Course access restriction

Question

How do I require a training or activity that students should complete before gaining access to their current semester courses?

Jeff_F · Accepted Answer

Hello @MDickmanRVU -

Several years ago we required students to complete the Math and English skills assessment (i.e., placement exams) prior to being able to register for courses. To do so we used our student information system (SIS) to require a score for these prior to their registration interface opening to their advisors. That was in place for perhaps a year and then it was decided to relax the approach so that students could register and take courses ahead of taking these skills assessments. However, students were required to take the assessments ahead of enrolling in any math or English topic course.  And they were required to take it within their first 12 credits or thereabouts. This gave students flexibility and enabled them to take a course they had a higher degree of interest in. Let's face it, most people are not fans of math and it can be a turn off. ;o)

Other than the automated approach of locking access to register via the SIS, I am not seeing a means to restrict access to a set of courses based upon completion of a prerequisite outside of the Canvas course. That said, it is possible to set due dates for the prerequisite and if students do not complete by that date then you could then act to put a hold on their courses within the SIS. But that would be a manual process. To help with this, each Canvas course has various settings that can be enabled to restrict student access to the course until a certain date. That would give the staff time to run reports, review lists, edit enrollments. But again, this is manual and takes beaucoup time. And chances are the staff do not have an abundance of free time to begin with.

Another method that can be employed is to create a quiz or assignment as one of the first modules in all the courses. Configure this so students must complete that assignment ahead of the remaining modules opening to them. This can be a simple one question quiz that asks students to confirm completion of the prerequisite: 'Have you completed the required training for.......... ?"  Include a statement that the quiz results are collected and reviewed to confirm completion.  And of course there should be a record of the training completion as well as a policy and process, perhaps tied to the Honor Statement.  This approach would help but is not a perfect approach. @MDickmanRVU  Edit: after giving this more thought, I would use a survey link that is created using a single survey tool. That can be a fancy Qualtrics survey or a more simple MS Forms survey. Doing so simplifies data collection as all the data is in one place. the downside is the course instructor cannot see the results in the course.

Lastly, one other idea is to use a separate system for the training delivery and to track completions. Our University requires everyone to complete annual training for IT security and an array of other topics. Everyone receives a notification via email and a due date, then when there is but two weeks remaining, the system is relentless with regular email messages to both the staff and their supervisor.