Canvas help week of Jan. 8

Vicky Austin, our Canvas faculty mentor-trainer, is available for any Canvas assistance during the week of Jan. 8. If you would like to make an appointment with her, email her directly at vaustin@laspositascollege.edu.

 

Scott

Canvas Fall 2017 semester wrap-up

Canvas instructors,

 

Hope your semester has gone well. To wrap it up and prepare for next semester, please note the following:

1.       Course access at the end of a semester works differently in Canvas than in Blackboard. Here are the most important points:

a.       You will have full access to your course until Jan. 5 at 11:59 p.m. After that, you will only have read-only access. However, you will be able to export your course.

b.       Students will have full access to your course until Dec. 20 at 11:59 p.m. (unless you have changed the Term end date and time). After the Term end date and time passes, students will have read-only access. They can get to the course by clicking Courses – All Courses. The course will show under Past Enrollments.

c.       If you want students to have full access after the Term end date and time, go into Settings, increase the Term end date and time, then check the box that says: Users can only participate in the course between these dates.  

d.       If you don’t want students to have any access to the course after the Term end date and time, scroll down in Settings, and check the box that says: Restrict students from viewing course after end date.

2. Make sure you check the accuracy of your grades and download your Gradebook. For students who do not complete assignments by the deadline dates, manually give them zeros in the gradebook. If you leave their grade cells blank, those missing assignments won't count against them. Canvas has a feature in the gradebook settings called Treat Ungraded as 0, but this does not automatically convert dashes to zeros; it only changes the Totals column. Students won’t see zeros or any changes in Totals when they check grades.
   

Download your Gradebook by clicking Export – CSV File. Keep your exported Gradebook on your computer or backup drive for safekeeping.

 

3.     If you are going to move your current course into a subsequent semester’s course, you can either copy a previous semester's course content or export the previous course and import it into the new course. You can do all of these by going to Settings in a course. While in Settings, do NOT click the Copy this Course button on the right side; this tool creates a new course that your students will not be able to access.

a.     Learn how to copy a course.

b.     Learn how to export a course.

c.     Learn how to import a course.

4.     Use method (b) above to export your course and save it in a secure environment (e.g. on your computer, to an external drive, to an online drive). If anything ever happens to Canvas, you’ll always have your course.

5.     If you are teaching a Distance Education course next semester, you should send a welcome letter to your students a week or so prior to the first day of classes. A template is attached. I have also attached a syllabus template for your optional use. If you put either or both into Canvas, you will need to convert to accessible PDFs beforehand. I even have an entire course template, and if you’re interested in that, let me know.

6.     A new Online Learning web site will be launched in early January. It will include content and information for both students and faculty. If you have links to the current site, you will want to check them prior to Spring classes.

7.     If you haven’t yet requested your course(s) for next semester, log into Class-Web, click Menu for Faculty, and click the Canvas link at the bottom.

8.     I will be out of the office from Dec. 19-Jan. 2. If you need assistance Dec. 19-22, contact Wanda Butterly at ext. 1655. You can also contact Canvas Support those days or throughout the holidays at 1-833-300-3467.

Scott

 

Keep up with new Canvas features and tools by reading the Canvas Release Notes at https://community.canvaslms.com/community/answers/releases/

 

 

Blackboard downtime last night

In case it is mentioned by your students, Blackboard had an issue and was down from 12:36 a.m. until 12:47 a.m. last night.

 

Scott

Reminder: Spring 2018 course requests

If you have not already requested your Spring 2018 courses for either Canvas or Blackboard, please do so by logging into Class-Web, clicking Menu for Faculty, Staff & Advisors, then clicking either the Canvas or Blackboard links toward the bottom of the page. Choose the term and Las Positas for the campus, and click Submit Query. From here, you can request individual courses, or you can choose courses or sections to merge.

 

Keep in mind that Blackboard will be going away at the end of the Spring 2018 semester.

 

Scott

 

Blackboard system maintenanc

Blackboard will be performing emergency maintenance on our system from 11 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 30 until 3 a.m. Friday, Dec. 1. According to Bb, there might be times during those four hours when the system is not available.

