How do you use Canvas for extra curricular clubs or teams?

[ntibbetts]

We would like to use Canvas for teachers to communicate with students that are in their clubs/sports teams.  We thought Groups would be a solution but it appears that an adviser/coach can't manage student enrollment which is too big a task for us to take on at the admin level.

How do you leverage Canvas as a communication tool for clubs or athletics while keeping the extra-curricular activities separate from classwork?

Thanks for your help!

[Bobby2]

Hi  @ntibbetts  Welcome to the Canvas Community.

Great question! It's super seeing so many different uses for Canvas, your purpose is a beauty.

I've seen people create a new course dedicated to special events such as sports, clubs, library, choir, debating etc. I've even seen students as young as grade 5-6 given the teacher role for their school student council course and run it themselves - with guidance of course. Great leadership opportunity. 

If you are allowed by your institution you could put your coach in with the a teacher role. They could be taught how to manage enrollments etc. This guide might help https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-13123-4152481701 

Would that work in your case?

[Bobby2]

Hi Nicole, I'm just checking in to see how you got on with this answer to your question. 

[ntibbetts]

I am not loving the Groups aspect for this. We were hoping to keep the extra curriculars students are involved in separate from their academics but it does not appear there is a aspect of Canvas that is intended to do this. We are sort of trying to fit a square peg into a round hole to make it work.

[Chris_Hofer]

Hello there,  @ntibbetts ...

In addition to the information you've received from  @Bobby2 , I wrote a blog post a couple years ago called Campus Clubs and Groups that you may find helpful.  However, we have now moved away from this setup and assigned each of our campus clubs/groups to their own Canvas course shell.  We then set up the shells so that instructors can share a unique course URL with students so that they can self-enroll in the club/group.  (This assumes that the student joining the club/group also already has an account in our Canvas environment.)  You can read more on how to set up your course with a unique URL here: How do I enable course self-enrollment with a join code or secret URL?.  I hope this extra bit of information will be of help to you, Nicole.