The University of Illinois has selected Canvas as the university’s official learning management system (LMS). Below is a list of frequently asked questions (FAQs) to help you find answers about the Canvas transition process. We are still in the early stages of planning the transition.
We will be adding additional FAQs and resources as the transition progresses. If you don’t see an answer to your question, please contact us to submit specific questions, comments, or concerns.
Compass 2g is retiring May 31, 2022. This means that Spring 2022 is the last semester you can use Compass. We encourage you to move to Canvas as early as is feasible, to help reduce confusion for students using multiple learning management systems.
You can now request Canvas course spaces. You currently have the option to create a blank shell Canvas course or do a manual migration of content. Compass courses from Fall 2019 – Spring 2022 are scheduled for automatic migration to Canvas.
There are three options to get started in Canvas. Check out the Migration page to learn more about the pros and cons of each migration option—blank shell, manual migration, or automatic migration—to decide what’s right for you and learn how to get started.
The calendar of training sessions, workshops, and online academies to assist instructors is now live. Additionally, Canvas documentation, Canvas Training Portal, Support Hotline, message boards, and chat are available 24/7. Training is a combined effort from campus and college support units.
Check out our charts comparing tools in Compass vs. Canvas and tools in Moodle vs. Canvas.
These charts are intended to help instructors locate tools from their current LMS in Canvas. It will tell you the equivalent of those tools and options in Canvas, where to find them, and offers links to guides on how to use them.
The Student Success Initiative began by inviting faculty, staff, and student voices to recognize and advance the good work already being done and identify opportunities for effective future outcomes. One of the main findings was that the proliferation of LMS and LMS-like systems was complicated for students to navigate. The timing of contracts, new opportunities, budget challenges aligned at this point.
Canvas has been identified as state-of-the-art in LMS systems and is used by 11 of 14 institutions in the Big 10 Academic Alliance. We see this as an opportunity to align learning systems on campus into one common platform, an LMS familiar to many of our undergraduate and graduate students. We seek to improve the learning experience for our students, and by using a common platform we intend to reduce costs and eliminate resource redundancies across campus.
Our contract with Blackboard (Compass2g) expires in June 2022 and the hosting environment faces an end of life in late 2022. The timing of the contract and the need to move the campus forward led to the decision to move now.
Please reference the Canvas Transition Timeline for the most up-to-date information about migration plans.
- Spring 2021 – Working groups, planning, preparation
- Summer 2021 – First group of courses migrate. Faculty training, workshops, and course migration support in full swing
- Fall 2021 – First group of courses utilizing Canvas. Second group of courses migrate
- Spring 2022 – Majority of courses migrated and utilizing Canvas
- Late Spring 2022 – Final migrations to Canvas, Migration complete
- June 2022 – Compass2g retired
At this time only Compass2g users will be required to migrate. A migration to Canvas will allow us to better use educational tools and, hopefully, help to consolidate more campus usage into a single LMS system. The campus will not mandate that all instructors utilize Canvas, but we hope that individuals and units will recognize the benefit to students and quality of the product, as well as operational efficiency and cost-savings associated with Canvas. If you use another LMS platform such as Moodle, we encourage you to investigate the features available in Canvas and discuss this options with your unit support teams.
No. The University requires contracts with hosting vendors including FERPA assurances. Third party hosts also must pass security and accessibility reviews. Integrations with Illinois resources will not be possible either.
A learning management system (LMS) provides one central location for students to easily access your course syllabus, assignments, announcements, grades and anything else pertinent to your course. Some of the benefits of using a learning management system include:
- Students can access everything they need to succeed in your course in a single, secure, and easily searchable location. Both faculty and students benefit from using a familiar interface from one course to the next greatly reducing the time spent learning how to navigate a new interface for each course.
- Modern learning management systems are built around Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI) allowing for the easy integration of additional tools such as Zoom, Kaltura Mediaspace, online publishing tools, plagiarism detection resources, and many others. By accessing these tools through the LMS, students do not have to remember and enter passwords for each of these applications individually.
- LMS platforms are designed to work well on all devices including screen readers and mobile phones. Mobile apps created to integrate with the LMS can aggregate calendars and assignments allowing students to more efficiently use their time to focus on the content of your course.
- Course development time can be reduced by using our custom course templates, and content created for one course can be re-used and shared between courses. In addition, using a common platform approved by the campus reduces faculty personal risk because regulatory compliance is handled by the campus.