The CUNY Academic Commons is a web-based platform available to all members of the CUNY community.
Why are we using the Commons?
This course site allows for all kinds of different course materials and media to be kept in one central location. It’s also a publicly available web page that can be used as an Open Educational Resource (see below). It’s a bit different than using a system such as Blackboard where everything happens behind a login. On the Commons, most of the materials and content are meant to be publicly available.
The Commons is built on a WordPress system. You may have heard of WordPress before. It’s an open-source platform that powers almost half of the overall internet.
Learning the basics of using WordPress gives you a skill you can take with you anywhere – to a job, or to creating your own web presence on or off the Commons.
Why not BlackBoard?
As an open-source tool, the Commons (and WordPress generally) are about encouraging the creation of new content and making it accessible. The goal of the Commons is to build communities and networks of research and learning.
As a participant in this class, you will be creating content and responding to each other on an open platform.
Wait. What about privacy?
The majority of this site is what is considered an Open-Education Resource. That means that the materials on the site are in the public domain or licensed under a variety of different open licenses. (We’ll talk more about this in class!) Sometimes there will be links to materials that are only available to you as a Brooklyn College student (via the library, for example) and you will need to login to that portion of the site with a password that I will provide on the first day of class.
Your comments on most materials are public and are part of our greater class discussion and knowledge building. The overall site is set to not be indexed by search engines such as Google but is available to anyone with the link.
Your work – the posts that you will make – will always be behind a passworded protected portion of the site. You have control over whether or not you make your video content public or unlisted on YouTube. This also means that you can remove it from there when you wish.
If you want anything removed from the course website after the class is over, I will be happy to do so.
Ok, what do I do?
- Do you have access to your CUNY email address? You will need it to claim your account. It can be any .cuny.edu email – it doesn’t have to be Brooklyn College. After you confirm the account, you don’t have to use this email again. You can set up your Commons profile with whatever email you prefer.
- If you already have access to your CUNY email, you will see an email invitation from the Commons/the course site. Follow the instructions from the email to create an account.
- Once you have set up an account you need to now join this course/site. There are three options to do this:
- Go back to the invitation email and click the second link that is there for the course.
- If you can’t find the link in the email, log in to the Commons and look for “My Invites”. The invitation may be here or you can enter the claim code from the email if the link above didn’t work.
- You can also search for the course and ask to join.
- If you’ve made a Commons account and still can’t get on or find the course – email me for a new invitation or to set up a few minutes to troubleshoot.
What do I do if I really don’t have access to my CUNY email?
Make sure you’ve followed the steps here. If that doesn’t work, contact the Help Desk. The number/email is on the bottom of the linked page.
In the meantime, you can still do the work for the upcoming two weeks while this gets sorted out.
I think I’m set up. Now what?
Fantastic! If you’re all set up on the site, you should see a black header bar that will show that you are logged in. There will be a “+New” link. Don’t click it yet, but if you see that option, you are ready to go on.
