How toautomatically remove students from manually created sections.

[wojcika]

I am currently struggling with how to automatically remove students from sections that instructors are manually creating in their Canvas courses. 

Here is the current situation. 

Our students are enrolled into SIS course sections via API. The instructor then is manually creating a section and adding the student. Then at some point the student decides to drop or withdraw from the course. The API is triggered and removes them only from the SIS course section. This makes sense as how would the SIS system be aware of manually created sections. So now the student is still in the course but only in the section that the instructor created. This is essentially still giving the student access to the course which is what we do not want. 

We wouldn't want to restrict instructors from manually creating sections, as that is how we currently allow students with extensions to access the course once the term is over.

Has anyone else dealt with this issue? I am looking for any suggestions that might be helpful!

[mzimmerman]

Hi @wojcika 

We do not allow instructors to create new sections.  Instead, we have the instructor fill out an automated request when a student needs an extension--along with an end date--then use the API to create a new section and enroll the student (and instructor) in the new section, with the end date applied to the section.

[wojcika]

Hi! Thank you, what is the reasoning behind preventing instructors from creating their own?

[mzimmerman]

Because enrollments are automatically managed from our SIS, we don't allow instructors to create their own sections or enroll their own students...pretty much to avoid exactly the kind of problem that you are having.

[wojcika]

Thank you! We will take this into consideration. I appreciate your feedback!

[dbrace]

Hi @wojcika,

My institution uses a similar process as what @mzimmerman described but I wanted to answer your "why" question with two additional reasons.

1. While we do/may not necessarily want a higher education institution to be considered a "business" (especially a public or private/non-profit school), they are a form of business. Students (a customer) are paying for a product (a course that is scheduled to run during a defined time). Faculty (an employee) are delivering a product (during the defined time). If a faculty member has the ability to create sections in a Canvas course and enroll students, they have the ability to give away a product for free by doing those tasks on their own.

2. Having a form for an incomplete (at my institution, the form for an incomplete is submitted by the faculty member and also signed by the student) notifies the appropriate areas (primarily my Department and our Registrar) that this student is still working on the class and holds the student accountable because they agreed to finish the incomplete by the date mentioned in the form.

-Doug