[Notifications] Automatic Notification for changes in course enrollment status

[scott_geddes]

Would it be possible to add a notification option for changes in course enrollment? Simply utilizing the current notification process, but with an additional option. Thus the course owner can be notified (according to their selections and chosen frequency) of dropped or added (or inactive) students, addition of TA`s, observers etc..

This would make course management for large classes, especially those that also meet and are active outside of the canvas environment, much simpler and more efficient.

[eengel]

This would be very helpful to my faculty-advisor practice, and beneficial to students that are added to my "Advising Course" in Canvas. I could reach out to them right away once receiving notification. (I'm the program director for their academic intent. They end up in my Canvas Advising course by a number of methods, and sometimes they have gotten a lot of misinformation for getting ready to apply to my program.)

[kgutierrez1]

This sounds like a great idea. However, based on the description, it sounds like only the course owner would get the notification, meaning instructor of that course. So how would the advisor get the notification that a student has dropped a course?

[kmeeusen]

 @kgutierrez1 ‌

"Notifications" is a function of Canvas that only works for Canvas users, and in this context would only work for members of a course. While notifying advisors might be handy, Canvas cannot and should not be a substitute for all college operations and system. Advisors should get this notification from registration services (or whatever it is called at your school).

All that being said, I know that our Registration Department is not particularly good at notifying anybody about adds, drops or transfers.

Kelley

[wheisler]

This would help as I use groups for some assignments and this change would notify me that someone needs to be added to a group or that someone has dropped the course and is no longer in the group.

[jonesn16]

This would be super helpful for classes that rely on a lot of group work. It can be frustrating to setup all the groups in advance and then not catch that a student added late.

[tdurbin]

In some cases our Advisors are added via the Teacher role to certain shells, so they would get the notifications that way. I also agree that there is a disconnect between registration & instructors, but there are also so many changes the first couple of weeks, that task alone would be daunting to take on, unless it is automated.

[jillmallek]

I'd like to add onto this that it would be nice to get notifications if a student declines an invitation, as well. This tacks onto this idea well, instead of making it its own.

[tdurbin]

You used to be able to see who declined an invite, by going into the People tab (where you could resend the invite) & also by going into Settings > Sections, but somewhere along the lines (sometime between July & Sept. 2017), they inadvertantly(?) disabled that feature. I have been trying to get them to re-enable/fix it since September, because we use the invitations & declined feature all the time. Currently, when a person declines an invite, you cannot see them in the People list nor the sections lists, but if you can track down the actual user, it still shows them as being enrolled in the course. you then have to delete the enrollment & then go back to the course & reinvite them.

[jillmallek]

That is too bad they disabled it! We have a situation with about 100+ students where it's cumbersome to track it, but we can't force them to accept the invite (unless I masquerade, but it's a lot of students, and it's not a situation where we could automate it). So when the student declines, it becomes a tracking hassle.  

[tdurbin]

I agree & have been hounding our support system & our rep directly. You are welcome to contact support & get added to the Case #02690034. They have marked it as "solved" but I have been told that they have it escalated beyond the general ticketing. You might be able to talk directly to your rep & ask them what the status is for the issue. Give them lots of detail on how you used it, that you are frustrated that you cannot use it anymore, etc. & see if we can get it back/working again. Let them know there are more of us that rely on the feature!

You can add them without the invite by using a CSV file, through SIS, but we rely on our students getting the email invitation as acknowledgement that they have been added.