Allow teachers to add people after courses conclude

[cbarham]

          

  Idea open for vote Wed. September 7, 2016 - Wed. December 7, 2016  Learn more about voting...

I would like for teachers to have the ability to add people (specifically other teachers) to their concluded courses. At the beginning of each term I receive an abundance of requests to add other teachers to past courses for various reasons. Currently I have to change the course term setting, then add the teacher, masquerade as teacher to accept course invitation, and then go back and reset the course term. This is a very cumbersome process. I can't think of a disadvantage to allowing teachers to add people to concluded courses but I do know it would be helpful to me!

  Comments from Instructure

Greetings all!

I am going to archive this idea, as it is not something we will be developing as a general solution.

After reading all of your comments above, we have come to the following conclusions:

1. When it comes to sharing course content, Commons or setting up a shared course shell is a viable solution
2. Every school has different internal policies on who and when teachers and TAs can be added to a course.  Creating a feature that ignores these policies is not something we should be involved in and should be handled at the local admin level.
3. When we look at idea votes, we also look at diversity of voters.  This idea seems to be important to less than a handful of schools.  (which is why we are archiving it as a general solution).  If these schools are interested in a solution, they can contact their CSM to be put in contact with Professional Services.

[CraigOgden]

Isn't this way the commons area was created?  It seems kind of counter intuitive to add someone, even a teacher, when the class is over.

[cdoherty]

Commons doesn't include student work. Often this year's teacher (or this year's TA) wants to see how last year's teacher/TA handled grading their student work, handled discussions (student discussion posts can't be copied to Commons), collaborations, etc. They need to see the full course.

Also, Commons is now utterly useless without the sub-account organization. It's a nice idea in theory, but an epic failure in implementation. All the instructors that were eager to use Commons have now given up on it entirely.

[brendaa]

We also get requests for faculty to be added to older classes so the new faculty can view the full course. I can list lots of reasons that Commons doesn't work for this purpose. There is no reason to share the course on Commons when only 1 instructor needs to see the class.  Commons is setup for groups, not individual sharing.  There's no option to share with a specific user in Commons.  Creating a group, by the admin, for each of these uses would be cumbersome.  Commons material also needs to be imported into a class to  be viewed, and faculty may not want to commit to that until they have viewed the course.

[shirvanagainer]

They now have a role as an "Observer".  I have only given extended this invitation to my two interpreters to be proactive with being able to assist those special students with the content of each assignment and those that are upcoming w/ due dates.

Like you, I agree, I would never give anyone a "TA" invitation!

[CraigOgden]

I have a lot of parents who are observing the class, which I think is a good idea.

[Renee_Carney]

Greetings all!

I am going to archive this idea, as it is not something we will be developing as a general solution.

After reading all of your comments above, we have come to the following conclusions:

1. When it comes to sharing course content, Commons or setting up a shared course shell is a viable solution
2. Every school has different internal policies on who and when teachers and TAs can be added to a course.  Creating a feature that ignores these policies is not something we should be involved in and should be handled at the local admin level.
3. When we look at idea votes, we also look at diversity of voters.  This idea seems to be important to less than a handful of schools.  (which is why we are archiving it as a general solution).  If these schools are interested in a solution, they can contact their CSM to be put in contact with Professional Services.

[cdoherty]

Please explain how Canvas Commons is an acceptable solution to this need. Commons doesn't include any student work, discussions, etc. It only includes teaching materials. This seems like a total misunderstanding of the comments made in this request.

Maybe only a handful of schools votes on any feature idea, because the process is such a sham. Even ideas that are able to get over the hurdle of votes don't get implemented unless it fits in with a pre-existing Canvas roadmap.

[jmdragna]

 @Renee_Carney ​ thanks for the update, but it's unfortunate to hear this request is being archived.  At our institution, we have not enabled Commons because of the grouping/sharing functionality and the removal of sub accounts.  I also understand that institutions have varying policies.  I would expect Instructure to embrace this aspect and build a platform that's flexible and can conform to a wide range of clients.  Giving institutions the option is what we were asking for, or at least I hope that's what you all understood from our request.  I hope this option will be considered as a potentially Teacher permission set.  Otherwise, our support team (and Instructure's) will continue to receive numerous requests at the start of a new semester.

[Renee_Carney]

cdoherty​.

The original request focuses on course content itself, not student work, discussions, etc. The suggestion of Commons, or a Master Course, was addressing the need to share.

I am truly sorry that you feel like the feature idea process is a sham.  I can assure you that we track the number of schools that participate and vote, and we have a vast number. We're very transparent in saying that we do not believe this is a perfect process. We love having a way to hear form our customers and communicate openly with them. We're currently working on a revamp of this process. You can find more information at Changes are closer for Canvas Community Feature Ideas​.

 @jmdragna ​

I am absolutely empathetic here. Varying policies of institutions is a factor that makes this feature very difficult.  Right now, admins can add users post conclude.  This seems to be the best control to meet the spectrum of policies - most of which revolve around FERPA and who should have access to student work.

In my previous career, as a Canvas admin, I usually encouraged an instructor to create a Master Course Shell (or I created it for them) and then copy their completed course there.  The course was usually in the Default term.  Then they could add fellow instructors without compromising student work.

[janekauf]

I agree that adding teachers to a course (especially when the teachers change) is a NEEDED feature which needs to be easily available.  

[hesspe]

I would be in favor of this, but only after there is the ability to prevent Teachers from adding other Teachers.  The reason for this is:  Teacher A (the real teacher)  adds "Teacher B" who adds "Teacher C" who adds "Teacher D" and so on and pretty soon, things are a bit out of control.  Most Teachers won't abuse this, but there is no way to guarantee that some won't.  And I know for a fact that a few do.