Email Announcements

[RogerTrietley]

I don't know if my Announcements are automatically emailed to all students.
If they are not, is there a way to have all Announcements emailed to all students?

[Chris_Hofer · Accepted solution]

Hello @RogerTrietley ...

Every user can set their own notification settings whether or not they want to be notified (e-mailed) about new course announcements. This is not something that you, as an instructor, can configure on behalf of your students. All users can configure notifications at their account level or at the course level. Here are the two Guides that students can use:

• How do I manage my Canvas notification settings as... - Instructure Community (canvaslms.com)
• How do I manage notifications for a single course ... - Instructure Community (canvaslms.com)

These are the similar Guides for instructors:

• How do I manage my Canvas notification settings as... - Instructure Community
• How do I manage notifications for a single course ... - Instructure Community

Hope this will help a bit...even though it might not be the answer you were looking for.

[DavidSavidge]

Yet another poor UX choice by Canvas. You have the student email addresses.  Why must I go through the tedious task of creating new email lists for my each class each quarter?  PLEASE CHANGE THIS! 

[Chris_Hofer]

@DavidSavidge ...

Full disclosure...I do not work for Instructure (Canvas), so I don't have the ability to fix anything in the Canvas LMS.  I'm a fellow Canvas user like yourself.

I understand the possible frustration of not being able to have your Canvas announcements automatically e-mailed to your students.  But again, the notification settings I described back in November are on a user by user basis.  If I were a student, I wouldn't want my instructor deciding how I wanted to receive messages about my courses.  I want to control that option.  That's just my opinion, and I understand that my choices might be very different than a fellow classmate.

You could visit the Ideas and Themes space here in the Community to see if there are any submitting ideas that would align with how you'd like to see this changed in Canvas.

There is a way that you can get a listing of your student e-mail addresses within Canvas.  Then, you can use that list to send that same announcement you posted in Canvas to your students via e-mail using your normal e-mail client such as Microsoft Outlook.  If you use New Analytics in Canvas, you can get this e-mail list by running a quick report.  How do I view and download reports in New Analytic... - Instructure Community (canvaslms.com).  You'll want to run/download the "Class Roster" report.

I hope this information will be of some help to you.

[TheodoreRyan]

Chris, my issue involves communicating at the start of the semester, including letting students know that I as a prof am using Canvas. Several students told us that they didn't receive Announcements because they didn't even know that we/they are using Canvas. This issue predates any notification setting by students. Do you see this point? Thank you.

[Chris_Hofer]

@TheodoreRyan ...

Thanks for your posting.  Yes, I understand this as well.  In cases where the course has not started yet, I highly recommend that you obtain a list of your students' e-mail addresses (maybe from your school's Student Information System) and e-mail them all before the course starts letting them know about things like this.  Hopefully when students register for courses at your school, there would be some kind of indication that Canvas will be used in some way.  But, I know this might not always be the case or always be clear.  Once students start logging in to Canvas to access their course(s), they can then get those notification settings set up so that they can ensure they'll be notified via e-mail.  But again, if the courses haven't started yet, then sending a regular e-mail would be a good alternative.  Your school's Online Learning / eLearning / Distance Education team may have some good suggestions for you as well about best practices.

Hope this will be helpful to you!

[TheodoreRyan]

Hello Chris,

I greatly appreciate your timely response, especially given that I imagine you are quite busy this time of year. 😅

I did go to our University system [DukeHub] to email our students and notify them that we are using Canvas.

The "hopefully" aspect didn't happen in two respects: [1] Duke and our own LMP/Canvas transition team not making clear to profs that we had to notify our students of the switch to Canvas; 2] Our students who didn't know of the switch would not be able to receive our Announcements.

As a prof, I own that I could/should have thought of these. In prior similar circumstances, the switch of learning management programs has been systemwide, so that profs would not be responsible for notifying their student and knowing that students could not receive Announcements.

I'm curious: Is this potential issue covered in the Canvas training for profs? I recommend that it is. Overall, I have found the Canvas instructor training to be excellent, and I appreciate it. Thank you!

Ted

[Chris_Hofer]

Hello @TheodoreRyan ...

Yes...busy with recently accepting a new job and now hunting for a new home.  🙂

Sorry to hear that your transition to Canvas may not have been as smooth as you'd hoped.  I can see how that can be frustrating.  I remember when I worked at a Technical College as a LMS admin back in Wisconsin when we transitioned from Jones e-Education to Pearson eCollege's LearningStudio ... and then eventually from LearningStudio to Canvas ... that we wanted to make sure our communication to both students and staff was as clear as possible...because that certainly can be a stressful time when everyone is trying to learn a new system...especially at the start of a new semester.  So, I get it.

I decided to check out Duke's website to see if I could find any pages there that had any info about Canvas that might be helpful.  You may have seen some of these pages already, and maybe they aren't as relevant, but I thought I'd share just in case:

• Homepage | Canvas (duke.edu)
• Introduction to Canvas | Canvas (duke.edu)
• LMS Transition (duke.edu)
• Canvas is Coming to Duke - Duke Learning Innovation
• Design Your Site for Student Success | Canvas (duke.edu)
• FAQ – LMS Transition (duke.edu)
• Frequently Asked Questions | Canvas (duke.edu)
• Canvas Training Materials | Canvas (duke.edu)

These links were all found on this page:

Search Results Area | Duke University

...but I did not really look beyond page 1 of the results.

I hope this extra bit of info will be helpful to you in some way.