 

Scott

Blackboard downtime

Blackboard instructors,

 

Blackboard is updating our system from 9 p.m. Nov. 17 until 3 a.m. Nov. 18. During this time, Bb says that users will “experience an interruption”. Just how long that interruption will be, Bb doesn’t say. Nevertheless, please inform your students that there will be intermittent availability during those hours.

 

Scott

 

3C Media app added to Canvas

Canvas instructors,

 

A new app for 3C Media, which allows for hosting and free, accurate captioning of instructor-created videos, has been installed in Canvas. It can be used to add videos to Modules and videos within the Rich Content Editor. Within the editor, the tool can be accessed by clicking the V-shaped icon, then selecting 3C Media.

 

 

Before you can use the tool, however, you will need to do two things:

1.       Create an account at 3C Media Solutions.

2.       Activate the app in your course by going to Settings – Navigation and dragging it from the hidden area to the navigation area before clicking Save.

 

Click to view instructions on using the app.

 

Scott

 

Canvas updates

Canvas instructors,

 

Here are a few new items to pass along:

 

1.       Canvas has a new Accessibility Checker in the Rich Content Editor. It will check common accessibility errors within the editor so your content will be ADA-compliant. It also provides explanations of errors and allows you to fix those errors. It will NOT check your Word or PowerPoint files, nor will it check that videos are captioned. Learn more about the Accessibility Checker.

2.       Canvas is supposed to add a new LPC faculty support phone number in the Help menu. The current number will remain, but it will just be for students.

3.       Canvas is working on fixing a couple of minor errors in the Rich Content Editor:

a.       When users embed a file in a Canvas object (e.g. a page, the description of an assignment or quiz, etc.) and selected the 'auto-open inline preview' or 'disable inline preview' options, these are not working as they should.  When users click on the link that is created to the file, they are taken to their personal Files page to preview the file. This means they must navigate back to their course after they close the preview. Also, there is no icon next to the file name to indicate that a preview is available.

b.       A separate issue affects images uploaded from the content selector on the right side of the page when editing content in the Rich Content Editor.  When a user adds an image using the "Images" tab in the content selector, no thumbnail of the image is embedded, nor does it appear in the content selector as having been uploaded and available for selection.  Only the title of the image appears.  Users must upload images via the "Insert Image" icon, directly within the Rich Content Editor or refresh the page after uploading from the content selector for the images to embed properly.

 

Scott

 

Keep up with new Canvas features and tools by reading the Canvas Release Notes at https://community.canvaslms.com/community/answers/releases/

 

 

Web accessibility checks

The LPC Distance Education Committee is once again soliciting faculty to voluntarily have their DE courses reviewed for web accessibility issues. As you know, all of your course materials must be accessible to students with disabilities whether you have such students in your class or not.

The reviews will be limited to Canvas courses, and priority will be given to adjunct instructors because they typically have less compensated time than full-timers.

Wanda Butterly, the college’s Instructional Technology Specialist, will be reviewing the courses. She will let you know what, if anything, needs to be fixed. You can then make an appointment with Wanda to learn how to fix the issues, or you can access the Web Accessibility Course in Canvas to see how to fix the issues.

If you are interested, simply complete this form.

Scott

 

Spring Canvas, Bb course requests

You may now request your Spring 2018 courses by logging into Class-Web, clicking Menu for Faculty, Staff & Advisors, then clicking either the Canvas or Blackboard links toward the bottom of the page. Choose Spring 2018 for the term and Las Positas for the campus, and click Submit Query. From here, you can request individual courses, or you can choose courses or sections to merge.

 

Some notes:

 

1.     Blackboard is going away after the Spring 2018 semester, so you might be better served by requesting Canvas courses now.

2.       When moving from one semester to another in Canvas, you can either copy a previous semester's course content or export the previous course and import it into the new course. You can do all of these by going to Settings in a course. While in Settings, DO NOT click the Copy this Course button on the right side; this tool creates a new course that your students will not be able to access.

