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Features to know in Elentra ME 1.27

A galaxy

We are pleased to announce that Elentra ME 1.27 and the maintenance releases 1.26.1, 1.25.2, and 1.24.3 are now available to all Consortium participants.

These high-level release notes contain a brief description of the key changes included in Elentra ME 1.27. Additional enhancements, bug fixes and more detailed information related to this release can be found in Elentra Collaborate here (login required).

Key Changes in Elentra ME 1.27

Update to Clinical Experience

Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team, Queen’s University, Elentra Corporation 

1.27 includes significant changes to the Clinical Experience module. These changes include updates to the Lottery the Location Module, and Manage Instructors. The majority of the contribution comes from the Elentra Corporation with additional enhancements created by Queen’s University.  

Lottery

The new lottery module allows learners to rank their order of preferred rotations, swap schedules and/or sites and preceptors. Swapping gives learners the ability to fine-tune their clinical experiences. Administrators can quickly upload the available options for learners via CSV, making it easier to run and maintain lotteries.

Locations

The updated location module now gives administrators the power to add contacts, site visit records and agreements to their location sites, buildings, or room levels. The location module has a robust search for sorting and filtering locations. Administrators can link locations to instructors, and link locations to curriculum tags for a more nuanced and detailed rotation schedule. Learner can now view this information to get a more detailed look at sites they may encounter during their clinical experiences.

Instructors

The new instructor module provides an enhanced way for administrators to manage the information associated with clinical faculty. Administrators can associate instructors with locations and curriculum tags to surface important data about preceptors to learners. Administrators may add notes to an instructor’s profile for administrative purposes or show them to learners. Images can be added to profiles, making it easier for administrators and learners to put a face to the name. Files may be associated with instructors to allow document management for clinical faculty members, including dedicated functionality for managing agreements.

Preferred Names

Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team, UCLA

Users may now choose to display a preferred name in place of their first name throughout most of Elentra. First name may still appear in some areas of Elentra, as a result we recommend using this feature for shorter forms of longer names or anglicized names.

Thank you again to all of the contributing members of our Consortium community for helping to create Elentra ME 1.27.

Elentra Mobile 4.2.1 Released!

Space Galaxy

The Elentra Consortium is pleased to announce the release of the latest mobile version 4.2.1. This minor release focuses on a few minor improvements and bug fixes. More specifically:

  • Added support for confidential question types.
  • Resolved issues with searching assessment forms.
  • Increased white space between assessment and evaluation questions.
  • Internal improvements, updates, and fixes.

Features to know in Elentra Mobile 4.2.0

Aurora Borealis

The Elentra Consortium is excited to announce the release of the latest mobile version 4.2.0. This release contains core updates and fixes included with the unreleased 4.1.0 version. It also contains an improved user experience for Learners and Faculty when completing Assessments & Evaluation. More specifically: 

1. Updates to display Start and End dates.

2. An updated single-page form

3. A new progress on the header

4. A new submit button instead of the save button.

5. Auto scroll to missed item.

This version is compatible with all supported versions of Elentra and supports both SSO and local authentication. 

Download on the App StoreGet it on Google Play

Features to know in Elentra ME 1.26

A galaxy

We are pleased to announce that Elentra ME 1.26 and the maintenance releases 1.25.1, 1.24.2, and 1.23.3 are now available to all Consortium participants.

These high-level release notes contain a brief description of some key changes included in Elentra ME 1.26. Additional enhancements, bug fixes and more detailed information related to this release can be found in Elentra Collaborate here (login required).

Key Changes in Elentra ME 1.26

Update to Elentra Javascript Libraries
Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team

Like all software, Elentra relies on underlying technologies to support its function. These technologies (e.g., Bootstrap, Axios, CKEditor, etc.) need to be routinely updated so that improvements and security fixes within each of them are applied to Elentra. The Core Team work included updates to multiple Javascript libraries, resolving bugs related to those updates, and removing duplicated and unnecessary libraries. The effect of this work is to improve the security and stability of Elentra while also making it easier for developers to work with the code in the future.

Competency-Based Education Error Messaging
Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team

Following a community evaluation of the updated competency-based education (CBE) tools and curriculum framework builder, improvements to error messaging to improve the user experience were identified as a priority. The Core Team has implemented over a dozen new error messages to help users effectively navigate Elentra when configuring curriculum for use with CBE.

Assessment and Evaluation Confidential Item Type
Contributor: Duke-NUS

This new item type lets you included a place for assessors/evaluators to make narrative comments on forms, but have the responses hidden from the person the form is about.

