Attending class

The online courses we offer all use the web browser based Blackboard online learning management system.

For questions relating to the Blackboard platform or your ability to access the virtual classroom, contact WashingtonOnline’s Help Desk http://www.waol.org/help/).

For questions of a non–technical nature, connect to WashingtonOnline’s Helpdesk and visit the Frequently Asked Questions site http://www.waol.org/help/faq.asp. You may also call 1–888–580–9011 between 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Pacific Time, Monday – Friday. If you reach the voice message during business hours, be sure to leave your name, phone number, your student ID and a brief description of your concern so they can research the problem before calling you back.

We highly recommend that you visit the WAOL Web site http://www.waol.org, bookmark it and then click on the Getting Started link. This site assumes you have not yet registered and will be somewhat repetitious of what is shared here, but many items go into more detail and will be a good reference throughout your distance learning experience.

Starting your Blackboard course

1. Connect to the Internet and surf to http://waol.blackboard.com

2. The next screen that will appear will prompt you to login. Click “login.”

3. To login in on the next screen, enter responses to the prompts as follows:

Your Username is waol (note lowercase letters) plus your student ID number, with no dashes or spaces. Your password is the first 5 characters of your last name in all lowercase letters. For example,

John Distance with SID 222334444 would be

Username: waol222334444
Password: dista

If you have a hyphen in your last name, like Mary Car-Black, the password would be: car-b.

If you have a last name fewer than 5 characters, like Sol, or a space between two last names, like Mia Rosa, use just the letters before the space, even if it isn't 5 characters. These examples would have passwords sol and mia.

If you reset your password the last time you took a course on waol.blackboard.com, it will remain unchanged!

There are more examples on the WAOL Blackboard login page.

4. After you login to Blackboard you must first enter your e–mail address into the “Personal Information” section, replacing the dummy address used to set up your account access.

From the “My Institution” screen that is displayed after the login screen, click on “Personal Information” on the left–hand side of your screen.

Then click on “edit Personal Information.”
Enter your e–mail address into the e–mail field.

[screen shot of Blackboard Personal Information form]

Click on “Submit” at the bottom of the page (may need to scroll the screen), then review the entered information on the confirmation screen and click “Okay” once to return to the “Personal Information” screen.

5. While in the “Personal Information” section, you may want to set your privacy options, allowing other students in the course to view your email address and other information.

Click “Set Privacy Options”
In step one, select the checkbox associated with your email address. If there is other information you'd like to share with your classmates, click the checkbox(es) for that information.

[another screen shot of Blackboard Personal Information form]

In step two, select the checkboxes if you want all Blackboard users in all courses on the server to see the items selected in step one.

Click on “Submit” at the bottom of the page to update your privacy options, and click “Okay” twice to return to the “My Institution” screen.

6. Enter the classroom from the “My Institution” screen by clicking the course title in the section of screen the labeled “My Courses” (see image in number 4 above).

Read the introductory “Announcement” in the main screen posted by your instructor.
To learn more about using Blackboard and the left–hand menu buttons, select the button labeled “Tools.”
Then select the link in the main screen labeled “Manual” and the documentation will open in the main screen.