1. Learn how to copy a course.
2. Learn how to export a course.
3. Learn how to import a course.

3.     If you are teaching an online course, you have the option to use the Canvas model course template as a starting point. The course is based on the OEI’s Course Design Rubric and provides organization and structure for your course. If you want to view the model course, let me know. If you already have access to it and want to use it, complete this form.

4.     The Succeeding in an Online Course tutorial and Online Learning Orientation that have been used with Blackboard for years and are on the Online Learning web site will be going away after Spring 2018. They have been replaced by the OEI’s Quest for Online Success and integrated into Canvas. Learn more about Quest.

5.     The current Online Learning web site is also being replaced. The new site will be posted after the current semester.

6.     I will send an email by the end of the week about registering for TLC workshops and appointments that will take place during the remainder of this semester. The next workshop, Web Accessibility Basics, will take place from 1-2 p.m. Tuesday.

7.     Remember that everything in your course must be made accessible to students with disabilities. You can either come to a workshop, make an appointment, or complete the Canvas tutorial called Web Accessibility Course.

 

Scott

 

Canvas Flex Day workshops

For those of you wanting to participate in the Oct. 24 Flex Day Canvas Introduction and/or Canvas Advanced workshops, we ask that you register in advance at the Professional Development Workshops page. This will ensure that participants are set up in Canvas and know how to log in prior to the workshops. It will also guarantee you one of the 45 seats in Room 803 with a view of the projection screen. If you have already registered, you don’t have to register again.

 

Other Canvas-related workshops on Flex Day (no need to register for these):

·         Canvas Drop-In Training, 8-8:50 a.m. in the TLC (Room 2410)

·         Using the OEI Online Course Design Rubric to Meet Accreditation Standards, 10-11:50 a.m. in the TLC (Room 241)

·         Making your Canvas Course Site ADA-Compliant, 1-2:50 p.m. in Room 2412

 

View the full Flex Day schedule, which includes descriptions of the workshops.

 

Scott

Canvas course migration/cleanup info

Blackboard instructors,

 

For those of switching to Canvas for Spring 2018, the District has again contracted with Canvas to not only migrate your courses from Blackboard to Canvas, but also to perform any necessary post-migration cleanup work. If you are interested in having Canvas do the cleanup for you, please fill out this form by Oct. 15 so we can get the process underway.

 

Some important points:

1.       Having Canvas do the migration/cleanup work for you is OPTIONAL.  In fact, you have 3 choices:

a.       Do the migration/cleanup yourself when your Spring 2018 courses are set up in Canvas (you will be notified later this semester when to begin requesting them). Here’s a document that will help you.

b.       Do the cleanup yourself whenever you want. Spring 2016 through Summer 2017 Blackboard courses have already been migrated for you. You can access them now in Canvas and begin cleaning them up. When your spring 2018 courses are set up in Canvas, simply export them from your cleaned-up course, and import them into your new course.

c.       Have Canvas do the cleanup for you in any of your already migrated Spring 2016 through Summer 2017 courses. You would then do the above export/import task into your new course.

2.       If requests exceed our limits, not all requests will be granted. Priority will be given to Spring 2018 Distance Ed courses.

3.       An FYI to those utilizing the Canvas cleanup service: In order for the cleanup person to do his job thoroughly, he needs instructor access to your corresponding courses in Blackboard. The District has given me permission to grant him that access. Once he is finished, I will remove him.

4.       Instructors utilizing the cleanup service will have a chance to communicate with the cleanup person. At least one webinar will be scheduled and announced.

5.       As a reminder to those teaching online courses, the Course Design Rubric for the Online Education Initiative is available to guide you through designing or redesigning your course for quality. There is also an Online Course Design Guide to use with the above rubric.

 

Scott

 

FW: 3C Media Solutions Fall 2017 Newsletter

FYI: 3C Media Solutions is the recommended site on which to host your instructor-created videos. It was created for CCC faculty and includes a tool that accurately captions your videos.

