HOW TO: Communicate with Enrollees before Publishing the Course?

[geralyn_stephen]

Hello Everyone: I like to send my online students Welcome Letters, in pdf, along with a pdf of the course syllabus, prior to the start of the semester.  Unfortunately, it appears that this is not possible until I publish the course.  Is there a work-around?  Any insight is helpful.   -Geralyn

[kona · Accepted solution]

 @geralyn_stephen , unfortunately no, there isn't a good work around for this in Canvas. Technically you could publish your course, but keep use the course start date from allowing students from accessing the course. The only issue with this is that I believe students would get notifications that you were adding content, changing due dates, etc. What I do is get the email addresses of my students from my Student Information System and then just email the students directly with this type of information.

There is also a feature idea for this - https://community.canvaslms.com/ideas/5740-emailing-students-in-an-unpublished-course - and my recommendation is to vote and comment on why this feature would be helpful!

Kona

[geralyn_stephen]

Thank you so much, Kona!  We're just moving from Bb to Canvas and there is some much to learn!  You and Jim are always available.  Please know that users, like me, are so very, very grateful for your super prompt responses and ready words of advice.  -Geralyn

[kona]

 @geralyn_stephen , I'm glad you're having such a great experience in the Community! It's a great place to get help, share experiences/resources/information, and collaborate with people! I'll also let James know that you gave him a shout out! 🙂

Have a great day!

Kona

[kmeeusen]

Hi  @geralyn_stephen 

2 possible solutions........................

• Publish your course just long enough to send out your Inbox welcome message and attachments - you can then hastily unpublish before any wander in, or
• Check with your school's IT folks. One of the schools I teach for set up a script years ago that creates Outlook contact lists for every course being offered. So prior to the start of term, I can search based on my course name, and send my students an email.
• Bonus - Some campus information systems (our state system is in the middle of a long migration to PeopleSoft's product), offer a function to email all enrollees in the courses.

I hope at least one of these prove helpful,

Kelley

[geralyn_stephen]

Thanks, Kelley!  We have Outlook/Office365.  With your permission, I'd like to share your suggestion with our IT folks.  Maybe we can do something similar.  -Geralyn

[kmeeusen]

If your IT folks are interested,  @geralyn_stephen  I can provide them with a contact info for the IT department at that one school who might be able to advise them on how to set it up. Problem is that there are so many systems out there, and I know the one at this particular school was grabbing that enrollment info from an old (40 years old) home-grown SIS developed by our state. But still, might be worth checking out if your folks need help.

That same school has since switched to the PeopleSoft product I had mentioned that already includes the function you need. So it may be there is nobody left around that knows the old method. I'll check just in case, and to be ready if you need it.

Kelley

[geralyn_stephen]

I've forwarded the request for exploration.  We'll see what happens next!  Enjoy your weekend, Kelley!  

[tparks1]

I just grab the list from People and paste it into Excel and grab all the emails, then paste them into my email account to send them.

Hope that helps.

Tracy

UCCS COB