[Assignments] Assignment Description Text Availability Window

[sara_weaver]

Problem statement:

While the ability to submit assignments during an availability window that can be set ahead of time is great, the description is still viewable by the students. Faculty often want the descriptions hidden, especially faculty that use audio/video descriptions. These faculty have to manually publish the assignments at their preferred time.

Proposed solution:

There should be an option to hide the description if an assignment is not accepting submissions so faculty do not have to manually publish/open an assignment if they do not want students to be able to access the assignment description.

User role(s):

instructor,ta

[jsailor]

Hi, @sara_weaver! Thanks for collaborating with us through the Instructure Community.

When an availability window is set for an assignment, the assignment description is currently restricted for students until the availability window opens. They should only see the assignment title, due date, points possible, and the date on which the assignment will be made available. We've tested this with multiple assignments across various types and courses. Both with and without assignment enhancements enabled, we are unable to reproduce students seeing the assignment description before the availability window begins.  

Is there a specific assignment type for which you are seeing the description as a student? If so, we recommend reaching out to support with examples so that they they can dig in and escalate to our engineers as needed. 

Also, if we are misunderstanding your request, please feel free to provide clarity. 

[sara_weaver]

Hi @jsailor ! Thank you for your reply. We did some testing, and you're correct- the instructions don't appear before the availability window is open, but they do appear after it has closed. It'd be helpful if this information was locked down on both ends.

Thank you!