The University System of Georgia (USG) recognizes the importance of a consistent and stable learning management system (LMS) in the facilitation and innovation of teaching and learning. The LMS is designed to be the official system used by instructors to deliver online content, assignments, and other course materials to students for teaching and learning. To optimize the performance of this system and to operate within product licensing limits, data and content stored within the LMS must be limited.

Effective January 2025, official LMS courses generated in BlazeVIEW by our student information system (SIS), or any other courses with students enrolled may be deleted from the LMS five years following the end of the semester in which they are taught. For example, a course taught in Fall 2020 may be permanently and irreversibly removed at the end of December 2025. Valdosta State University will be notified at least one semester prior to the deletion of the courses that are scheduled for deletion. Valdosta State University is charged with communicating a 30-day notice to all faculty and department leadership when courses are scheduled for removal. Institutions must also make a request for any special circumstance during the 30-day notice. This will give the instructor(s) an opportunity to save any important documents or data to locations outside of the LMS. Institutions are responsible for exporting or archiving course materials and student work that must be kept for accreditation or record retention purposes beyond the five years.

Review the accordions below for frequently asked questions. For additional information, contact Marsha Dukes, Associate Director of eLearning, at mbdukes@valdosta.edu or your Department Head.

 

Privacy and security: Data should be retained in accordance with the USG’s retention policy, which is rooted in retaining data for a specified time period.

System health: Since VSU implemented BlazeVIEW in 2013, the number of courses and amount of storage space used has grown to unsustainable levels. Users with large course lists, especially instructors, may face performance and functionality issues.

Limited storage: The LMS is not designed, equipped, or contracted to be long-term or unlimited storage.

Courses targeted for removal in 2025:

  • Banner courses from semesters before Fall 2019.
  • Non-Banner courses with create or end dates before 2020.
  • Non-Banner courses that have not been accessed by a student, instructor, or administrator in 5+ years.

Note: Non-Banner courses include sandboxes and other manually-created shells not associated with a for-credit course.

 

Timeline for removal
Action Banner Courses Non-Banner Courses
List of courses provided to institutions February 14, 2025 February 14, 2025
Identify courses to be removed March 21, 2025 Summer 2025
Last date for instructors to access courses June 1, 2025 October 1, 2025
Courses permanently removed July 16, 2025 November 17, 2025

Any course contents or materials should be exported or downloaded to another location before June 2025 (for Banner Courses) and October 2025 (for non-Banner courses).

Course removals will be scheduled annually based on a 5-year cycle. Dates for future course removals are to be determined.

When a course is deleted, all course files, student grades, and student work will be permanently removed from the system. This will include all content pages, uploaded documents, hyperlinks, gradebook contents, discussion boards, submitted assignments and quizzes, and so on. Materials hosted elsewhere (e.g., Kaltura videos) will not be impacted.

Deleting BlazeVIEW courses that are more than 5 years old meets the timeframe required by the USG to retain student records for grade appeals. Information about the USG's records retention policies and procedures can be found at the following website:

Examinations, Tests, Term Papers, Homework Records, and Grade Books

Number: 0472-06-012

Description: This series documents student subject mastery in institution courses. Records may include but are not limited to: examinations and answers; quizzes and answers; homework assignments; course papers; term papers; essay assignments; and grade books. This series does not include graduate student qualifying or comprehensive examinations.

Retention: Uncontested grade results: 1 term after completion; Contested grade results: Until resolved, whichever is longer.

Watch the following video or read the steps for exporting your course materials as a zip file. Note: When a course is exported, it does not retain student data or submissions.

 

 

Watch the following video or read the steps for exporting the course gradebook.

 

Watch the following video or read the steps for downloading student assignment submissions.

Watch the following video or read the steps for downloading quiz results.

Watch the following video or read the steps for downloading files from your course.

Kaltura videos will remain available through your Kaltura My Media account and do not need to be downloaded. However, videos uploaded directly into the course will be permanently deleted with the course. Follow the steps above for downloading files.