Globally Reset Student Passwords

[mcgrail_jennife]

For the beginning of the new School year, I am assuming all our student forgot their passwords.  Is there a way to globally reset all their passwords?

How do other schools handle this?  Our users are already in Canvas--we are not uploading our Schedule (it's not done yet lol)  So I didn't know if there was a way to just update passwords in mass.

thanks

Jenny McGrail

Holy Family Academy

mcgrail.jennifer@hfa-pgh.org

[bneporadny]

Hey  @mcgrail_jennife ,

Canvas does allow you to reset the students password by using their edit user login API. Below is a link to Canvas's documents of that API.

Logins - Canvas LMS REST API Documentation

Brian

[garth]

 @mcgrail_jennife  You can also use the SIS user import.

Take a look at this document:

SIS Import Format Documentation - Canvas LMS REST API Documentation

Notice that the "users.csv" contains two fields for the user password:

• password
• ssha_password

You can create a csv file containing a list of students, insert their passwords, and import the file.

This is an easy way to reset the password for groups of students, which is particularly useful if you are not using SSO.

I would recommend testing this in your test or beta environment to make sure you understand the behavior.

[cjack]

I have never been able to successfully bulk reset passwords using the SIS import. If this is now possible it would be fantastic.

[garth]

If a student has reset the password in the UI, that likely would make it sticky.

Have you used the "override_sis_stickiness" pareamter in your imports?

I am going to be traveling for work through mid-next week, but I'll prove this out as soon as I have some time.

Let me know if you are able to test it first.

[cjack]

This id an idea in the Canvas Community. The thread is located here.

[garth]

Reading the idea, I don't see anyone mentioning the "override_sis_stickiness" flag, so not sure it won't work.

I do agree however that if you are using SSO, overriding the password in Canvas could cause problems.

[garth]

Darn, nevermind, I just proved my idea wrong.

I tried an SIS import with a single user record, and used the override_sis_stickiness flag, and the password did not change.

Next I tried importing with a user status of "deleted", the importing again with user status of "active", again using the override_sis_stickiness flag, and again it did not work.

So, throw that idea out the door, and vote on the idea that was posted:  ​

This seemed so obvious to me, I'm voting when it's open : )