Minnesota State Learning Technologies

Have a question or need help with D2L Brightspace?  Please contact the Learning Technologies Team at Minnesota State:

D2L Knowledge Base for Faculty, Staff, and enrolled Students

The Learning Technologies Team offers a D2L Knowledge Base for the Minnesota State D2L community, including students, faculty, trainers, administrators, and other support staff.  A variety of knowledge articles are available including, commonly asked questions, how-to processes, and best practices within D2L Brightspace.  The knowledge articles are searchable within Office 365/SharePoint, providing users with on-demand support 24x7.

The D2L Knowledge Base is available to faculty, staff, and enrolled students at all Minnesota State schools. Navigate to the D2L Support SharePoint site (https://mnscu.sharepoint.com/sites/D2Lsupport).

Use the following username format to log into the D2L Support SharePoint site:

  • Students:  Use YourStarID@go.minnstate.edu as your username and your StarID password.
  • Faculty and Staff:  Use YourStarID@minnstate.edu as your username and your StarID password.
  • View the PDF for how to login instructions.

D2L Knowledge for Other Users

For users who do not have StarID credentials, you can view select Knowledge Articles (e.g. FAQs) at our D2L Knowledge public page. 

Questions? 
 If you have questions, please contact: suzanne.schlangen@minnstate.edu

Requests or questions about using D2L Brightspace

For requests or questions about D2L Brightspace, please contact the Learning Technologies Team:

For escalation of D2L Brightspace technical questions, please contact:

Minnesota State IT Service Desk

The IT Service Desk at Minnesota State provides a IT Services customer portal (https://servicedesk.minnstate.edu) for Minnesota State users.  If immediate assistance is required, please call the IT Service Desk (1-877-466-6728) and provide detailed information to allow our staff to provide efficient support.  The IT Service Desk is available during their business hours listed their portal login page.

IT Services customer portal

You can access the the IT Services portal by logging in with their StarID credentials. 

After logging in, you can submit a request:

  1. Navigate to the Submit a New Request/Ticket link on the homepage. 
  2. Enter D2L in the window, and click OK.
  3. On the search results page, select the role-specific link to submit a request for D2L Brightspace:
    • Faculty or Campus Staff:  click Request Assistance - Faculty or Staff.
    • Students: click Request Assistance - Student.
  4. Complete the required fields (highlighted in red).
  5. When reading, click Submit.
  6. After submitting your request, a prompt window will provide your Request ID number.  Please provide this number when referring to your request.
  7. You can view your submitted request from the View My Submitted Requests/Tickets link on the homepage.

A variety of training is offered or coordinated by the Minnesota State system office for D2L Brightspace users, including faculty, trainers, campus site admins, and other technical support staff.  Training is provided in a variety of venues, including, but not limited to: printed documentation, on-demand recorded videos, webinars, and hands-on face-to-face workshops.

D2L Brightspace Videos for Instructors

From Minnesota State:

Academic and Student Affairs has an events calendar that brings together faculty development opportunities to a single location.  Join us for the D2L Brightspace webinars and short courses offered throughout spring semester 2020.

Training Webinars are available on the D2L IMS SharePoint site, including Annotations in Assignments and Intelligent Agents.  Faculty, trainers, administrators, and support staff can log into the D2L IMS SharePoint site using YourStarID@minnstate.edu as your username and your StarID password.  View how to login instructions.

From D2L's YouTube Channel:

*These videos were developed by D2L for different Brightspace versions, features, tools, and workflow that may not be part of Minnesota State D2L Brightspace implementation.

D2L Brightspace Videos for Learners (i.e. Students)

From D2L's YouTube Channel:

Overview Videos**

**These videos were developed by D2L for different Brightspace versions, features, tools, and workflow that may not be part of Minnesota State D2L Brightspace implementation. 

D2L Brightspace Monthly Update Schedule 

Continuous delivery updates for D2L Brightspace are implemented on a monthly basis, typically on the third Thursday of the month. Typically no downtime is required for the monthly software updates. If downtime is required, users will be notified in advance. 

These dates are scheduled by D2L.  Any changes to this schedule (such as delays in receiving the monthly update) will be updated here and communicated to campuses.  Note that on occasion D2L will also deploy hotfixes between monthly updates.

D2L Brightspace Monthly Update Schedule

D2L Brightspace version upgrade schedule
Prod Update Version*
November 21, 2019 20.19.11
December 19, 2019 20.19.12

January 16, 2020

January 17, 2020
(rescheduled date)

 20.20.01

February 20, 2020

February 19, 2020
(rescheduled date)

 20.20.02
March 19, 2020 20.20.03
April 16, 2020 20.20.04
May 21, 2020 20.20.05
June 18, 2020 20.20.06
July 16, 2020 20.20.07
August 20, 2020 20.20.08
September 17, 2020 20.20.09
October 15, 2020 20.20.10
November 19, 2020 20.20.11
December 17, 2020 20.20.12

*Note: D2L's product versioning number for Brightspace monthly updates. The base number, 20.20, represents the year and .01 represents the month, which will increment with each monthly release.

Minnesota State D2L Reported Issues

Reported issues within D2L Brightspace is available from the D2L IMS SharePoint site. A Known Issues document is provided by D2L at each software version release. The list is updated by the Learning Technologies Team when new issues are discovered and reported by our Minnesota State D2L Community.

Faculty, trainers, administrators, and support staff can access the site to view the Known Issues document.  When prompted to login to the site, use YourStarID@minnstate.edu as your username and your StarID password to log.  View the PDF for how to login instructions.

Our learning management system provider, D2L, is based in Ontario, Canada.  D2L hosts a free community website that is available to D2L Brightspace clients, including faculty, administrators, and technical support staff.

Visit or login to the D2L Community.

The Community Site Features

  • Community Updates
  • Best Practices
  • Documentation
  • Future Directions
  • Share
  • Discussions

Join the Community

To enroll in the D2L Community, click the Become a Member button on the Community login page.  Provide your name, institution and email address.

The community is available to instructors, administrators, and other support staff (trainers, instructional designers, etc.), but not students.  A D2L staff member will confirm your affiliation with a Minnesota State school and you will be provided with a username and password to access the community site.

Best of All It's Free!

Take advantage of the Community site for up-to-date information about D2L, and opportunities to connect with other D2L Brightspace users world-wide.

D2L Brightspace Contract and Software Licenses

A number of software applications can be used to build course materials that can be used in D2L Brightspace.  Some examples include LodeStar Learning and Respondus Quiz Generator.  Software applications that are licensed for Minnesota State schools is provided at System-wide Academic and Student Affairs Educational Innovations (https://www.minnstate.edu/system/asa/innovations/index.html).

For administration of the D2L Brightspace software license and academic issues within the Minnesota State colleges and universities, please contact: