We’re in the final stages of testing a new feature within the Digication Assessment Management System that we’re calling e-Portfolio Snapshots.

• Snapshots do not appear in the directory
• The only way to access a snapshot is via the Assessment system
• Hits/views are no longer updated
• Snapshots cannot be changed by anyone, including school administrators
• Comments and tags will be locked. If they were visible when the e-Portfolio was submitted, they’ll be included in the snapshot.
• Cached external content, such as Twitter or the upcoming RSS feeds will be archived
• Non-cached external content, such as YouTube videos, may change. A warning will soon be shown under the content to warn the viewer of this.
• Email to a friend, subscribe, and export functions are disabled
• Snapshots will remain even if the e-Portfolio is moved or deleted
• The submitter can choose which pages within an e-Portfolio to archive. Only the selected pages will be included.
• If a submitter archives a page on the left, but doesn’t choose the parent link at top, then the link will be included automatically to allow for navigation

If you’re using the assessment features at your school, you’ve probably seen the ‘Submit Evidence’ screen. This allows a user to store information that contributes to an assignment or shows progress towards a goal/standard. We currently support entering rich text, uploading of files, and linking to an e-Portfolio.

The e-Portfolio feature has been enormously popular, as it allows a student to both demonstrate their work and store it for grading. This is, however, just a link to the e-Portfolio as it looks now, not how it looked when the user submitted it. Schools have expressed an interest in using the e-Portfolios as a repository of information towards their accreditation reviews. For this to work, the e-Portfolios need to remain the same.

Once this feature is available, all e-Portfolio evidence will point to an archive of the work. It will always reflect the e-Portfolio as it looked when submitted.

Several things to note:

For our existing Assessment users, we will automatically snapshot all your existing e-Portfolio evidence. The submission date will not change, but the snapshot will be of the e-Portfolio state when we launched, not when it submitted.

We plan to launch this feature early next week. If you have any questions or comments, please don’t hesitate to contact us.