Do stuff using Online Attendance data

[jozua]

Context

My institution uses Canvas predominantly for synchronous contact-based teaching and we use the Roll Call Attendance module quite extensively. While it does the basics quite well, it has some shortcomings (cannot take attendance more than once on the same day for the same course; things can start breaking if you have multiple sections with overlapping students in the same course.) So we were particularly interested to see if we can use Online Attendance to address some of these, and also to use it in other cases. 

Online Attendance... now what?

When Online Attendance preferences could only be set on account level, this was of no use to us. But now you can set preferences on course level. I excitedly enabled the feature, set the preferences on course level, and went into New Analytics, and then I was completely stumped for what to do next… 

I expected to be able to *do* something based on this data, not just to look at a grid of online attendance data and filter stuff. 

FEATURE IDEA (the stuff I expected to be able to do)

+ Let us do stuff based on the online attendance data, like sending messages to students based on Online Attendance data, or getting something into the Gradebook. (At the very least just export the data.)

I realise I might be missing something, but what can you do with Online Attendance other than gaining some on-screen insights from the grid? 

[KristinL]

Hi @jozua -

Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts about Attendance with the Instructure Community! You've definitely thought this through, and you've communicated it clearly.

To better help your ideas gain the attention of Community Members and Project Managers, please create a separate post for each improvement. I know the third suggestion already has an idea, so this would only need to be done once to separate Idea 1 and Idea 2. You may edit this idea to keep one idea here. Then, modify the title so Community Members know exactly what you'd like to accomplish with Attendance. 

Downloadable report for attendance in New Analytics 

How do idea conversations work in the Instructure Community? 

I look forward to collaborating!

[jozua]

Hi Kristin

I've removed the third suggestion that already has an idea. The other two ideas are really just one idea so I've combined them. As the title suggests, the idea is that you can do stuff based on Online Attendance data. (Do anything really, rather than just stare at a grid on screen.) Is that sufficient? 

I've noticed other feature ideas that have long lists of multiple suggestions. Is that a legacy thing?

[EdCasey]

Maybe "stuff" could also be a simple option to:

(1) mailto: [person]

(2) synch with SIS

[ProductPanda]

Comments from Instructure

As part of the new Ideas & Themes process, all ideas in Idea Conversations were reviewed by the Product Team. Any Idea that was associated with an identified theme was moved to the new Idea & Themes space. Any Idea that was not part of the move is being marked as Archived. This will preserve the history of the conversations while also letting Community members know that Instructure will not explore the request at this time.