Students circumventing Available Dates/Times

[CATHYSHEELY]

Good morning,

In the last week I have had two students submit assignments that they shouldn't have been able to since the assignments were closed.

In one case, the assignment isn't set to open till next week, but one student has already posted their work. I checked the settings on the assignment and it clearly states that the assignment isn't available till next week Thursday. So I have no idea how this student managed to submit work.

In the other case, the assignment closed on the 28th, but somehow, one student managed to submit their work on the 29th. I, again checked the settings on the assignment and it clearly states that the assignment is closed. So I don't know how a student was able to submit work.

Any ideas?

[chriscas · Accepted solution]

Hi @CATHYSHEELY,

This one is going to be really difficult for Instructure Community members to help troubleshoot.  My advice would be to contact Canvas Support with details of the examples you shared here to see if they can track down what may have happened.

In general, the date enforcement happens on the cloud/server side of Canvas, so aside from any major bugs in the code, it really shouldn't be possible for students to game the system and submit or access things outside of the intended dates.

Do you think it's possible someone accidentally changed the dates, then changes them back again at some point?  I'm struggling to come up with other plausible options here, aside from there being an unknown bug in Canvas code (which support could potentially identify).

If you're able to reach out to support, please do keep the community here updated with their findings!

-Chris

[CATHYSHEELY]

I don't know why this was labeled as a solution, when it doesn't solve my problem. I think it is a bug in the code because I am not the only teacher here at East Tech that has experienced this phenomenon.

I am the only person working within my Canvas courses, so unless you are suggesting that an administrator altered something and then changed it back, it is a problem in the code.

For further clarification, these are text entry assignments. And for some reason, Canvas has allowed students to access the assignment page outside of the dates/times that they should have been able to access it. I tried to chat with support but waited over 10 hours without anyone joining the chat. 

Feel free to look at the images. The first assignment was already closed, and yet a student was able to submit their assignment a day after the close date. The second assignment hasn't even opened yet, and there is already a submission.

[CATHYSHEELY]

I tried reaching out to support and waited 10 hours for someone to join the chat.

For further clarification, these are text entry assignments. And for some reason, Canvas has allowed students to access the assignment page outside of the dates/times that they should have been able to access it. 

Feel free to look at the images. The first assignment was already closed, and yet a student was able to submit their assignment a day after the close date. The second assignment hasn't even opened yet, and there is already a submission.

[rmartini]

I haven't heard of this happening, but could you tell us more about what type of assignments these were? Were they regular assignments (submitting text entry or file upload), or a quiz (classic or new), or an LTI assignment, or something else?

[CATHYSHEELY]

For further clarification, these are text entry assignments. And for some reason, Canvas has allowed students to access the assignment page outside of the dates/times that they should have been able to access it. I tried to chat with support but waited over 10 hours without anyone joining the chat. 

Feel free to look at the images. The first assignment was already closed, and yet a student was able to submit their assignment a day after the close date. The second assignment hasn't even opened yet, and there is already a submission.

[rmartini]

Is it possible that students are in more than one section? I can't tell if the "2nd assignment dates and times" screenshot shows all of the "Assign To" options, but the "Assignment dates and times" screenshot shows due dates/times for specific sections (or specific students). I have seen some assignments where students see different due dates as a result of them being enrolled in multiple sections and the assignment having different availability settings for each section (Canvas would generally display the later/"more generous" due date for the student though). Something like that may be happening in your course. Like @chriscas said, contacting Canvas Support may be your best option because they'd be able to access your actual course site. At my institution, in the Help menu, there is an option to "Report a Problem" which will open a ticket with Instructure Support so you don't have to wait for a chat to open.

[CATHYSHEELY]

Students are only enrolled in one section. And all the sections were closed at the times that the rogue assignments were submitted.