 

Scott

 

From: 3C Media Solutions [mailto:events@3cmediasolutions.org]
Sent: Tuesday, September 05, 2017 11:53 AM
To: Scott Vigallon <SVigallon@laspositascollege.edu>
Subject: 3C Media Solutions Fall 2017 Newsletter

 

If you are unable to read this newsletter, click here. For text version, click here.

 

 

Canvas dropped students update

Canvas instructors,

 

District ITS has fixed the issue of dropped students having access to their Canvas courses. If you still have any of these, let me know (student, W number, course), and I will forward them along.

 

Scott

Resources from last week's DE workshop

For those unable to attend the College Day workshop last week titled Meeting the Laws and Regulations for Distance Education Courses, I’ve attached the PowerPoint and listed some resources below:

 

·         LPC's Regular Effective Contact Guidelines

·         Google Advanced Image Search (Go to Google Images – Settings – Advanced Search)

·         Converting a Word document to an accessible PDF

·         Converting a PowerPoint presentation to an accessible PDF 

·         3C Media Solutions

·         Web Accessibility Course

·         Intro to Canvas-LPC course

 

Scott

 

Update: New students in Canvas

District ITS has fixed the issue that stopped students who registered Wednesday night from being inputted into their Canvas courses. Regarding the issue of dropped students still showing in Canvas, I am told that should be resolved next week.

 

Scott

New students in Canvas

District ITS is working on an issue today in which students who registered last night for classes using Canvas are unable to access those classes. When it gets solved, I’ll let everyone know. I still haven’t heard anything from District ITS about the issue with dropped students still showing.

 

Scott

Students in Canvas

I’ve received reports from faculty saying the number of students in their Canvas courses don’t match the number in Class Web. I have alerted District ITS about this. Hopefully, it will be fixed soon. The same thing occurred at the beginning of the Spring semester and got fixed.

 

Scott

Info for DE instructors

DE instructors:

 

1.       For those of you using Blackboard, this is a reminder that the Succeeding in an Online Course tutorial and the Online Learning Orientation, both located on the Online Learning web site, will be going away when the transition to Canvas is complete. Those tutorials are old and Blackboard-focused. For those of you using Canvas, you should NOT be linking to either of the above; you should use the new Quest for Online Success tutorial with your students. Information on that is in the email I sent you this morning.

2.       On College Day, Aug. 15, I will be facilitating a workshop on the legal requirements of teaching DE. You are all invited. It takes place from 10:30-12 in Room 2412.

3.       Over the next week or so, I will give you all access to the new Online Course Development Program course in Canvas. You can use it for hands-on training, or you simply use it as a resource. It contains all of the important information you’ll need to design, develop, and teach an online course.

4.       If you want to view my model course template for Canvas, just let me know. Like the OCDP course above, it’s optional for you.

 

Scott

Fall Online Course Development Program

LPC Faculty,

 

For those of you interested in designing online courses, the Online Course Development Program is soliciting participants for the Fall 2017 semester. The ultimate goal of the OCDP to learn the technical and pedagogical skills necessary to design and teach a high-quality online course.

 

Please see the OCDP web page for more information, including guidelines and training requirements.

 

If you would like to take part in the OCDP, reply to me by Aug. 21, and include days and times that you are available. Weekly meetings in the Teaching and Learning Center (Room 2410) begin the week of Aug. 28. Every attempt will be made to accommodate individual schedules, but if a day and time cannot be worked out, you may participate in the self-paced version of the OCDP in Canvas.

 

Any questions, email or call me at ext. 1654.