Improvement to Assigning Graders in Gradebook Assessments
Contributor: UCLA

This enhancement to the Gradebook allows an administrator to import a csv to populate the grader to learner relationships for an assessment. This can save administrators significant time, especially in a course that includes multiple assessments with tutors or others consistently grading the work of the same learners.

Release Process Change

For the release of ME 1.26 the Core Team also piloted a process to include a community tester in our release preparation phase. We appreciate the time dedicated by staff from the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis to help us in our work. We are excited to evaluate the pilot and explore how we might further engage our community in our release cycle.

Thank you again to all of the contributing members of our Consortium community for helping to create Elentra ME 1.26.

Features to know in Elentra ME 1.25

A galaxy

We are pleased to announce that Elentra ME 1.25 and the maintenance releases 1.24.1, 1.23.2, and 1.22.3 are now available to all Consortium participants.

These high-level release notes contain a brief description of some key changes included in Elentra ME 1.25.

Key Changes in Elentra ME 1.25

Laravel 9 Upgrade
Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team

Laravel is the web application framework that the Elentra code relies on. The version of Laravel we were using was coming to the end of its life, so to ensure that we continue to receive the latest security fixes to Laravel, the Core Team upgraded from Laravel 6.20 to 9.0 in ME 1.25. This upgrade reduces security vulnerabilities and helps ensure a more stable product.

The Laravel upgrade also required a PHP upgrade which the Elentra Core Team addressed in Elentra ME 1.24. All schools should note that upgrading to Elentra ME 1.25 requires PHP 8+.

Creation of Seed Data and Writing Functional Tests for the API (application programming interface)
Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team

The Core Team have completed work to write functional tests to address virtually all end points in the Elentra API. The API is what lets Elentra send information from databases to the user interface. Creating functional tests for the API allows us to more easily test Elentra and make sure that when we pull in new code Elentra remains as stable as possible. With these tests included in ME 1.25, developers from Consortium schools now have a model to follow to write tests for their own code contributions. This supports our strategic goal to eventually require functional tests for all new or revised API end points.

Also included in Elentra ME 1.25 is seed data for developers to use. This provides an initial set of demo data to use when using Elentra.

Event Attendance Self-Reporting for Learners
Contributor: Northern Ontario School of Medicine

NOSM’s work introduces a new event attendance option that allows learners to self-report their attendance status from an event page without requiring a geolocation check. This feature enhancement optionally integrates with the existing Absence Management dashboard to allow for approvals of requested absences as desired.

Improved User Experience for Competency-Based Education Tools
Contributor: Elentra Consortium Core Team

Following user experience best practices, the Core Team implemented a series of changes to the user interface to continue to improve the experience of using the Curriculum Framework Builder introduced in ME 1.24.

Increased Options in the Assessment Plan Builder (Competency-Based Education)
Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team, University of Toronto

This feature enhancement introduces the ability to define dependencies across contextual variable responses in an assessment plan. It will allow post-graduate medical programs to better track learner progress towards meeting assessment plan requirements in Elentra.

Learner Self-Assessment Option in Learner Dashboard (Competency-Based Education)
Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team, Elentra Corporation, Queen’s University

This enhancement allows courses/programs to allow learners to self-assess their status on a curriculum objective on the learner dashboard. This can be enabled per course/program.

Thank you again to all of the contributing members of our Consortium community for helping to create Elentra ME 1.25.

Features to know in Elentra ME 1.24

A galaxy

On behalf of the Elentra Consortium community, I am pleased to announce that Elentra ME 1.24 and the maintenance releases 1.23.1 and 1.22.2 are now available to all consortium participants.

These high-level release notes contain a brief description of the changes you can expect to see in 1.24. Smaller enhancements, bug fixes and more detailed information related to this release can be found here.

Competency-Based Education (CBE)

Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team, Elentra Corporation, Queen’s University

Queen’s University with the support of the Elentra Corporation and the Core team is pleased to announce a more flexible competency-based module. This new framework will allow schools to build their curriculums using their own nomenclature.

With CBME the foundation of CBE, schools will easily be able to migrate their existing curriculums over to the new framework.

While this module was specifically developed for Competency-Based curriculums, there is functionality that may be applicable to other use cases. The Core team is happy to work with you to see if CBE is the right tool for you.

PHP 8

Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core

Release 1.24 is also now compatible with PHP 8.0, in addition to PHP 7.4.

PHP 8.0 changes that required fixes in Elentra to support it includes changes to how String to Number comparisons work, warnings that are now errors, notices that are now warnings and other backward incompatible changes in PHP 8. Schools are encouraged to test their custom changes with PHP 8 before deploying 1.24 to production. More information on PHP8 backward incompatible changes can be found here.

