How do instructors find Canvas courses for previous semesters?

Canvas course sites are not deleted. After the end of each term, courses go into a read-only archived state for instructors. This maintains a record of the course as it was taught, which is helpful for incompletes and grade challenges. See the Canvas guide on how to view all your courses. Information about incomplete course grades and Canvas access is in the accordion below.

All past courses may be copied into other course sites using the import tool.

How do instructors access courses for upcoming terms?

Canvas courses for future academic terms are created approximately two months prior to the course start date. Instructors are enrolled in Canvas course sites when they are listed on the UIS dynamic course schedule. Instructors may be manually enrolled in orientation, department, and gold courses. 

New full and part-time faculty: If you have new part-time (adjunct) instructors who need Canvas access to develop courses, the best practice for providing Canvas access is to issue their employment contract. When the employment contract is executed, your new instructors will have their NetIDs and may be added to Canvas courses. The External Affiliate NetID accounts creation process, detailed under Guest Accounts below, is often slower than the normal hiring process. The External Affiliates program should only be used in rare circumstances for part-time faculty Canvas access.

How are students added to courses each semester?

Students are enrolled in courses approximately ten days prior to the course start date academic term courses. Students are enrolled and dropped from Canvas course sites automatically based on enrollment data from the Office of Records and registration. Instructors may not add or remove students in academic term courses. Courses will publish automatically at 12:01 a.m. on the first day of classes, which makes them available to students. Instructors may publish their courses early. Courses close to students on the Friday before the next term starts. 

Students may be manually enrolled in orientation, department, and other courses. If students require TA or supplemental instruction (SI) access to an academic term course, contact COLRS. 

Students with Incompletes: If a student received an incomplete in a course, student and faculty access to the course will be automatically extended for one year. If an instructor prefers that a student complete their work in a Canvas course in the current term, contact COLRS for assistance.

How do students with incomplete grades access Canvas courses?

Access to course in term enrolled

Students who have been assigned an incomplete in Enterprise (Banner) will automatically be granted extended access to the corresponding Canvas course, for a period of one year. For example, all students who earned an incomplete in Summer 2026 already have access to the corresponding course in Canvas until August 2027, in order to give them time to complete all coursework before their provisional grades become permanent. No action is required on the part of the instructor to grant this extended access to the course, other than timely submission of grades in Enterprise (Banner).

• Instructors should still communicate their expectations regarding the completion of the course with any students who have received an incomplete.
• Instructors should still submit incompletes and provisional grades in Enterprise by the Registrar’s due date each semester.
• Instructors should still submit grade changes to the Registrar according to the current procedures when students have successfully completed a course.
• Students who did not receive an incomplete will still lose access to the course the week before the start of the following semester.

In case a student with an incomplete finishes their work before the year is up, and you wish to remove student access to your course, please contact COLRS for assistance.

Access to current semester course

If an instructor prefers, COLRS staff can provide access to a current Canvas course for students with incomplete grades. Contact COLRS and provide the term and course in which the student earned the incomplete and the course in the current term. If the instructor is no longer at UIS or was a part-time faculty member, the UEO may reach out to provide this access.

Adding Additional Canvas Assignment Due Dates for a Single Student

Though access to the Canvas course site is automatically extended for students and instructors in courses with incomplete grades, specific assignment due dates may need to be modified. If the availability for an assignment has passed, and some other specific Canvas course assignment settings, some instructors may need to add a new assignment due date for the student with an incomplete. Learn how to add a Canvas assignment due date for a specific student. 

How do employees who are not instructors or students access Canvas courses?

Create a Canvas Account

If you are new to UIS, or you are an employee who has never accessed Canvas before, you will need to activate your Canvas account before you can begin working in Canvas. A NetID is required to access Canvas.

1. Visit the Canvas login page at uispringfield.instructure.com
2. Log in with your UIS NetID and password.
   • Learn about how to locate your campus NetID or reset your NetID password
3. Once you have logged in to Canvas, your account has been activated.

Access to Courses

Employees may be manually enrolled in orientation, department, and gold course sites. Employees who need access to academic term courses must complete FERPA training and be approved to be enrolled in courses. FERPA training must be completed for all employees who have access to academic term Canvas courses, including: academic coaches, student tutors, teaching assistants, assessment coordinators, and Learning Hub staff. Permission must be granted by the instructor of record and/or UIS administrators, depending on the situation. Contact COLRS for more information on gaining access to academic term courses. For more information on the processes that the COLRS team follows to protect intellectual property, see the Developing and Sharing Course Content page.

Can people not connected to UIS access Canvas courses?

All users must have a NetID to have access to UIS Canvas.

If you or your unit needs to provide access to Canvas or other campus resources for guest lecturers, site internship supervisors, or accreditation work, the External Affiliate NetID process can be used to create a NetID account for these people.

To request an account using the External Affiliate UIN and NetID program, you will need the full name, birthdate, and email address for the guest. This process can take up to two weeks, as the iCard center has to verify whether the user has previously had a NetID on any campus. 

Once affiliate NetID accounts have been created, the department chair should contact COLRS for assistance with Canvas access. Department chairs, school directors, and deans may request that people who are not official instructors to be added to courses.

Alternately, if you were planning on simply using Canvas to share documents and files with your guest, consider using Box instead.