yourself 2.3

• Challenge Yourself 3.4

• Challenge Yourself 4.4

• Challenge Yourself 5.3

The following In Practice series projects have been adapted to Office Online Projects:

• Independent Project 1-4

• Independent Project 2-6

• Independent Project 3-6

• Independent Project 4-4

Please review the specific features that are not available in Word Online and which steps have been removed accordingly in the Office Online Projects PDF above.

Excel

The following Skills Approach series projects have been adapted to Office Online Projects:

• Challenge Yourself 1.3

• Challenge Yourself 2.4

• Challenge Yourself 3.3

• Challenge Yourself 4.3

• Challenge Yourself 5.3

The following In Practice series projects have been adapted to Office Online Projects:

• Independent Project 1-6

• Independent Project 2-5

• Independent Project 3-4

• Independent Project 4-5

Please review the specific features that are not available in Excel Online and which steps have been removed accordingly in the Office Online Projects PDF above.

PowerPoint

PowerPoint projects are currently in development. They will be available in time for the Spring 2021 semester.

Access

There is no Office Online version of Microsoft Access.

SIMnet will be unavailable on Sunday, August 2nd, 2020 from 4AM – 8AM US/Central time. We are performing routine maintenance to improve performance, reliability and security.

Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Sincerely,

McGraw Hill Product Team

SIMpath Personal Assignment grades can now be automatically transferred into a student’s SIMpath grade in the course gradebook. Previously, Personal Assignment grades had to be manually adjusted by instructors upon completion.

SIMpath Personal Assignment transfer options

To assign a Personal Assignment SIMpath, find the SIMpath in the SIMpath section of the left navigation and select Edit/Assign from the actions menu. Click the Student Assign tab and select the desired student. Fill out the desired preferences. In the Post-Test Gradebook Options section, ensure that the **Transfer student results to:**drop-down list shows the desired course.

Restricting Dates when Creating New Classes

SIMnet has improved your control over when your students can enroll for your courses and how and when students can access materials. When creating a class, you can elect to note the dates when the course becomes available and is no longer available. Instructors can then use those dates to restrict enrollment to the course and ensure that no students are viewing materials ahead of time.

Create a new class using the Create option in the Manage section of the left navigation of the Course Manager. Fill in the details of the course. Fill in the Class Available From text box with the desired start date and time for the course. This value defaults to allowing the class to be immediately available. If you select a Class Available From date and time that is in the future, selecting the Restrict enrollment before start date check box will keep students from being able to enroll in the course before the start date. You may alternatively elect to allow students to enroll in the course by leaving the Restrict enrollment before start date check box blank. If you allow students to enroll in the course, you may stop students from viewing assignments before your course begins by selecting the Restrict viewing of class assignments before the start date check box.

The Create Class view

Fill-in the To text box to select an end date and end time for the course. Once you select an end date and time for the course, two additional restriction options become available.

Select the Restrict enrollment after end datecheck box to keep students from inadvertently enrolling in a course that has ended.

Select the Restrict viewing of class assignments after the end date check box to keep students from re-accessing their course materials after the course has ended. Restricting the viewing of class materials will not keep students from being able to review their SIMbooks after the course is complete.

SIMpath Exam Question Analysis Report

There is a new Report available to Instructors to analyze their course materials. This report works like the Exam Question Analysis Report but uses questions from SIMpath Exams.

To create a SIMpath Exam Question Analysis Report, select Reports and Create on the left navigation in the Course Manager. In the Type drop-down menu, select Simpath Exam Question Analysis.

The SIMpath Question Analysis Report view

When creating a new SIMpath Exam Question Analysis Report, you may filter the results by Class, Campus, SIMpath, and a Date Range. You can have results automatically grouped or grouped by sections when applicable.

LMS Deep Integration – Push vs Pull Re-Linking

The LMS re-linking process automatically pulls assignment details and dates from the LMS into SIMnet. We have added an option to push SIMnet assignment details and dates to the LMS. This feature is available on the class level cover sheet for Canvas and D2L and on the Integrate feature for all Learning Management Systems.

The Deep Integration Relink buttons

SIMnet will be unavailable on Saturday, April 11th, 2020 from 2:30AM – 3:00AM US/Central time. Additionally, LMS integrations will be unavailable on the same day and time until 3:30AM US/Central time. We are performing routine maintenance to improve performance, reliability and security.

Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Sincerely,

McGraw-Hill Product Team

The new SIMnet Instant Help site is here! help.simnetonline.com/students/ is now available for SIMnet students to review and get the most up-to-date information they need to successfully complete their SIMnet courses.

New Instant Help view

The new SIMnet Instant Help site is organized by topic area instead of broken by individual help questions. Students will be able to get focused information about each topic in one place. New pullouts and tabs allow students to view potential pitfalls and see information targeted directly to their computer setup.

Help tabs organized by browser

The new SIMnet Instant Help system is being updated in stages. At this time the student help section is live. The Instructor and Administrator help system is being brought online next. The links inside SIMnet to the current SIMnet Instant Help site, activated by clicking the ? icon, are being updated on July 17th.

SIMnet has a new and improved which makes it easier than ever to know if one of your students has been flagged for an Integrity Violation.

The improved Integrity Violation interface now allows you to receive email notifications regarding new integrity violations at the time(s) of your choice.

By default, you will begin to receive one email per week, at 8:00 AM Monday whenever there have been new integrity violations since your last email. You can edit your preferences to receive more emails, fewer emails, or no emails.

