Start and End of Semester Checklist for Instructors

Each semester brings a set of tasks to help ensure your Canvas courses are ready for students and wrapped up properly at the end. These checklists outline key steps for getting started, managing your course, and closing things out. Use them as a reference to stay on track and support a smooth teaching experience.

Start Checklist

Task Details Verify access to courses and course availability. Make sure your courses appear under the "Courses" menu in Canvas. If a course is missing, appears incorrect, or you’re not listed as the instructor, contact your department chair. Departments coordinate with the Registrar to manage course listings in Banner, which syncs with Canvas regularly. Ensuring you're correctly listed as the Instructor of Record in Banner is key to gaining access. Course/Section merges (crosslisting) Teaching multiple sections of the same course? Request a merge before adding content. Email elearning@gfcmsu.edu with the course title, course code, section(s) to be merged, and semester information. Publisher Integrations

If you previously used a publisher integration in D2L (Brightspace), please refer to the last module in Growing With Canvas to help you locate where those tools now appear in Canvas.

If you don’t see what you need or want to set up a new integration, email elearning@gfcmsu.edu with your course title, code, section, semester information and the name of the publisher.

Activate course All courses at Great Falls College are activated/published in Canvas at the time they are created by the SIS integration. Students will be able to access the course 7 days prior to the semester (or block) start date. Therefore, instructors should have their course content in the course prior to that date. Attend workshops as necessary Visit the Teaching and Learning Center's website for information on upcoming workshops and training opportunities. Enroll other instructors, course assistants into course(s) as needed

You can manually add users—such as co-instructors—to your Canvas course as long as you're within the course start and end dates. If you're outside that window and the +People button is greyed out, contact elearning@gfcmsu.edu and we’ll help you get them added.

Copy or import previous course content Save time by reusing course materials from previous semesters. Follow these steps to copy content.

End Checklist

Task Details Release Final Grades In Canvas, final grades are shown in the Total column of your gradebook. By default, this column is visible to students and appears on their Grades summary page. If you need to hide or unhide this information—for example, while finalizing scores—this tutorial walks you through how to manage grade visibility.
Incomplete Grades
Backup Grades

Make a backup of course grades by exporting a spreadsheet file of course grades. This creates a local copy that is accessible and printable. This file can serve as a departmental record (if required).

Learn more about exporting grades in Canvas

Export a course backup Download a copy of your course content (without student data) for future reference. Instructions for exporting a course.