Assumptions are a death knell for any class/student polls on Blackboard....

Why do I say that assumptions are a death knell for any class? Well, because you come into the class with preconceived notions about the work and how difficult/easy it will be, and it's nothing like you thought...particularly a class that you thought you could coast through and get an easy A. Not that my grade is suffering right now or anything; I just noticed that with regard to my CIS 203 class, in particular, I can't just assume that Access 2007 is Access 2007. There IS a reason that it's called "Advanced Databases". It's not simply entering information into a database, running queries, creating forms, and reports. We now have to import external data into the databases that we use so that all of our information is up to date. To my credit, I've seen a few ways that this could be applied to someone's job function, particularly with regard to updating customer contacts and information, as well as saving one from having to recreate separate databases for external data. So in this regard, I'm learning a lot. And so far, it's paying off.

With regard to the polls that are on Blackboard currently, I'm really liking them. They really are in touch with what students are faced with on an almost-constant basis, such as purchasing NetBooks for school, the latest Apple technology, and whether or not all books have been received and used for class (this is particularly crucial right now, as this is the fifth week of the quarter; and a good portion of the grade has already been earned). So I will continue to tune in and add my voice to the opinions polls set out by Blackboard.