Organization Self-Enrollment

An organization can be set for participants to self-enroll in an organizations that has been made available.  

Organization Leader Considerations

When you submit a Blackboard Organization Request form, you can elect an option for prospective participants to "self-enroll." It's important to ensure that the course availability is turned on when you are ready for users to enroll in your organization. In order to do this:

  1. Locate the "Details & Actions" control center in your organization (located to the left of the organization page)
  2. Within the control center, an icon will display that shows either a lock icon or unlock icon
  3. If the control center displays the unlocked icon, your organization is available and users will be able to search for and enroll themselves in your organization.
    1. If the control center displays a lock icon, the organization is unavailable and will not appear in the Organization Catalog. Continue to Step 4
  4. Next to the locked icon, click the link that says "Participants can't access this organization"
  5. Click the option "Open to Participants" on the confirmation message that pops up
  6. You should now see an unlocked icon in the control center indicating that your organization is now available to users in the Organization Catalog

GIF showing the home page for an organization. The cursor navigates to the control center of the organization, located on the left side of the screen. The cursor clinks a link next to a lock icon titled Participants can't access this organization. A pop up message occurs asking the user to confirm that they would like to open the organization to participants. The cursor clicks a button that reads Open to Participants. The pop up menu disappears and the home page of the organization appears again with the lock icon now having changed to an unlocked icon.

Participant Self-Enrollment Instructions 

To self-enroll in an organization:

  • Navigate to the "Organization" section of your Blackboard dashboard
  • Click on the "Organization Catalog" located in the top right hand corner of the page


Image showing.a screenshot of the Organizations page within a user's Blackboard account. A red arrow labeled with the number 1 is pointing to the right side of the screen at the Organizations tab of the Blackboard sidebar menu. A second red arrow labeled with a 2 points to the top right corner of the screenshot at an icon of books that has a linked title Organization Catalog next to it.

  • Once the Organization Catalog is open, use the search bar to search the name of the organization you wish to enroll
  • When the organization appears in your search, click the options menu button located next to the Organization ID 
  • Select "Enroll" from the options menu


A screenshot of the Organization Catalog's search feature. A red arrow labeled with a 1 points to a search bar that has searched the term UOSA. The search bar is located in the top middle part of the screenshot. A second red arrow labeled with a 2 points towards the bottom left hand corner. The arrow is pointing to an options menu icon next to an organization ID that appeared from the search. A third red arrow labeled with a 3 is pointing to the word Enroll that dropped down from the options menu that was selected.


If the organization is access code protected, a page will display asking for you to provide the code. Contact the Organization Leader listed for the organization to obtain the access code.