Pro Tip Tuesday: Add a user to a course site after the term end-date has passed

We get a lot of requests from instructors asking us to add a colleague to a prior term’s course site so that the resources can be shared. While the process to add a user to a current term’s course site is pretty straightforward, it’s not as intuitive if the course has ended. That’s because the +People tab appears to be grayed out in past courses. What you essentially need to do is reopen the course, just temporarily, so that the user can be added. How do you do this?

1. From Courses > All Courses in the left-hand Global Navigation menu in Canvas (it’s the big, WPI-red bar on the left), click into the course in which you would like to add a user.
2. Select Settings from the left-hand Course Navigation menu.
3. From the Course Details tab, scroll down to the course start/end dates section.
4. Change the Ends date to today’s date (or a future date).
5. Check the box below that states “Students can only participate in the course between these dates.”
6. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Update Course Details.
   

You now will be able to add users to the course from the People menu. Reminder, registered students can see your course again. To re-close the course, go back to your course Settings, revert the Ends date, and un-check the box next to “Users can only participate in the course between these dates.”