Blackboard's core software began as a class tool built by students at Cornell. Michael Chasen and Matthew Pittinsky started Blackboard in Washington in 1997 as consultants on education technology standards. In 1998 they bought CourseInfo, the Cornell project, and turned it into a product. By 2004 a generation of college students logged into Blackboard to find their homework. When the company filed to go public that year, it sold to thousands of schools.

Two Consultants and a Cornell Project

Blackboard's first job was advising a group of universities on standards for online learning. The founders saw that every campus would need software to run courses on the web. CourseInfo gave them a working system that faculty already used. Blackboard sold it to colleges as yearly licenses, then added campus card systems for dorm doors and dining halls. Its customers ranged from community colleges to large state universities.

From Nasdaq to Providence

Blackboard priced its IPO at $14 a share in June 2004 and listed on Nasdaq as BBBB. It bought its main rival, WebCT, in 2006 and became the giant of college course software. Newer rivals and free open-source tools kept up the pressure. In 2011 the private equity firm Providence Equity Partners took Blackboard private in a deal worth about $1.64 billion. Blackboard later combined with Anthology in 2021.

Cover: The Lesson of the Professor, plate five from Les Comédiens de Société, Honoré-Victorin Daumier. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for a professor's lesson (the lecture hall).