Auto enrolling students in a canvas course

Question

Hello! At our institution we are looking for a way to auto enroll a student in a canvas "orientation" course that we want to create to give them a basic tutorial on how to use canvas.

I know that self enrollment is an option - but was wondering if there was a way to automate enrolling all new students to a course, and also removing them. I have looked into the canvas API and there is a enroll API call - wondering if there are some other ways of doing it that I am not thinking of.

Any input would be awesome. Thanks!

tbirbeck · Answer

Hi!  Do students just need to access the materials, or will there be submissions?  If they just need to access the information, you could consider setting the course visibility at "Institution" or "Public (do not include this course in the public course index)"  which would bypass the need to enroll/unenroll.  We use this option for our school libraries and for PD materials.  The biggest disadvantage is that the course tile does not show up on the student dashboard.  We get around this by posting a custom side navigation link in all courses (performed at the Account or Sub Account level).  Students can see the link in any course unless the instructor removes it from the side navigation.  For PD offerings, we post the link in the PD Enroller tool.

The biggest advantage is that you can set it and forget it.  Changes can be made to the course content if desired with no need to manage links or participants.

To learn more about course visibility, check out this Canvas Guide: How do I customize visibility options for a course?

For more info on custom course navigation, check out this resource