[Conversations] Should be able to message admin users from Canvas Inbox

[HParkhurst]

When a faculty member needs support on a student issue that they were notified about through the Canvas inbox, there is no way for them to respond to the student and copy in my support email without the support USER being in the course. 

My request is that all admin users are accessible in the Canvas Inbox, regardless of whether they are enrolled in the course.

[straussi]

@HParkhurst Since we have a separate ticketing system, as well as Canvas Support, this would create a third avenue needed for tracking support. It would also make record keeping on support items difficult.

[HParkhurst]

@straussi My use case is because I want to provide support, however I don't think that is every use case. We use a lot of LTI integrations in our Canvas instance and Canvas support doesn't know how to help our students. When students ask technical questions of our faculty, it would be great to not send them to a completely different location and just be able to have me added to the conversation. 

(The current workaround is I am adding us into the course as an observer so the faculty can message me).

I don't understand "It would also make record keeping on support items difficult." since it would come in as an email notification and can be followed up by email anyway? 

[straussi]

@HParkhurst We have support at three levels of teams for the university, as well as Canvas Support. When we get a level 3 ticket or request, it has generally already been vetted by one of those teams. We track these carefully for review and data analysis, as well as follow-up and surveys. None of that will be possible if we are receiving email notifications within Canvas. We actually do the same thing with our university email; if a request is received by email it is referred to IT Support to open a ticket before we act on it. 

[HParkhurst]

@straub We are a much smaller school with only one level of support, so it's definitely a different scenario. Also, the email notifications wouldn't be within Canvas, but sent to the support email (as they are now). At the moment, what's happening for us is the faculty is forwarding the emails to support anyway - my suggestion here would save them a couple steps in order to get me involved (same result for me on the support side).