[ARCHIVED] Progress on Canvas Groups Unique to One Canvas Course Only?

[mcmaguire]

I've posted to Canvas help community in previous semesters regarding this issue with Groups.  I thought I'd post issues to this higher ed user community, as I've been told that some of the issues I have with the infrastructure for Canvas Groups may be related to Canvas as a vendor for PreK-12.  I'll give these a go with this community:

• I still do not have access to a Canvas function that allows me to set up Groups in any of my Canvas courses (I teach 4-5 courses per-semester) in such a way that the Group is unique to the class for which I set it up, and for which it has no other purpose - i.e., it will not be used in any other Canvas courses I (or any other Instructors) teach.  I continue to use work-arounds (i.e., multiple clicks) when navigating Canvas Groups in a course, vs. simply staying within one course, for which I may have multiple groupings/teams of students - associated only with that one course.  Unlike PreK-12, I do not have any use for being re-directed away from my Canvas course while navigating Groups in that course.  I'll confess that I'm a bit bratty about doing the multiple-clicks work-around, but time is precious.
• I think this may be somewhat related .......... I just discovered a new foible associated with this default infrastructure of Canvas Groups.... this semester, I noticed that, at my Canvas course "People" page for two of my courses, a Group tab appeared - that I did not create - labeled, "Project Groups."  Huh?  I don't want Canvas setting up any default Groups in my courses.  It can be confusing for students and me.  In fact, I only noticed this because I received a query from a student asking me about why we have "Project Groups" as they didn't see any associated Assignments, Discussions, or mentions of "Project Groups" in the syllabus (or elsewhere).  A possible culprit could be that someone at an administrative level provided that "Project Groups" setting (I'm looking into it).  But I thought I'd post it here, in case anyone else has had a similar issue.

Many thanks for any wisdom 🙂

Michael Maguire, Faculty Associate

UW-Madison School of Human Ecology