[ARCHIVED] Suppress student notifications by deactivating accounts?

[dunnbri11]

Hello, 

I am attempting to suppress notifications for students from the instructor end -- in particular for the Scheduler in the Calendar tool, to prevent what we feel are unnecessary and potentially confusing notifications that are sent each time an appointment slot is created or modified.

I understand that notification settings are controlled by the student/individual account holder, and that this question has been asked and answered before, but I didn't see this approach mentioned anywhere else. 

Basically I was thinking of (temporarily) deactivating all students in the course, setting up all the appointment slots, and then reactivating everyone. I did a quick test and this did suppress the notifications, and reactivating returned student progress to what it was just prior to deactivation (ie, course progress, grades, etc all were maintained).

My question is: are there downsides to this approach that I'm not thinking of, aside from students not being able to access the course while they're deactivated? I was thinking of just sending a notice to the students that the site will be down for maintenance for a bit while we set up the appointment blocks. 

Thanks a lot for any input.