One of the most frequently criticized aspects of Brightspace is the number of clicks and keystrokes required to accomplish simple tasks. With that in mind, here are two seemingly minor interface changes that would eliminate unnecessary user actions.
1. Make “Untitled” placeholder text when creating a quiz.
When creating a new quiz, the title field is automatically populated with “Untitled.” Because “Untitled” is actual text rather than placeholder text, the user must first select or delete it before entering the quiz title.
An experienced user can simply double-click “Untitled” and type over it, so the inconvenience is admittedly small. But not every user knows that double-clicking selects the text. Some will click at the end of “Untitled,” delete the characters, and then type the desired title.
Why require any of this? If “Untitled” were placeholder text, the user could simply click in the field and begin typing. This would appear to require only a minor interface change, would save an unnecessary action every time a quiz is created, and would conform to familiar contemporary interface conventions. Having users manually replace default text in a basic text-entry field feels unnecessarily antiquated in 2026.
2. Automatically enable “Can Exceed” when a quiz contains bonus questions.
Brightspace allows individual quiz questions to be designated as Bonus. However, if those bonus questions cause a student's quiz score to exceed the maximum possible score, the associated grade item must also have “Can Exceed” enabled for the extra points to be reflected properly in Grades.
This creates an unnecessary disconnect between Quizzes and Grades. If I have explicitly designated questions on a quiz as Bonus, I have already told Brightspace that students may earn points beyond the ordinary maximum. I should not then have to navigate to Grades, edit the associated grade item, and separately tell Brightspace to permit exactly what I just configured the quiz to do.
Rather than making “Can Exceed” the default for every grade item, I suggest that Brightspace automatically enable it for the associated grade item whenever a quiz contains one or more questions designated as Bonus. At minimum, Brightspace could prompt the instructor: “This quiz contains bonus questions. Enable ‘Can Exceed’ for the associated grade item?”
Neither change would revolutionize Brightspace. That is precisely the point. Small, obvious reductions in unnecessary clicks and keystrokes, repeated across the many routine tasks instructors perform, could substantially improve the overall user experience.
