Quantum course development disentangled - customize Black Opal with Content Assignment

Quantum workforce development is a major priority globally, with universities building new courses and enterprises integrating quantum training into their professional development packages. Black Opal has become a key part of this global drive, making it easy for anyone to learn quantum computing. 

We’ve seen exceptional success integrating it into formal educational initiatives at major enterprises and undergraduate programs. Students love the interactive visualizations and the ability to build intuition for the complex concepts they’re encountering in their education. And Black Opal has become the default skills training software nationwide in the UK via the National Quantum Computing Centre.

But it’s not always easy for educators to incorporate outside material into their courses, no matter how good it may be. The specific needs of a student cohort may not align with the general structure of a predefined training pathway, for example. Or an educator may have a particular course syllabus they want to deliver, covering material in a unique pathway.  The structures and constraints of formal educational programs can lead to stumbling blocks in adopting innovative new educational materials.

In fact, the most popular request we’ve received from educators and enterprise customers is the ability to customize Black Opal to match the structure of a preset syllabus or cater to differing skill levels among student cohorts.

Introducing Content Assignment for Black Opal

We’re excited to announce it’s now even easier for educators in Colleges, Universities, and Enterprises to incorporate Black Opal’s award-winning visual and interactive lessons into their own formal coursework with enhanced new features!

We want to help educators and administrators enable learners to achieve a level of quantum understanding tailored to their goals

Black Opal’s newest feature, Content Assignment, brings course customization, cohort management, and progress monitoring to Black Opal for Educators and Black Opal for Enterprise, enabling customers to tailor quantum education to the goals of their learners and the structure of their curriculum.

Customize Black Opal to align with learning outcomes

Now you can select the course modules that best align with the knowledge level and desired outcomes of your students. For example, some learners may want to focus on a high-level overview of quantum computing from the introduction and beginner sections of the course while others might be ready for Black Opal’s advanced modules on circuits, algorithms, and programming. Administrators set the specific skills to be completed: each learner then gets a focused experience within Black Opal that guides them to complete the modules they have been assigned. 

Augment your course with tailored assignments

Draw from Black Opal’s visual and interactive content to build an unlimited number of assignments aligned with your own course structure. You can create a unique assignment for each group moving through the same content, or create a series of assignments with progressively increasing difficulty to challenge your students. 

For each assignment, configuration is simple and streamlined. Select the modules to be assigned, and nominate an optional due date (with built-in email reminders) to ensure the assignment is completed in the desired time. Then either choose specific users to receive the assignment, or distribute an assignment link to students so they can get started on their assigned modules with a single click.

Monitor student success with assignment analytics

View the progress and performance of every student through their assigned content with visual dashboards and detailed exportable analytics. For each assignment see at a glance how many students are progressing through the assignment, how many have completed it, and who is yet to start. Export assignment metrics to see time spent, challenge (quiz) results, and module-level performance for every student.

With these insights you can monitor student performance or surface learners who might need assistance. You can even follow up immediately by assigning additional supportive assignments to reinforce the material you’ve covered. 

When an assignment is complete, use the archive function to preserve analytics for future reference, while preventing new students from beginning an inactive assignment.

Incorporate Black Opal into your course today

Integrate Black Opal’s award-winning quantum-education content into your course work today.  Whether you’re supporting professional development or undergraduate students, Black Opal delivers the best in visual, interactive training content to support your needs. Find out how to prepare for the quantum era with Black Opal for Enterprise and Black Opal for Educators.