Announcement Email Options

[gguba]

We are doing a pilot with Canvas for Fall 2019. As I'm working my way through some of the options, I see some potential issues with the use of Announcements and email responses. As I look at how our setup is currently working, I can send a group email to students and it shows up properly for them. However, they can only reply if I set the options for Announcements to Reply Enabled. The student replies show up in my email, but they also show up as replies on the announcement itself. Is there any settings within the course, or for the institution to set it to reply to just the instructor without appearing as a reply as well. 

Working in other systems, a reply only goes to the instructor of the course. In fact, in most cases of student responses to announcements in courses that I've taught over the years, most responses from a student are often personal in nature and shouldn't be public. Without that type of reply to an announcement, I often don't hear from students having issues at all.

[snugent]

In our instance of Canvas we have the announcement reply option turned off by default in the course settings. That is the way most instructors wanted it but they can turn the option on if they want to have replies on announcements. 

Announcements are good for posting time sensitive content since students will get notifications about the announcements and it will also show in their To Do lists. You can also setup a course so announcements display on the home page. 

• How do I set my Canvas notification preferences as an instructor?
• How do I use the to-do list for all my courses in the List View Dashboard as a student?
• How do I show recent announcements in the Course Home Page?

When using the inbox instructors can send out a message to all students. It is important to note they can choose to make the conversation a group conversation (default option) or send individual messages (must check box next to Send an individual message to each recipient). Notifications of inbox messages can be setup to be received ASAP.  The biggest issue we have with the inbox is that attachments to not display with the notifications people get in their email. Any attachments must be viewed in the Canvas inbox. 

• How do I send a message to all course users in Conversations as an instructor?
• Attachments to Inbox from External Email