[New Quizzes] Allow any outcome available to the course to be aligned to questions in item banks

[leward]

This idea has been developed and deployed to Canvas LMS

---

Problem statement:

In classic, any outcome that has been added to the course can be aligned with question banks. This includes outcomes created in the course as well as outcomes at the account and subaccount level that have been added to the course via the Outcomes > Find command. New quizzes doesn't allow aligning questions with item banks, but it does support aligning outcomes with individual questions in banks. Currently, however, the only outcomes that are available to align are those that have been published at the account (root) level of the Canvas account hierarchy.

For higher education institutions, this limitation will make New Quizzes unusable for conducting programmatic outcomes assessment. Programs that use Canvas outcomes to assess student learning and program assessment, typically create their outcomes in the subaccount closest to the courses in which the outcomes will be used. This practice is important because it prevents faculty in other programs from inadvertently aligning outcomes that do not apply to their program. It also keeps the list of outcomes and outcome groups that are available to a manageable number that should already be familiar to them. The upshot is that outcomes at higher education institutions, with perhaps the exception of general education outcomes, are located in subaccounts, not the root and it is critical that these outcomes to be available to align with questions in item banks.

Proposed solution:

When working with item banks within a course, allow any outcome that has been added to the course to be aligned with questions in the item banks available to the instructor and/or instructor, including course-level outcomes, sub-account-level outcomes, and account-level outcomes. When recording outcomes results for item bank questions that have been pulled into a quiz, report on only those outcomes that apply to the current course.

For example:

• If an instructor aligns course-level outcomes with items in a bank, the results for those outcomes should only be reported in that course.
• If an instructor aligns sub-account-level outcomes with items in a bank, the results for those outcomes should only be recorded for courses in or beneath the subaccounts in which the outcomes are located.
• If an instructor aligns account-level outcomes with items in a bank, the results for those outcomes should report any course in the Canvas instance.

Additionally, when an instructor views or edits item bank questions with aligned outcomes, the user interface should visually distinguish between between sub-account outcomes that apply to the course and those that don't.

User role(s):

instructor,ta,designer

[lgekeler]

Yes, this relationship between New Quizzes and Outcomes is needed for Outcomes to be useful at all.

[vanzandt]

This is critical to our use of program-level outcomes, which get assigned at the sub-account level. We would need this before we elect to move our campus to New Quizzes.

[benjamin_rodrig]

I agree that this feature is needed. At our university, we have a sub-account dedicated to each college and their departments. The ability for New Quiz creators to align college and department level outcomes to New Quizzes and Items is necessary for them to assess students according to their unique programmatic standards. This can be done in Classic Quizzes and would be useful if it can also be done in New Quizzes.

[scombs426]

Totally agree 100% this should be added for New Quizzes feature. All features of the OLD tool should at least be available in the NEW improved tool? It seems odd to me when I listen to Canvas webinars and they're encouraging schools to turn off classic quizzes, they should be communicating that there are still some features missing. Admins get bombarded with requests then to shut off classic quizzes only to get complaints regarding the missing features. I was encouraged with the latest communication to remove the required deadline - I've had it on but it's not there yet. The 'hub' was genius!! searching through tons of community posts is overwhelmingly time consuming.

I wish they'd do the same 'hub' for ePortfolio, portfolium, student ePortfolio, lol I've read enough to know that it's also confusing in the community.

[KristinL]

  Comments from Instructure

This feature is available in Beta. For more information, please read through the 

Canvas Release Notes (2024-06-15) 

How do I access the Canvas beta environment as an instructor?

[KristinL]

Comments from Instructure

For more information, please read through the Canvas Release Notes (2024-06-15)