Although 1.24 is compatible with PHP 7.4, schools are recommended to update to PHP 8.0. Upcoming release 1.25 will only be compatible with only PHP 8+.


Features to know in Elentra ME 1.23

Space Nebula

On behalf of the Elentra Consortium community, I am pleased to announce that Elentra ME 1.23 and the maintenance releases 1.22.1 and 1.21.2 are now available to all consortium participants.

These high-level release notes contain a brief description of the changes you can expect to see in 1.23. Smaller enhancement and more detailed information related to this release can be found here.

Exam Question Management

Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team, University of Ottawa

The University of Ottawa with support from the Elentra Core team has made significant changes to the exam module.

Question uploads will now support a labels feature, instead of folders. This allows your institution to apply the relevant categories directly to the question, instead of duplicating the question in different folders.

Various enhancements have been made to the user interface including:

  • Introduction of an optional mode that allows admins to define whether individual exams and/or questions are Summative, Formative, both, or neither. This may be a useful tool to ensure formative questions don’t end up on a summative assessment (and vice-versa)
  • Improved question search functionality that greatly expanded filtering options to make it easier to find the question you’re looking for
  • Improved the user experience around creating and defining questions and their content
  • Developed as a new Elentra JS 1.x module featuring an enhanced user interface

Peer Instruction

Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team Sponsored by University of Arizona Vet Med

We are excited to announce the inclusion of a Peer Instruction module in Elentra ME. Peer Instruction is a pedagogical tool developed to provide learners with the opportunity to examine both their own and their peers’ understanding of content. In Elentra, administrators are able to set up a pair of polls, both for the same question. The first poll establishes a baseline of knowledge, after which Learners have an opportunity to discuss their answers and rationales with their peers. Following a brief round of discussion, the second poll begins and Learners record their answers once again, incorporating any new found perspective and insight on the subject matter.

AAMC CI Report Enhancements

Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team, Washington State University

Significant enhancements were made to the AAMC CI Report to comply with version 10 of the Medbiquitous specifications. These changes were applied to versions 1.20, 1.21 and 1.22.

Learning Events

Contributors: various schools

Several new enhancements have been added to Learning Events including:

  • the ability to add comments and photos to the list of Learners
  • attendance tracking by location
  • display the event audience on the tooltip
  • the ability to take attendance and mark Learners as present, late or absent and send an email about their attendance status
  • the ability for Learners to mark their own attendance

Gradebook

Several bug fixes and a Gradebook enhancement will increase the file size limit for learner submissions to 250 MB for Assignment Drop Boxes. Bug fixes include:

  • fixes to the grade calculation
  • fixes to grade weighting

Course Website

Several bug fixes were completed including:

  • fixes to course rollover functions
  • fixes to allow learners to open Streaming Media links in a course website
  • fixes to display curriculum tags in the course community
  • fixes to the course website discussions

Several other bug fixes and minor enhancements have been made. For a full list, please access the Detailed Release notes here.

Features to Know in Elentra ME 1.22

Solar System

On September 13th, 2021 version 1.22 was released to the community. Below is a high-level summary of the improved features and functionality you can expect.

Microsoft Teams Learning Event Integration
Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team Sponsored by University of Singapore (NUS)

This exciting new integration allows Teams to be set up in a Learning Event based on the course enrolment. Once integrated, Teams Meetings may be automatically generated per Learning Event.

Updates to Learning Event Draft Schedules Including box.com Integration
Contributors: Elentra Consortium Core Team Sponsored by University of Singapore (NUS)

This enhancement includes significant changes to the user interface to provide a better experience. It also includes the ability to add event resources to draft events, which was previously unsupported. An integration with box.com was added which will allow users the ability to upload resources if they have an account.

Improved Control Over Course Pages and Events
Contributed by the Elentra Corp.

For private courses, administrators are now able to set a visible start and end date for the course website and all associated events. Learners will only be given access to course materials at a defined time.  

Improved Discussions Experience
Contributed by the Elentra Consortium Core Team

Threaded discussion pages are now available in Communities. Learners and Faculty may now reply to a reply.

Improved Evaluation Privacy and Security
Contributed by the Elentra Corp.

Individual completed evaluation tasks may now be restricted. This function may be turned on using new optional database setting. Organizations can optionally allow specific users to view completed individual evaluation tasks by adding them to a database field.

Improved Visibility of Tasks Awaiting Completion
Contributed by the Northern Ontario School of Medicine

In recognition of the frequent request by learners to view tasks they have initiated but are not yet completed by an assessor, NOSM built a view to display this information. Currently, learners will not be able to send reminders for these tasks, nor will they be able to view the task data (since it is in draft mode), but they can feel confident that the task has been generated and is awaiting action from the assessor.

