All academic advisors have an "advising site" on Canvas that can be used to share information and communicate with advisees.

An advising site is simply a Canvas course which contains all of your assigned advisees.
If you haven't used Canvas as an instructor, you should register for and complete the required Canvas Training workshops to learn the basics before using your advising site.

How do I access my advising site?

Log in to Canvas.
You will most likely see your advising site on your Canvas Dashboard. However, if it's not there, click Courses on the Global Navigation menu and select All Courses.

What can I do with my advising site?

The following Canvas tools may be useful for advising:

Modules and Pages

Used to post useful information, documents, and/or helpful links
More information on Modules
More information on Pages

Canvas Inbox

An easy way to reach all of your advisees at once is to send a message with important information via the Canvas Inbox
Students will receive message through their Canvas Inbox and their Durham Tech email, and can reply to you directly in either
More information on Canvas Inbox

Announcements

Canvas Calendar Scheduler

Let students know your availability for an advising session
Set up the Appointment Scheduler to allow students to sign up for advising appointments (virtual or in-person)
More information on the Canvas Calendar Scheduler

External Booking Sites

BigBlueButton (Conferences)

You can use BigBlueButton in Canvas for virtual (online) advising sessions with students.
- Or you can use Teams to meet with advisees, if you prefer.
VIDEO CLIP: How to set up a one-on-one meeting in BigBlueButton
More information on BigBlueButton

How are advisees added to my site?

Once a week (on Sunday), an automated process adds any new advisees that have been assigned to you (and inactivates any that were unassigned).

★ NOTE: The Advising office in Admissions, Registration, and Records handles assigning advisees (and unassigning them) to advisors in Colleague. Changes they make in Colleague to your advisee list will be reflected in your Canvas advising site the following week.

How can I see a list of my advisees?

In your advising site, on the course menu, click People. A list of your assigned advisees will display.

★ NOTE: If for some reason you need to give additional students access to your advising site, you can do that. On the People page, click the + People button. Type the advisee's email address and click Next and then Add Users.

How do I make my advising site visible to my advisees?

As with courses, you must "publish" your advising site before students will be able to see it.

To publish the site, click the Publish button in the upper-right area of the Home page.

★ NOTE: If for some reason you need to "unpublish" the site again, you will be able to do so ONLY if there is no advisee activity or submissions. Go to the Home page and click the Unpublish button.

How do students access the site?

The same way you do! If you publish your advising site, your advisees should see it on their Canvas Dashboard. (Or they can click Courses on the Global Navigation menu and select All Courses).