Sending Email in a BeachBoard Course

BeachBoard's Send Email tool lets you send email to anyone who participates in your BeachBoard course. BeachBoard Services has several ideas for enhancing a course with Email.

Note: Students who have not entered an up-to-date email address in MyCSULB will not receive BeachBoard email messages. If you send an email message to a student with an invalid email address, you will receive an error message in your email inbox. The solution is for the student to update his/her email address in MyCSULB.

Additionally, AOL, Hotmail/MSN, and Yahoo users may have difficulty receiving BeachBoard email messages. It has been reported to us that AOL, Hotmail/MSN, and Yahoo may block BeachBoard emails as spam. Blackboard Inc. is aware of the problem; however, there is no resolution at this time. In the interim, encourage students with AOL, Hotmail/MSN, and Yahoo email addresses to either check their "bulk" or "spam" folders for their BeachBoard email messages or, better stull, update their preferred email address to a non-AOL, Hotmail/MSN, or Yahoo address in MyCSULB.

New: Watch a closed-captioned movie that shows you how to send email in a BeachBoard course [opens in a new window]

Sending an Email

1. Login to BeachBoard at https://beachboard.csulb.edu/
2. Under My Courses, click the name of the course in which you would like to send an email.
3. Click the course's Control Panel link.
4. Under Course Tools, click the Send Email link.
5. Choose the recipients:
   • All Users - Sends email to all users in a specified course. [This is preferred.]
   • All Groups - Sends email to all of the groups in a specified course.
   • All Teaching Assistant Users - Sends email to all of the Teaching Assistants in the course.
   • All Student Users - Sends email to all of the students in the course.
   • All instructor Users - Sends email to all of the instructors in the course.
   • All Observer Users - Sends email to all of the Observers for a specified course
   • Single / Select Users- Sends email to a single user or select users in the course.
   • Single / Select Groups - Sends email to a single group or select groups in the course.
   • Single / Select Observer Users - Sends email to a single Observer or select Observers in the course.
6. If you chose Single/Select, highlight the recipients on the left side of the screen and press the black triangle pointing to the right [>] to select them. This is not necessary if you chose to send an email to All Users, All Groups, All Teaching Assistant Users, All Student Users, All instructor Users, or All Observer Users.
7. Enter your email subject.
8. Enter your email message.
9. Choose whether or not you wish to receive a Return Receipt. BeachBoard Services recommends that you do not choose this option. If Return Receipt is selected, your students will be asked to acknowledge that they have opened your email message. This acknowledgement is optional. If your students choose not to acknowledge the receipt of your email message, or if the students' email security settings block return receipts, you will not know which students have opened your email message and which ones have not.
10. Add attachments. [This is optional and is strongly discouraged. Many overzealous spam filters automatically block any emails containing certain file attachments. A better idea would be to post your files to BeachBoard and then inform your students in the email message text where to locate those files.]
    • Click the Attach a file link. This opens a the Attachments box.
    • Click the Browse button. This opens a Choose file pop-up window.
    • Find the file on your computer you wish to attach and click the Open button. This process is similar to the process of attaching a file to an email message.
    • Click the Submit button.
    • Click the Attach Another File link and repeat the preceeding steps to attach additional files.
11. Click the Submit button to send your email message.

More Information

Q: Can I send email to people who are not in my course?
A: No, you can only send email to users who are enrolled in your BeachBoard course.

Q: I just sent an email message to all of my students and a few minutes later I received a "Delivery Failure" message in my email inbox saying that my message could not be delivered to certain students. What should I do to fix this?
A: When you send an email message to a student who has not entered a correct, up-to-date email address in MyCSULB, you will receive an error or ("bounce" or "delivery failure" ) message in your email inbox. The solution is for the student to update his/her email address in MyCSULB.

Q: Does BeachBoard retain a copy of the emails I send?
A: No. Instead, BeachBoard sends to your default email address a copy of each email you compose. Check your email program for those emails.

[Special thanks go to Cal Poly, Pomona for their help with this page.]