How to create a custom Account Role for reports, data, and analytics?

[rbh43]

I'm the full time Canvas admin at my school and I have been asked to create a custom role in the admin panel called "University College Data and Analytics". The higher ups are predicting a greater demand for "at-will" Academic access/insight into Canvas Data. So I made a custom account-level role in our Canvas test environment with the necessary permissions to view Reports under admin >> settings.

In general I am making a “Reporting Analyst” role. I feel like in a SaaS job, you always have someone wanting reporting from some software...

We have Canvas vanilla, no fancy add-ins or other Instructure products. Just plain ol'Canvas. I am thinking about what I want out of it:

• Access to course analytics, usage reports, and outcome data(maybe).
• Read-only permissions to prevent accidental course content changes.
• Centralized oversight without granting unnecessary student/faculty-level privileges. Rule of least privilege and all that fun. 

I added a screenshot of the permissions I am thinking to meet these needs. My BIG question: Do you have a custom reporting role and what permissions did you pick? 

I work in the IT area so this is for my higher ups. Does your institution use it for IT or faculty/staff? What was the need for your custom reporting role?

[Paolo_D]

Hello @rbh43 

Since you're the full-time Canvas admin at your institution, I wanted to share some helpful resources for reviewing and configuring user role permissions. By the way, the screenshot isn’t loading or it might be experiencing an error. I’m not sure if the issue is on my end, but just thought I’d mention it.

You can access your account’s Permissions settings from the global navigation bar on the left-hand side of your Canvas instance. Once you're in the Permissions area, you'll be able to see which user roles have specific permissions enabled or disabled. If you're unsure what a particular permission does, simply click on it—a side panel will appear on the right with a description and additional considerations for enabling that feature.

Here are some Canvas Community guides to help you learn more about user roles and permissions:

• What are user roles?
• How do I add an Account-Level Role in the Permissions Page?
• How do I set permissions for a user role?
• Account Role Permissions

Additionally, The Admin Analytics feature is a phenomenal addition to the analytics options admin have available at their fingertips in the UI to help identify areas of success, and those that can be focused on for additional support.

I’ve also included a few resources from the community that go into greater detail of all the data points that are available within Admin Analytics:

• Feature Preview Overview: Admin Analytics
• Admin Analytics Hub - Join/subscribe for the latest updates, FAQ, video & more! 
• March 29 Release

The User Course Access Log is a comprehensive report that has activity fields by course, role, and date/time. To get started with pulling account level reports, check out this guide: How do I view reports for an account?

Hope this helps address your question.