 

Scott

 

Final Fall Canvas reminders

For those of you teaching with Canvas in Fall 2017:

 

Attached is a checklist to help your Fall classes get off to a good start. And here is some information/reminders to help, too:

 

 

1. View Canvas beginning-of-semester faculty notes. There are a bit too many of these to fit into this email.
2. You can get your Canvas questions answered by calling Canvas directly. LPC has paid for a license that gives students and faculty 24x7 access to Canvas. The toll-free phone number is 1-844-600-4956. This number is also in the Help menu in Canvas.
3. Email your students to let them know that your course is in Canvas, not Blackboard.
4. Publish your courses by the beginning of the day your class starts so students can access them. If you are not teaching an online or hybrid course and want to wait longer to publish your courses, that’s up to you. To publish your course, go to the course home page, and click Publish.
5. Additions to your Canvas courses since last Spring included an LPC Library icon in the global navigation menu, a chat tool, a Google Drive tool, and YouTube and Films on Demand tools in the Rich Content Editor. If you want to make the chat and Google Drive tools available to students, go to Settings – Navigation, and drag Chat and/or Google Drive from the bottom area to the top area, and click Save.
6. If you are teaching a DE class, contact your students prior to the start of the semester, and encourage them to self-enroll into the Quest for Online Success Course in Canvas. This is a readiness course that prepares students to succeed online. Learn more about Quest. DE students were notified by email Aug. 1, and many have already self-enrolled. A reminder from you would be good, especially since students who added after Aug. 1 did not receive the original email notification. Here are instructions you can copy and paste for your students:

a.     Go to https://clpccd.instructure.com/enroll/KDENL6. If necessary, copy and paste the URL (without the period at the end) into your browser.

b.     Log into Canvas with your W number. Your password is the first 2 letters of your first name, followed by the first 2 letters of your last name (all lowercase), followed by the last four digits of your W number. If you have already logged into Canvas and changed your password, use that password.

c.      Click the button "Enroll in Course".

d.     Click the button "Go to the Course".

e.     Complete the modules.

7. Also, if you are teaching a DE class and want to see how your course measures up to the quality standards set by the Online Education Initiative, you can compare it to the OEI Course Design Rubric. Examples that meet the rubric’s criteria can be found in the Online Course Design Guide.
8. Make sure all of your content is accessible to students with disabilities. Everything you need to know about web accessibility, including “how-to” tutorials, is available in a Canvas course in which you have access. Just log into Canvas, and you will see a web accessibility course in your Dashboard called Creating Accessible Course Content.
9. The Regular Effective Contact Guidelines, approved by the LPC Academic Senate, state that all Distance Education courses, whether fully online or hybrid, must demonstrate regular effective contact with student. For hybrids, this contact is required not only during on-campus meetings, but it is also required online.
10. The LPC DE Committee has developed recommendations, along with answers to frequently asked questions, that are intended to aid instructors—particularly new instructors—in determining how many students to add and when to add those students near the beginning of the semester. View the recommendations and FAQs.
11. Here is LPC’s DE drop policy:
    
    The instructor may drop students who miss the first meeting of a course. The first meeting of online or hybrid Distance Education courses is the first day of the class as specified in the class schedule listing.  For these courses, instructors may drop students who do not log into their Blackboard course and/or complete indicated activities by the third day of classes. DE instructors may drop students if they have not submitted work and/or accessed the class for two consecutive weeks. For Summer courses, DE instructors may drop students if they have not submitted work and/or accessed the class for one week.
12. Encourage your students to use the NetTutor online tutoring service. View more information about NetTutor.
13. The Canvas Teacher mobile app lets you manage your courses via an Android or iOS device. Learn more about the app.

 

 

Good luck with your courses!

Scott

 

Fall 2017 students to be inputted

Canvas, Blackboard instructors:

 

This is a heads-up that Fall 2017 students will be inputted into their courses tonight (Canvas) and overnight tonight (Blackboard). If you don’t want students to access your courses until the start of classes, keep your courses unpublished (Canvas) and unavailable (Blackboard).

 

Scott

Revised design in Canvas

Canvas instructors,

If you haven't already noticed, Canvas updated its design by enlarging its font and implementing new icons. To keep up on Canvas changes, you can always follow its release notes at

https://community.canvaslms.com/community/answers/releases/.

Scott

Canvas 1-day conference

American River College in Sacramento is hosting a 1-day Canvas conference called Can-Innovate on Monday, Aug. 14. The conference costs $20 and is supported by Canvas and the state’s Online Education Initiative. For more information, go to http://innovate.losrios.edu/.

