Blackboard Adds Over 1,000 New Course Cartridges
From Leading Educational Publishers This Year
WASHINGTON, Dec. 16 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Blackboard Inc.
(Nasdaq: BBBB) announced today that it has added 1,165 new Blackboard Course
Cartridges(R) to the offerings now available to higher education institutions
and individual instructors through the Blackboard Learning System(TM). To
date, more than 30 of the world's leading educational publishers distribute
more than 3,500 ready-to-use Blackboard-compliant courses through Blackboard
Course Cartridges. With these cartridges, instructors and students can access
a wide variety of educational materials online, at any time and from just
about any location.
"These Blackboard Course Cartridge additions demonstrate Blackboard's aim
to step beyond courses and incorporate the many educational resources
available, both traditional and digital, into the online learning experience,"
said Matthew Pittinsky, Chairman of Blackboard. "With the deep and broad
selection of course content available through the Blackboard Course Cartridge
Catalogue, Blackboard clients now have an even greater ability to assemble
highly specific curricula in a format that can be refreshed easily and
customized to the needs of individual instructors."
Created by leading educational authors, editors and publishers, Blackboard
Course Cartridges are pre-packaged course materials, formatted for the
Blackboard Learning System and may include slides, documents, multimedia
files, links to related websites, test banks, and quizzes. While some
cartridges correlate to textbooks or eBooks, others are intended for use as
stand-alone courses, and all the cartridge materials may be customized once
downloaded to a specific course site.
The Blackboard Course Cartridge Catalog includes course cartridges in more
than 200 precisely targeted disciplines. Blackboard's collection of course
cartridges includes offerings in Academic Skills and College Life, Arts and
Humanities, Business and Management, Computer Science and Desktop
Applications, Education, Engineering, Interdisciplinary Studies, Law and Legal
Studies, Medicine and Allied Health, Professional Fields, Science and
Mathematics, and Social and Behavioral Sciences. This year alone, over 640
cartridges have been refreshed with updated content.
"Using the Blackboard content platform, publishers, institutions and
instructors are positioned to find new ways to distribute and exchange large
amounts of educational content," said Pittinsky. "Blackboard Course Cartridges
-- and other Blackboard-compliant course packages created by publishers,
institutions and instructors -- represent the leading edge of the broad-based
content sharing that will characterize educational environments in the years
ahead."
Publisher partners who now distribute products through Blackboard Course
Cartridges include Bedford, Freeman, Worth; Elsevier; EMC/Paradigm Publishing;
Houghton Mifflin; John Wiley & Sons; Lippincott, Williams and Wilkins; McGraw-
Hill; Pearson Education; Power-Glide; and Thomson Higher Education. Please
visit the Blackboard website at http://www.blackboard.com for a complete
Blackboard Course Cartridge partner list.
In addition, a number of publishers license Blackboard software to power
their own e-learning websites, including Pearson Education:
CourseCompass(TM), Elsevier: Evolve(TM), Lexis/Nexis(R): Web Courses(TM),
Houghton Mifflin: Eduspace(TM), and Thomson Higher Education: WebTutor(TM).
About Blackboard Inc.
Blackboard is a leading provider of enterprise software and services to
the education industry. The Company's product line consists of five software
applications bundled in two suites, the Blackboard Academic Suite TM and the
Blackboard Commerce Suite TM. Blackboard's clients include colleges,
universities, schools and other education providers, as well as textbook
publishers and student-focused merchants that serve education providers and
their students. Blackboard is headquartered in Washington, D.C., with offices
and staff in North America, Europe and Asia.
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
most recent 10-Q filed with the SEC. In addition, the forward-looking
statements included in this press release represent the Company's views as of
December 16, 2004. 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 December 16, 2004.
CONTACT: Melissa Chotiner, Public Relations Manager of Blackboard Inc.,
+1-202-463-4860, ext. 2404, mchotiner@blackboard.com; or Media: Stacey Finkel
of DBC Public Relations Experts, +1-202-298-7600, ext. 219, stacey@dbcpr.com,
for Blackboard Inc.
|
