Canvas Tips

As you know, the University has transitioned from eCourseware to Canvas.  Your professors have (or will soon) post welcome messages, first assignments, syllabi, and other important information for the spring semester on Canvas.

On the first day of classes (1/12), all of your spring courses will be shown on your Canvas Dashboard, which is the first thing you’ll see when you log in to Canvas.  In the meantime, you can see all of your Canvas courses by selecting “Courses” in the left navigation menu and then clicking “All Courses.”  Click here for a very short video (less than 1 minute) walking through these steps and showing you how to find guides and videos to help you navigate Canvas.  The University has also automatically enrolled you in a self-guided training Canvas course, called Passport to Canvas.  This is a free and optional self-paced asynchronous course.

When you access one of your spring courses before the first day of classes, you will receive a popup message indicating that the course “hasn’t started yet[, and you] will not be able to participate in [the] course” until the first day of classes.  This message simply means that you won’t be able to take quizzes, submit assignments, etc., until the first day of classes.  You will be able to view announcements and download documents posted by your professor.   Click the “X” on the right side of the message to dismiss it.

If you have problems with Canvas, contact ITS at 678.8888 for help.  You can also try using a different browser, as that has been known to resolve some issues.  Finally, please note that when opening announcements, you may need to click on the announcement title, rather than the body of the announcement.