Integration with Respondus LockDown Brower for Elentra Exams
Contributed by the Elentra Corp.

A new integration is available that will support Respondus LockDown Browser as a security option for exam posts.

Features to Know in Elentra ME 1.21

Carina Nebula

On April 27th, 2021 version 1.22 was released to the community. Below is a high-level summary of the improved features and functionality you can expect.

Location Management
Contributors: Washington State University, Elentra Core Team

A refreshed Location Management module has been rewritten in EJS 2. The new user interface has  an updated look and feel.

Custom Course Contacts
Contributor: UCLA

Users managing courses can now optionally define custom course contacts (i.e., label someone as a Course Assistant instead of Teacher). You can choose to show the course contact on the course website or not.

Learning Event Teaching Minutes
Contributor: Elentra Corp.

Administrative users, or faculty themselves, can optionally define the number of minutes in a learning event that a specific teacher taught. This data is captured in the relevant System Reports.

Learning Event Feedback Form Bulk Management
Contributor: Rush

Administrative users can now associate a feedback form with multiple events at once. They may now optionally generate a passcode that must be entered for learners to access the feedback form.

Course Gradebook Assessment Form Display Flexibility
Contributor: Elentra Corp.

Gradebook administrators can now decide whether to show learners assessment forms linked to gradebook assessments. They will now have the flexibility to show assessment forms before grades are entered, after grades are entered, both, or neither.

Course Gradebook Adjusted Total
Contributor: Elentra Corp.

A new column in the grade spreadsheet will now allow gradebook administrators to enter an adjusted total course grade. This can allow you to show a learner’s final grade incorporating ungraded requirements like professionalism or attendance.

Course Gradebook Ignoring Unentered Grades
Contributor: Elentra Core Team

Previously in a course gradebook, any unentered grades were automatically treated as zeros in the administrator view of the grade spreadsheet. A database setting has been introduced to allow you to decide if unentered grades should be ignored.

Learner View of Assignments
Contributor: Elentra Core Team

Updates have been made to the Assignments page to allow learners to apply filters to their view of their assignments. This allows learners to easily see which assignments are for which course and curriculum period, and which they have yet to submit.

Assessment and Evaluation Completed Form Confidentiality
Contributor: Northern Ontario School of Medicine

This new feature allows you to mark an assessment and evalution form as confidential. Confidential forms will hide the name of the assessor or evaluator whenever the form is viewed in Elentra (e.g. on the Admin dashboard for Assessment and Evaluation).

Assessment and Evaluation Task Forward Support for External Assessors
Contributor: Northern Ontario School of Medicine

Administrator can now forward existing external tasks to another assessor. The assessor may be internal, or external.  

Clinical Experience Rotation Schedule Improvements to Import and Export Options
Contributor: Queen’s University

Administrative staff can now use csv files to upload rotations. Changes include the ability to schedule learners into bookings of varying lengths, and include site and preceptor details in the csv.

Competency Based Medical Education Assessment Plan Detail Visibility
Contributor: Queen’s University

Programs and Residents using CBME dashboard will now see more EPA details, including contextual variable.

Competency Based Medical Education Visual Summary
Contributor: University of Ottawa (via University of Saskatchewan)

An exciting new dashboard will show the summary of completed CBME assessments. This enhancement is the result of the collaborative work done by the University of Saskatchewan and the University of Ottawa.

Entrada 1.6.0 Now Available

The Entrada project team is pleased to announce the release of Entrada version 1.6.0. This newest release includes some very exciting new features, and significant refinements to some existing features, further empowering our users within Entrada. I would like to thank each of our Entrada Community Partners for your extensive contributions to this release.

What’s New?

In addition to many user interface and user experience improvements to existing areas within Entrada you will find the following platform enhancements:

AAMC Curriculum Inventory Reporting

As part of our commitment to developing a highly flexible, interoperable and robust integrated teaching and learning environment we have added the ability to export the curriculum within Entrada to the MedBiquitous Curriculum Inventory data standard (ANSI/MEDBIQ CI.10.1-2013). This XML formatted export allows you seamlessly upload your curriculum to the AAMC Curriculum Inventory Portal. This exciting feature is available to Entrada Community Partners as part of consortium membership. For more information on using or obtaining this feature, please contact us.