 

Aug. 14 is Convocation Day for full-time LPC employees, so this is probably more pertinent to adjunct faculty.

 

Scott

Dropped students follow-up

Canvas instructors,

 

The issue with dropped students still showing in classes appears to have been solved by District ITS. Students who withdrew after the add period show as inactive in People. For those who started classes this week, you shouldn’t notice this until after the drop period. Students who dropped prior to NGR will simply disappear from your class.

 

Scott

Canvas Summer students

Canvas instructors,

 

District ITS has been alerted of an issue whereby dropped students are still showing as active in Canvas courses. This happened last semester and got fixed, so I’m assuming ITS will fix it soon.

 

Scott

Canvas improvements

Canvas instructors,

 

The interface for the VeriCite anti-plagiarism tool in Canvas has been updated and is available to use. VeriCite said it was updated “for improved ease of use, functionality, and accessibility.” To see the update in action, view a YouTube video about it. You can also read about it on VeriCite’s Canvas User Guide for instructors.

 

Canvas’ Assignments tool has been updated with a new viewer in the SpeedGrader that converts uploaded documents into a readable format and allows you to add comments. It works very similarly to the old viewer. Read more about the new viewer.

 

Scott

Blackboard Spring 2017 semester wrap-up

Blackboard instructors,

 

Hope your semester went well. To wrap up Spring 2017, please note the following:

 

1. Make sure you: a) archive your course, b) check the accuracy of your grades, c) archive your emails, d) download your Grade Center, and e) make your course unavailable to students when they no longer need access. If your Total column in the Grade Center is set to Calculate as a Running Total and display as a Percentage, please make sure your grades are accurate by either turning Calculate as a Running Total off or entering zeros for missing assignments. If you have hidden columns in which you entered points possible but did not score students, check that you have not included those points in the Grade Center calculations and have not made the columns invisible to students. If your points possible don’t look correct, make sure all visible columns are included in the calculations.

 

Also, there has been recent emphasis by accreditors and federal regulators to prove instructor-student contact in DE and hybrid courses, so archiving your emails has become increasingly important. More information, and instructions on the tasks above, can be found in the document “Closing your course”.

2. Once you determine that students no longer need access to your class, make it unavailable to them. To make the class unavailable, go to Control Panel - Customization - Properties, and for Make Course Available, click No, then click Submit.
   
   
3. Click here to view information on copying courses. Important: If you are using publisher materials and need to copy them into your new course, make sure you scroll down the Copy Course page, and under the heading Course Cartridge Materials, check the box. This is a very easy box to miss because it is located further down on the page from the rest of the checkboxes. Please make sure you check this box each time you copy a course. If you don't, your exams will be copied, but the pools that house the questions, do not.
   
   
4. Support: I will be gone May 26. Beginning the week of June 5 and finishing the week of July 31, the college will be closed on Fridays. I will be on vacation the week of July 3 and will also be gone July 24. We will have a new part-time support person in the Teaching and Learning Center beginning July 17.

 

Scott

 

Canvas Spring 2017 semester wrap-up

Canvas instructors,

 

Hope your semester went well. To wrap up Spring 2017, please note the following:

 

1.       If you are going to move your Spring 2017 course into a subsequent semester’s course, do NOT use the Copy this Course function. Copying creates a new course that is NOT integrated into our Banner system, meaning your students will NOT be able to access it. Instead, you will use the Export Course Content function to export, and download, the course to your computer, then you will use Import Content into this Course.

a.       Follow these instructions to export your course. Keep your exported course on your computer or backup drive for safekeeping.

b.       Follow these instructions to import content.

2.       Course access at the end of a semester works differently in Canvas than in Blackboard. Here are the most important points:

a.       You will have full access to your course until June 8 at 11:59 p.m. After that, you will only have read-only access. However, you will be able to export your course.

b.       Students will have full access to your course until May 26 at 11:59 p.m. (unless you have changed the Term end date and time). After the Term end date and time passes, students will have read-only access.

c.       If you want students to have full access after the Term end date and time, go into Settings, increase the Term end date and time, then check the box that says: Users can only participate in the course between these dates.  

d.       If you don’t want students to have any access to the course after the Term end date and time, scroll down in Settings, and check the box that says: Restrict students from viewing course after end date.