To turn off Integrity Violation Notification emails, click the Gear Icon in the upper right corner of the Integrity Violations section to view the Integrity Violation Preferences window. Click the I want to receive the Integrity Violation Notification email checkbox to deselect it.

To edit the time(s) you receive Integrity Violation Notification emails, click the Gear Icon in the upper right corner of the Integrity Violations section to view the Integrity Violation Preferences window. Click the I want to receive the Integrity Violation Notification email checkbox if it has been deselected. Click the desired days of the week you would like to receive an email when there has been a new violation submission. You may select as many days of the week as you would like. Finally, set the desired time you would like to receive the email. You may only select a single time to receive your email(s).

When there has been an integrity violation, you will receive the following email:

The Chromium Project announced that starting with Chrome 80 they will require specific cookie flags in order for 3rd party cookies to be honored. Chrome 80 is scheduled to release on February 4th, 2020. SIMnet released full support for these changes as of January 24, 2020.

Please note, this change only relates Canvas and D2L users coming from the McGraw-Hill Campus Deep Assignments integration because they load “inside” of the LMS and are considered a 3rd party.

Instructors can now assign Projects that must be completed in a set time. Once the student begins an attempt of their assigned project, a countdown timer will begin. The student must submit that assignment before the timer has run down. This feature is available with all 2016 and 2019/365 projects.

To assign a Timed Project, go to Projects on the Left navigation, select the desired project, and assign it to a class or student. In the Assignment Preferences section of the Project Assignment Details pane, select the Enable Timer check box.

Once the Enable Timer check box has been selected, two new options will appear. The Minutestext box and the Attempt drop-down menu. Set the number of minutes you would like the assignment to last in the Minutes text box. The number of minutes must be a whole number.

In the Attempt drop-down menu there are two options, Each Attempt and All Attempts. Selecting All Attempts creates a single timer that begins to run at the start of the first project attempt and continues to run until all attempts have been used, or the time has run out. If the student uses all of the time in any one attempt, they will not have time available for subsequent attempts. The timer in All Attemptsassignments continues to run from the beginning of the first attempt until there is no time remaining or no attempts remaining. The timer will continue to run even if the student is between attempts or is not logged in to SIMnet.

Selecting Each Attempt means that each single attempt will have the total amount of time in the Minutes text box. If they use all of the time on any one attempt, they will still have all of their minutes available on subsequent attempts.

All ADA multiplier settings are automatically applied to all students who are using timed projects.

When students select a timed assignment, they will receive a prompt to start the project. With an All Attempts timed project they will receive the following prompt:

With an Each Attempt assignment they will receive the following prompt:

Once the student clicks the Start Project button, their project will be automatically downloaded and their project timer will begin. The timer is visible at all times throughout the completion of the project. If the student cannot find their downloaded file, they may download it again by clicking the Start File link on the assignment page. If the project has Resource files, the student will need to click the link to download those files.

As the student reviews the project instructions on all 2019/365 projects, they will be able to see the timer indicating the amount of time remaining in the project.

With Each Attempttimed projects, the student will receive the timer prompt each time they visit the page and have attempts remaining.

With All Attempts timed projects, the timer begins to count down once the student begins their first attempt and will continue to run between attempts until the timer has run out. The timer will continue to run between attempts and students will not receive a new prompt upon starting another attempt.

SIMnet Exams and SIMnet Practice Exams are now SIMnet Exam – Scenario A and SIMnet Exam – Scenario B. Scenario A questions and Scenario B questions cover the same content in the same manner but are distinct from each other and from SIMbook Let Me Try simulation questions. Exam questions may reflect all or part of a Let Me Try. SIMnet Exams are divided into two groups of questions, A and B, so that instructors can design exams, study materials, and SIMpath Pre-test and Post-tests without needing to check if they’ve used a question before.

This change clarifies a misconception among some of our SIMnet users: that the Assessment Exams and Practice Exams were designed with different difficulties or were designed for a different setting. SIMnet Exam questions are alike in difficulty and content across exam scenarios and may be used interchangeably.

All current SIMnet Exams will now be SIMnet Exam – Scenario A.

All current SIMnet Practice Exams will now be SIMnet Exam – Scenario B.

The Dashboard view in the Course Manager has been updated to give instructors more information about their students and courses at a glance. Instructors will be able to quickly determine which of their students are earning digital credentials in the Credentials Earned section and which of their students may be in danger of a poor result via the Past Due Assignments,Integrity Violations, andStudent Activitysections.

The default view for instructors is to show all assigned courses. However, instructors can select the desired course from the Classdrop-down menu.

The Past Due Assignments and Integrity Violations sections may both be tailored only to show the desired date range, showing data within a set number of days, weeks, months, or all time. Users can edit that setting by clicking the gear icon in each section. Clicking on existing Past Due Assignments or Integrity Violations notifications will show all current students who have a late assignment or have been flagged for uploading a file that did not include their unique signature in a project.

The Credentials Earned section displays the number and type of credentials earned by students enrolled in the selected courses. Clicking View All brings up a list of all credentials earned by students in that course. Clicking on the legend or corresponding section in the pie chart will display a list of all students who have earned a specific credential type.

The Student Activity section shows the number of students who have accessed SIMnet in the previous week, have been idle for more than 1 week but fewer than 2, have been idle for 2 weeks or more, or who have not logged in at all. Clicking on each text link or on the pie chart in the desired area brings up a separate view showing a list of students who fit that criteria.

The Assignment Schedule section provides a view at the last 10 Past Due assignments, the top 10 Current assignments or the next 10 Upcoming assignments, based upon the selected tab.