Recurring Learning Events

Creating repeating events within Entrada just became a whole lot easier thanks to the new ability to schedule recurring Learning Events. This powerful feature enables you to create daily, weekly, or monthly recurring Learning Events with a variety of advanced options. Updating content within these recurring events can be done at high level or a very granular level, empowering you to leverage your recurring events without being handcuffed by cascading changes that you didn’t want to make.

Synchronize Course Enrolment

Having course enrolment synchronized with your institution’s Student Information System was previously possible within Entrada through the use of a scheduled script. However, thanks to a new feature, administrators and course directors can now synchronize on-demand to get students into their courses without any waiting.

Synchronize Small Groups

In addition to being able to synchronize course enrolment on the fly you can now synchronize small groups for a course. This feature will detect if there are any small groups already being maintained within your Student Information System and if any groups are found the group structure will be duplicated, synchronized and maintained within Entrada automatically.

Learner Activity and Statistical Information

This new feature gives administrators and faculty members the ability to see how many of their learners have accessed the learning event and it’s material. These statistics and history can then be used to identify which learning events are being accessed less than other events so that action can be taken to improve the quality of these events, and the learning material associated with them.

BasicLTI Integration

Our continuing effort to increase the interoperability of Entrada with third-party learning tools has brought us to add BasicLTI Consumer support to Entrada. System administrators and faculty members can now connect to external BasicLTI Providers through the Course Website / Community system, as well as through Learning Events. This feature works great for connecting to Library systems, Publisher platforms, and external learning tools.

MeSH Keywords Support

Administrators and faculty members now have the ability to link MeSH keywords to both Courses and Learning Events within Entrada. This important features allows for impressive reports that demonstrate where exactly linked MeSH keywords are taught throughout your entire curriculum.

Clinical Encounter Logging Enhancements

Entrada Mobile now allows learners to log clinical encounters easily and efficiently from within the mobile app (available for iOS, Android, and BlackBerry 10). This feature gives your learners the freedom to enter what they learn on the fly while it is fresh in their minds.

Quiz Module Question Grouping

When attaching quizzes to Learning Events or Course Websites, faculty members can have the option to randomize the questions within the quiz. In most scenarios this feature has worked very well, except for when certain quiz questions needed to be grouped together. The perfect example of this presented itself when a quiz had case based questions in it and those questions needed to remain in sequence. Randomizing such a quiz would move case based questions in with other random quiz questions resulting in a question sequence that did not make sense. Now when authoring a quiz, faculty members can group those sets of questions together, while still having the benefits of randomizing the overall quiz.

First Time Login Terms of Use / Copyright Agreement

System administrators can now configure Entrada to require users to accept a terms of use or copyright agreement, along with attesting that any material uploaded does not violate any copyright laws. This feature ensures that all users have acknowledged that their use of the system is bound by institutional policy.

Course Specific Learning Event Calendars

Faculty, staff, and students can subscribe to their own activity-based Entrada calendar, or they can subscribe to specific calendars for specific courses. Providing Entrada users with even more ways to view and manage their schedules.

Linking Gradebook Assessments to Learning Events

Included in Entrada 1.6 is the ability to link assessments to learning events. This feature allows you to maintain linkages across your whole curriculum; linking assessments to events, events to courses and curriculum objectives to all four. This provides you with a powerful tool for tracking and reporting on your curriculum in both how it is delivered and how it is assessed.

Learning Event Draft Schedule Import Enhancements

Importing Learning Events into Entrada just got easier. The CSV import tool now allows administrators and faculty members to import Comma Separated Values (CSV) data in any column order they wish. The new column mapping feature then allows you to map required and non-required Entrada fields to the columns in your file.

Gradebook Assignment Dashboard Notices

When attaching an Assignment Dropbox to a Gradebook Assessment administrators and faculty members now have the option of automatically notify the affected learners through a Dashboard Notice.

Default Community Template Facelift

Entrada communities just got a whole new look and feel thanks to the redesigned default template. The redesigned template gives your community a sleek more modern look and feel while making the user experience that much more enjoyable. Entrada 1.6 also allows for media to be embedded within announcements, discussion posts, and more.

Developers Rejoice

As part of the Entrada 1.6 release we have upgraded many of the internal components that make Entrada tick, such as Zend Framework, ADOdb, CKEditor, HTMLPurifier, Smarty, etc. This makes working within Entrada a breeze for developers looking to leverage new features within these components.

For more detailed information on any of these features you can go through the closed Issues for the 1.6.0 Milestone on GitHub.

For further information or clarification regarding information contained in this release announcement please contact:

Matt Simpson
Manager, Education Technology
Faculty of Health Sciences, Queen’s University
Website: http://entrada-project.org
Telephone: +1 613-533-6000 x78146
E-Mail:[email protected]