[ARCHIVED] Cross-listing sections taught by different instructors

[ppelzel]

In many of our Health Sciences programs, we have multiple sections of one course. Some are taught by our full-time faculty and some by adjuncts. To ensure the integrity and quality of the course content, all content is created and posted by the full-time faculty member. In our previous LMS we created a "COMBO" course that took all of those sections and put them into one course so the full-time faculty could post the content, but the adjunct faculty still did all of the grading for their section. With cross-listing, only instructors assigned to the course can cross-list. NOTE: What we called "sections" in our old LMS are actually considered separate courses in Canvas. We cannot add the adjuncts as an official instructor to the full-time instructor's course due to credit count. We could add them as a coordinator, but that does not move the students into the course. Have any of you found a workaround for this?

[kona]

My initial suggestion would be to have the full time Instructor build the course and share it in Canvas Commons. The adjunct could then copy it into their course. If there were any updates the adjunct would get notified of the change and could go ahead and accept the update. We do something slightly similar except we have a master course (built by a full time Instructor) and then the adjuncts can copy the content over from the master course into their regular semester course.

I'm going to also share this question with the https://community.canvaslms.com/groups/admins?sr=search&searchId=3192604e-ff7b-4f73-8de3-b3e46fa8d75...‌ and https://community.canvaslms.com/groups/canvas-developers?sr=search&searchId=fe696afe-74b2-4414-a956-...‌ to see if they have any recommendations or suggestions on the best way to work this.

[Adrienne_J_Gaut]

I might not be understanding your situation correctly and we might not have our Canvas integrations with SIS/Banner set up the same (how courses/sections are created or how faculty/students are enrolled.)  We use Banner and some custom bits on the back end where courses get created from the Banner tables/information and then we do a faculty enrollment from Banner into Canvas so faculty can get to their courses before students.

We frequently use the cross-listing tool to merge lab courses and some of our math courses. My example is similar to yours - there is one course coordinator who teaches a section and then there are 3 other sections each with a different instructor. In Banner, these are listed as four sections of the same course. As far as Canvas is concerned, it is four courses.

MATH.003.01 Prof A (course coordinator, plus teaches one section)

MATH.003.02 Prof B

MATH.003.03 Prof C

MATH.003.04 Prof D

We want all of the professors to share Prof A's course, the master course. In Canvas, we manually merge MATH.003.02 into MATH.003.01, then .03 into .01, then .04 into .01.  The enrollments come along for the ride. So - when I go to People, I see Prof A is enrolled in .01, Prof B in .02, Prof C in .03 and Prof D in .04. They are all instructors in the course and the integrity of the separate courses/sections is kept. As long as the profs have directions (and a stern pointy-finger shake) of how to email ONLY their section, how to add to their own section pages, how to add an assignment or calendar item ONLY to their section --- it all works out grand. On the Home page there are links that students click to go to each section where the instructor can customize a few things. Everyone shares the same assignments, etc. Student enrollments fly into Canvas and the section integrity is kept as well for those enrollments.

Does my example help? These courses are *not* cross-listed in Banner with the Registrar...we do it after in Canvas and cross-list the courses (which is done in the Section tab, so really we are merging sections.) Enrollments follow and update add/drops accordingly. 

?

[tdelillo]

I agree with  @kona ‌, that you're much better off sharing the content with the adjuncts, rather than adding them via cross-listing to the main instructor's shell. Enrollments (including Teacher assignments) live in the sections, but the permissions are applied course-wide. Assuming that the adjuncts will have the Teacher role in their own section, this will give them full access to - and edit privileges over - the course content. In my experience, having two or more instructors sharing a course shell inevitably leads to someone adding, editing, or deleting something they shouldn't.

[kona]

"In my experience, having two or more instructors sharing a course shell inevitably leads to someone adding, editing, or deleting something they shouldn't." 

Yes, this times 1,000!

[ysmalls]

Hi  @kona ,  

We have had the same issue happen to us and our work around was to create a new role based of the teacher role that is called "Teacher - Copy Only".  Teachers  can go view the course and have access to it like the teacher and they can copy content from it but they can't add, edit or delete anything.

[kona]

ysmalls, we do that for some things, but for this we actually do allow the adjuncts to tweak and adjust the content. For example they need to individualize their syllabus with their information, they need to adjust due dates for their specific course/course section, and they also need to update the Getting started information with their picture, bio, contact information, etc.

[Adrienne_J_Gaut]

I agree with others - that if the instructors are meant to be editing things and really running their own sections - then yes, separate courses to avoid issues. In my example, the course coordinator is the one editing, publishing, releasing, updating the assignments (and also doing fun data things with Khan Academy and Canvas) --- and needs it all in one course. Else - he'd be updating 4 or 5 (depending on the term) Canvas courses each day/week instead of just one. All sections share the same assignments, calendar, etc. so it works well.

But yes - stern warning to the other instructors about any editing. We haven't had any issues besides an instructor messaging ALL sections instead of just their own. After that kerfuffle, we limit those instructors only to their sections.

[ppelzel]

Thank you all for your suggestions! This sharing of courses has been common practice here for many years (before my time) so the issues of content deletion, etc have long been dealt with. We discovered that if the main instructor is added as a coordinator to the adjunct's section the main instructor can then cross-list the section into the main course.

[adkim]

I had this exact problem a couple of years ago, and our workaround "works" wonderfully...  First, let me make sure I understand the problem.  You want all of your courses to "look" the same - same content, same assessments/quizzes, etc.  BUT, you can't cross-list them all together because it affects how your school does contract loading, etc.  Is this correct?

What we ended up doing is this:  Our Canvas Administrator manually links the course sections in Canvas at the beginning of the semester.  Doing this prevents external programs from looking at the sections as only one course, which affects faculty loading, etc.  The only trick comes with people that would receive an "Incomplete" grade.  In manually linked classes, one course/section serves as the master and the other are subordinates.  If a student in one of the subordinate courses needs a grade of Incomplete (and therefore needs to maintain access to course materials), that student needs to be manually moved to the master course section, otherwise they will lose access when the other courses are closed out.  

If you need more information, feel free to email me directly at adkim@aacc.edu.

I hope you figure something out!

Andy

[lopaul]

I usually take care of the cross-listing for me and my co-instructors who teach a few sections of a large, standardized course. I have them add me as a co-instructor to their sections, then I cross-list, and then I have them remove me as a co-instructor for those sections. It works great, and I'm no longer listed on others' sections but we still have one big cross-listed course.