Assignment - Publish Unpublilsh

[lph]

I am trying to use a single Canvas shell for each of my classes, and NOT make a copy of it each semester. For years, I've had to make a copy each semester, then spend an hour fixing the green navigation links (Try this five times a semester!). To save time, I decided to cross list students into the single shell at the start of the semester and decross list at the end. This has saved time with the left green navigation menu links (redirect link is used heavily).

However, now I am not able to UNpublish assignments because Canvas thinks there are still student data. Those students were decrosslisted but the assignment can't be unpublished. I can unpublish the module but the assignment still shows in the gradebook.

Now I'm in a bind. I can either make a copy, spend the hour fixing the left navigation menu, or figure out how to proceed with the single shell (I actually have five shells due to teaching five courses). 

Does anyone know of a way to get the assignments Unpublished so that students do not see them, and they do NOT show up in the gradebook? I can bulk edit and remove the dates so that they do not show up missing in the gradebook but they still show up -- and this becomes overwhelming for high school students. Some students think they have to immediately do all 160 assignments. Parents get upset. ETC. Some immediately drop the course because "it's too much." Admin doesn't understand. Adults totally misunderstand that it is 160 assignments for 182 days that get shown. 

Is there any way to unpublish these assignments and get them so that they are NOT shown in the gradebook? Otherwise, I'll have to return to wasting my time copying shells, then fixing the dang navigation menu.

[chriscas]

Hi @lph,

As a Canvas Admin for a higher-ed institution, I would highly recommend a new course shell for each semester.  I'd also recommend a separate course shell for each section for student privacy (and best FERPA compliance if you're in the USA).

With that being said, could you expand on the issues you're having with a course copy and navigation?  Generally a course copy/import should get you a pretty much identical course shell to the original, so I'd be interested in what is not working for you in that process.  More details or screenshots or something could be very useful (I'm not familiar with "green navigation links," for example).

As for the immediate issue with your course shell, I think even if you decrosslist, Canvas still knows there were submissions to the assignments, and therefore will not let them be unpublished.  I don't know of a way around that, which is why I'd really return to the idea of figuring out what's going wrong with your course copy/import and trying to solve that issue.

-Chris

[lph]

I appreciate the reply.

The green navigation sidebar is the course navigation, and my shells are heavily modified with the redirect tool. Any course copy does NOT fix the links -- and so I have to spend time fixing all of them. Since there are five course shells each semester, I face up to 5 hours of fixing links. 

[chriscas]

Hi @lph,

Thanks for the screenshot, it's very helpful to see.  So, I assume that the green links there are created with the redirect tool, and when you do a course copy, they end up pointing at the "old" course, and you need to go back and fix all of those to point to the new course ID (number in the URL), am I correct?  if that is the issue, I have a fix that will just require editing the links one more time.  When you create/edit the links, you can replace the course id number with ${Canvas.course.id} to have Canvas dynamically reference the current course.  So instead of https://canvas.instructure.com/courses/12345/pages/hello, you'd input https://canvas.instructure.com/courses/${Canvas.course.id}/pages/hello.  Once you do that, Canvas will use use the course number where the link was clicked, so it will essentially always link your "current" or "new" course shell and you'd never need to edit the link again (unless you change the name of the page or whatever you're linking to inside the course).

Is this perhaps helpful?  I know it will still be an hour of work to fix initially, but maybe no more hours every again after that!?

-Chris

[lph]

I appreciate the help. 

It's too bad that the master shell cannot simply be reset at the end of each semester. It's too much time to spend copying courses -- but -- this is a solution for now. 

This would also mean that I'd have to reset all the shared new quiz items banks (hundreds of them). They are shared by default as view instead of edit. 

I'm thinking of making a backup, reset the master, copy the backup content back into the master. This way the item banks aren't messed up, too. 

Have a great day. 

[lph · Accepted solution]

To update:

I found a solution that works for me. This solution works because the district supported the idea. 

Admin flipped the switch on the master shells to become blueprint courses. This means I don't lose all the New Quizzes item banks shared to the courses. It makes 33 pages of item banks much easier to handle. 

Next, the SIS generated courses are associated with the proper blueprint course. When I make changes in my master shell then I'm able to sync and students see all the new changes. I've been running this for a week and it's really quite nice because I can work in New Quizzes item banks quickly, update quizzes, push them out, and I don't have to worry about synching with the SIS. The best part is I can publish and unpublish assignments because there are no student data 🙂

The only issue found so far is that New Quizzes marked as Practice in the Blueprint are not identified as Practice in the Associated course. To overcome, I have to manually change the practice quiz setting in the associated courses.