[Course Settings] Restrict Users to Their Own Section(s)

[millerjm]

I'm resubmitting the idea Limit visibility to Section Users submitted originally by Wade James and supporting information added by Ben Reynolds and  Melody CSUCanvasAdmin-Brake

When dealing with multiple sections (created manually or cross-listed), the ability to easily limit visibility to other sections users is very important in many cases to comply with FERPA or to maintain control and order in large courses with many sections and teachers/TAs.

A single, course-settings-level check-box would modify user privileges from "this user can view students in any course section" to "limit this user to only see fellow section users".

This can currently be turned on one user at a time. How do I limit a user to only view other users in the same course section?  It should be made more clear - it is not just one click per student to change this permission - it is actually 3 actions per user enrolled in the course. From the People starting point - it is (1) to select the user's name, (2) to set 'limit this user to only see fellow section users', and (3) to return back to the main People listing page [or backspace].  So, it really looks more like...

(click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), (click-click-backspace), ...

vs.

click.

In a course with multiple sections (we have several courses with with approximately 75 sections, 42 TAs, 4 Teachers and 2000 students), this is simply not a viable option.

We don't need to do this across the board, but we do have non-academic courses such as resources or labs that use these courses.

Comments from Instructure

:smileyinfo: Sometimes, with the volume of ideas we have come in, we miss a duplicate.  This idea has a duplicate with Course-Level Setting: Restrict Users to Their Own Section(s).  Both threads will receive the same updates.

[elovitt]

Our administration has recently requested our LMS admin to remove student access to duplicate sections from cross listing due to concerns from FERPA guidelines.  I see this conversation dates back to 2016 and am surprised that Instructure is using votes only to decide what needs to move forward.  This is a Federal law!  Not something that is up for discussion so I am confused why the default setting for the system admin is not to remove all connections to multiple sections including all the discussions and communications not just the People button.

I do see all the conversations about how to remove people from the list and the scripts that can be run using CSV files.  This does not help with new enrollments or changes that happen on a daily basis at our school. Most faculty and voters in the community are probably not going to vote for something that really a behind the scenes and not a fancy new tool.

Please reconsider this administrative need to help schools stay federally compliant.

[millerjm]

 @elovitt ‌

This feature request is to be able to do this at the course level with one click, but you can actually restrict this in your SIS import files. 

In your enrollment files, set the limit_section_privileges to TRUE and the students will only see their own section in a crosslisted course.  We include this field in most of our SIS import files for enrollment.  I'm not sure if that would help your situation?  SIS Import Format Documentation - Canvas LMS REST API Documentation 

[elovitt]

Joni we have looked at the SIS import but we are using real-time integration with our SIS not flat file imports.  If a student adds or drops the course we need to run these again, and again and again.  We are hoping for a default setting in the system that would automatically set the limit_section_privileges to TRUE instead of running a script.  Also this setting does not help with discussions and other tools.

[ksbsroy]

I agree that this functionality should be at the section level. It is far to time consuming for Admin to set this student by student, cross-list by cross-list.  A simple check box during the Cross-List process to indicate whether students should be limited to their original section would accomplish this.

[amaz81]

I teach three sections of the same university course out of one course site. I want to have discussion posts set up so that students only see people in their own section. When I set up groups in the discussion post settings, I found a work around by setting three groups (because I have three sections) then clicking the option so that they can only see people in their own section. The only issue is that if a student adds the course after I do this, they won't be added to a group. I'd have to manually add them, which is tedious. (I have a 157 students and the university is adding more and more students each semester.) It would be so helpful if you had this filter set to it would automatically sort new students that add the course to the groups that are already set. Or if there was just an option to sort students by section without making a group and any new students that add would be included automatically. I appreciate your help! Thanks!

[A00364575]

The inability to limit students to their own section at a course level is very consequential for our institution. It means we are limited by FERPA from being able to offer faculty and students more flexibility in their use of Canvas across courses. It would be an enormous benefit to us if this could be a course level setting, and it would save countless hours of work. As a general rule, I've always felt like Canvas could do far better at make more things doable in bulk. That might give me more time to build index finger strength in other ways, like learning a new instrument or something. 

[KaelynB]

I agree. Especially, now that we have catalog, it makes sense for the new section to be kept separate from other sections.