3. Make sure you check the accuracy of your grades and download your Gradebook. For students who do not complete assignments by the deadline dates, manually give them zeroes in the gradebook. If you leave their grade cells blank, those missing assignments won't count against them. Canvas has a feature in the gradebook settings called Treat Ungraded as 0. If you enable it, you will get the students' true scores, but the students won't get it when they check their grades. In other words, the zeroes are only reflected in the totals in your view, not theirs.

 

Download your Gradebook by clicking Export – CSV File. Keep your exported Gradebook on your computer or backup drive for safekeeping.

4.     If you haven’t requested your Summer or Fall course(s) yet, log into Class-Web, click Menu for Faculty, and click the Canvas link at the bottom.

5. Support: I will be gone May 26. Beginning the week of June 5 and finishing the week of July 31, the college will be closed on Fridays. If you need assistance, call the Canvas support line at 1-844-600-4956. I will be on vacation the week of July 3 and will also be gone July 24. We will have a new part-time support person in the Teaching and Learning Center beginning July 17.

 

Scott

 

Summer Canvas training opportunities

The TLC is hosting six Introduction to Canvas workshops this Summer for those of you wanting to learn LPC’s new course management system. Vicky Austin and Teri Donat, two of the college’s Canvas faculty mentor-trainers, will conduct the workshops. They will also be available for individual appointments.

 

To register for a workshop and/or request an appointment, go to the Professional Development Workshops page. All Canvas trainings are eligible for flex credit.

 

Scott

 

 

Summer students inputted tonight

Canvas and Blackboard instructors,

If you are teaching a course during the Summer using either Canvas or Blackboard, I’m letting let you know that students will be inputted into their Summer classes tonight. There are two reasons why this is being done so early: 1) Summer classes begin early, on May 30, and I don’t have the ability to activate students for classes that begin later, and 2) I will be alerting DE students that they can self-enroll in the new Quest for Online Success readiness course in Canvas and/or attend an on-campus Online Learning orientation.

If you are not teaching a Summer course with Canvas or Blackboard, please disregard this email.

Scott

SafeAssign slowness

Blackboard instructors,

 

I received this from Bb about slowness processing SafeAssign papers:

 

Bulletin/Advisory Information:

The Blackboard SafeAssign service continues to experience delays in returning Originality Reports and results to end users. We understand the impact that these delays have had on users and apologize for the poor performance of the system during this time.

The root cause of the delays continues to be that the SafeAssign service is receiving significantly more document submissions from Blackboard Learn customers than it can process. This is typically seen during end-of-year activities when many Assignments and student submissions are due.

We are working diligently to reduce and potentially eliminate the possibility of document processing delays in the future with the following actions:

• Moving components of the SafeAssign service to Amazon's AWS infrastructure – this will unlock benefits of SaaS and IaaS such as elasticity and scalability that are not available in the current infrastructure.
• Creating adaptive hardware/infrastructure scaling policies that align to weekly and monthly usage patterns – this will allow SafeAssign to meet customer submission volume and demand more efficiently

Once implemented, these changes should result in a significant increase in the service's ability to adapt to customer demand. We are targeting completion of this work for mid-2017.

Thank you for your patience as we work to improve the product to meet your needs.

 

Reminder: Summer and Fall 2017 course requests

If you have not already requested your Summer 2017 and Fall 2017 courses for either Blackboard or Canvas, please do so by logging into Class-Web, clicking Menu for Faculty, Staff & Advisors, then clicking either the Blackboard or Canvas links toward the bottom of the page. Choose the term and Las Positas for the campus, and click Submit Query. From here, you can request individual courses, or you can choose courses or sections to merge.

 

If you have already requested your courses, thank you!

 

Scott