Concluding 2025
This isn’t going to be a gosh-this-was-such-a-busy-term missive. It’s not going to be a virtue-signaling-let-me-bore-you-with-all-the-amazing-things-I-did ramble. And this sure-as-sugar ain’t gonna be an AI-generated post on 5 ways to level up your Canvas course with sponsored content, constantly reminding you to smash that like and subscribe button.
I’m Chris. I’m a Canvas Admin. I know a lot of creative ways to fix issues with Canvas courses. I choose never to make my clients feel dumb. I never refer to my customers as “users,” they’re not drug addicts. And even though you probably haven’t met me in person, I also have a life outside my job that doesn’t involve technology. I am a deep-thinking, internally-processing, empathetic-to-a-fault introvert who uses way too many hyphenated descriptors.
If you are reading this and are a fellow Canvas Admin, I encourage you in 2026 to peek out behind the ticketing system you are required to use to resolve client issues and have a face-to-face interaction with your customer. Watch their facial expression as they describe their difficulties with their Canvas course. Do keep in mind that our customers don’t interact with Canvas 40 hours a week like we do; solutions we have sent to hundreds of clients may be the first time they are receiving the information. In 2026, I hope you develop a friendly rapport with a few of your clients so you know them, and they know you outside of a horribly-formatted, transactional, devoid-of-human-relation helpdesk ticket.
If you are reading this and are a manager/supervisor/director/imperial-wazoo of a Canvas Admin, I encourage you in 2026 to learn —in person— what your Canvas Admin’s superpowers are, and provide opportunities to leverage their talents during the workday. Take me for instance. My superpowers are hyper-observance and devising creative out-of-the-box solutions to technology issues. I can spot the solution to a client’s issue in their course within the first 8 seconds of listening to them, but I choose to let them be heard, and then offer a sometimes elegant, sometimes bailing-wire-and-duck-tape option for them to consider. Both get the job done and resolves the issue for my clients, and it never involves me telling them to click on a knowledge base article to fix the problem for themself. A high-performing, intelligent, resourceful technology support professional working for a bureaucratic workplace is hamstrung by enterprise-wide tech support policies. Blah blah blah, octagonal peg, triangular hole. Your Canvas Admin knows what software helps them get the job done; allow them the opportunity to do great work with their own tools.
If you are reading this and are a teacher, I encourage you in 2026 to understand the following: your Canvas support did not impose the mandate requiring your course content to be accessibly formatted for all learners because they are vindictive and take delight in giving you additional work. It’s a federal, say it with me… FED-ur-ull, mandate from the Department of Justice. Your Canvas support are the messengers of this ruling, and are offering ways to help you complete this required work. Please holster your verbal bullets.
If you are reading this and you are in a leadership/executive role at your higher education institution, I encourage you in 2026 to revisit your Canvas support to learn more about whom is making your department or division look good on a daily basis serving teachers, staff, and students. Some-not-all leadership choose to only receive information from their direct reports and opt not to engage with personnel lower down the organizational chart. Some-not-all are leadership missing a valuable opportunity to learn who the shining stars are at their educational institution.
If you are reading this and you work for Instructure, I encourage you in 2026 to help Canvas Admins easily add teachers to past-term courses. Since teachers can’t accept an invitation to join a concluded course, a Canvas Admin has to:
Go into the old course’s settings.
Change the Term from the original academic term to Default Term to un-conclude and save settings.
Go into the course’s People roster.
Add the new teacher to the course.
Masquerade as the new teacher.
Accept the invitation for them to join the old course.
Stop masquerading as the new teacher.
Go into the old course’s settings.
Change the Term from Default Term to the original academic term to re-conclude and save settings…
This takes me 52 seconds to accomplish when I am caffeinated and mentally in the zone. But still…I’m just sayin’. Nine steps. And I’m not finding efficiency with the SIS Upload method. It takes me 84 seconds because I have to clickity-clickity-click search around to copy/paste the old course SIS ID, Section SIS ID, and the User ID of the new teacher colleague into the enrollments.csv file. </NerdyCanvasAdminRant>
If you are still reading this, I encourage you in 2026 to send me a couple of ideas of what you’d like to see published in this Canvas Insider blog. I don’t want to be a content creator who recycles the same tips and tricks over and over with a different headline. But maybe you want a fresh look at something I posted in the past? Or maybe you want to hear more about what life is like in the trenches supporting an LMS used by 20,000+ faculty, staff, and students. Or maybe you are interested in learning what a Canvas Admin does to protect and secure their online life? You may not see it with most of my Insider posts, and some-not-all managers/supervisors/directors/imperial-wazoos at my workplace can’t see past my Canvas Admin job title, but I have a big tinfoil hat firmly planted on my head with my professional and personal technology landscape. And best of all? I like sharing information with people…
Merry Christmas in advance,
Chris