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I have a college student who is paid by the university to assist my class. He cannot get access to Canvas as an observer because there is some magical button clicked that doesn't allow someone who isn't in our district to get an account. How do admin limit the creation of accounts for non-institutional users to Canvas Admins? More importantly, how do they allow accounts for nonusers?
This post says that it is absolutely possible, but that the admin may have it blocked.
Post: "When I follow the instructions above, the resulting message is that the person doesn't have a Canvas account. Is it possible to add an observer to a Canvas course who doesn't have a Canvas account? For example, a scientist who is following the progress of students' research/projects. Or a professional tutor who doesn't have a school-assigned account. Thanks!"
Reply: It absolutely is possible - however some institutions limit the creation of accounts for non-institution users to Canvas Admins. Since you received that error message, I assume your school has elected to do that. So you'll need to contact your school's Canvas Admin in order to get this done.
Please advise.
I'm not sure the admins are doing that intentionally. It is probably a default. Student and faculty accounts are created automatically through integrations with the institution programs. However, non-institution users are not a part of the pathway for automatic access. The admins have to manually create a non-institution user as described here: https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Admin-Guide/How-do-I-add-users-to-an-account/ta-p/90
If this is something available to be delegated to instructor roles it will be through the roles and permissions: https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Admin-Guide/What-user-roles-and-permissions-are-available-in-Canv...
I'm not an admin though, so you will need to work with your admin to get this resolved.
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