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This service is for faculty and staff
Several weeks after the end of the term courses "conclude" in Canvas and are placed in a read-only (archived) state. Read-only means that a course is not available for submitting assignments, posting discussions, uploading files, grading, or any other action-based task within a course.
Once a course has reached its end date it becomes read-only for students; once the term has concluded it becomes read-only for faculty. When a course is concluded, instructors are not able to add individuals to a course. If you need to share content from a concluded course with another faculty member for teaching purposes or if an individual needs to gain access to student records for grading or accreditation purposes follow the instructions in this article.
To find/access your concluded courses see the Canvas article: How do I customize my courses list as an instructor?
Closed Course Guide for Faculty/Staff
*If you need to open up a concluded course for a student with an incomplete grade view the article: Canvas: Student Incomplete/Extended Section Guide for Faculty
*This must be requested by the original instructor of the course, the chair of the department, or the dean.
The best way to share content from your closed course with another faculty member is to have the St. Thomas Canvas team create a sandbox copy of the closed course and enroll you (the original instructor) as a teacher in it. From the sandbox copy, you can add faculty members and decide which content to share. By creating a sandbox copy of the course you can give another instructor full access to the original content without fear of them accidentally viewing or changing your student's grades or activity in the already concluded course. If the other faculty member DOES need to view student grades and records along with course content read: How to access student grades/records in a faculty member's closed course for accreditation or grading purposes.
To request a sandbox copy of a closed course, the instructor from the original course (or an authority in the department such as a chair/dean) should submit a ticket request to the Learning Management Systems (Canvas) team requesting a "sandbox copy of your closed course".
Things to include in the ticket details:
- The SIS ID or link to the original course
- The names and original St. Thomas email addresses (example: smit1234@stthomas.edu) of the individuals who should be invited as "teachers" into the sandbox course copy.
- If the original instructor of the course would like to copy the material themselves or pick and choose which content to copy over into the sandbox specify that an empty sandbox should be created.
Once the request is received, the Canvas team will create the sandbox, copy the content over, and invite the instructors into the course as "teachers." The sandbox will have a "default" term and will include the original course's SIS ID (e.g. if the old content exists in 201720THEO101-01, the "sandbox course" would be named "sandbox_201720THEO101-01"). Those enrolled in the sandbox will see an invite to the sandbox course on their Canvas dashboards and in their inbox.
**If the secondary instructor plans on copying the sandbox course content into their future course it is highly recommended that they reach out to our instructional designers to ensure the course includes up-to-date teaching and learning standards. Use this bookings link to schedule a consultation with an Instructional Designer.
*This must be requested by the original instructor of the course, the chair of the department, or the dean.
The instructor from the original course (or an authority in the department such as a chair/dean) should submit a ticket request to the Learning Management Systems (Canvas) team requesting "Teacher" enrollment for the individual who needs access.
Things to include in the ticket details:
- The SIS ID or link to the original course
- The name and original St. Thomas email address (example: smit1234@stthomas.edu) of the individual who needs to be invited as "teacher" into the closed course.
- The reason that you are requesting the individual needs access to these records
* It is imperative that individuals added to a closed course as a "teacher" understand how to use Canvas so they do not change/remove student content. If any content is accidentally changed, the individual must contact the Canvas team immediately so that we may recover the content. If too much time elapses after a mistake, the content may not be recoverable.
*This must be requested by the original instructor of the course, the chair of the department, or the dean.
Faculty members who need to gain access to a closed course for observation purposes, need the instructor from the original course (or an authority in the department such as a chair/dean) to submit a ticket to the Learning Management Systems (Canvas) requesting "Faculty Observer" enrollment for the individual who needs access.
Things to include in the ticket details:
- The SIS ID or link to the original course
- The name and original St. Thomas email address (example: smit1234@stthomas.edu) of the individual who should be invited as "Faculty Observer" to the closed course.
- The reason that you are requesting access
Faculty Observers added to a closed course will not be able to alter the content within the course. This is primarily requested for faculty/staff members who need to view the course exactly as it was published for students. If faculty/staff members need to view the content for teaching purposes, we recommend instead following the directions under the header "How to share content from your closed course with another instructor."
To report a problem or receive additional troubleshooting, please contact the
Tech Desk.