Welcome back! As we kick off the academic year for Autumn 2026, here are essential reminders, upcoming timeline dates, and new Canvas features to explore in your courses.
Quick Link: Bookmark UW Canvas for fast, direct access to your courses.
On this page:
Course Management & Navigation
Course Visibility & Student Access
Every Autumn, support receives many questions about course visibility. Keep these points in mind for both you and your students:
- Publishing: Students can’t see Canvas courses on their Dashboard until they are published. Publishing is at your discretion, but ensure students know when they are expected to access materials.
- Finding Courses: If you don’t see all of your courses in your Dashboard, check the All Courses page which can also be accessed by clicking Courses in Global Navigation.
- Pick your Favorites: On the All Courses page, use the star icons to Favorite courses, so they appear on your Dashboard’s Card View.
UW Resources in Every Course
When's the last time you clicked the UW Resources tab in your course? It's tailored to your role and your campus, with support for teaching and course setup.
- Students can also use UW Resources for campus-specific academic support, health & wellness resources, and technology help, which is worth mentioning in your syllabus or first announcement.
- Seattle Campus instructors can click Instructors: START HERE in UW Resources for information on getting started and default course settings.
Hypothesis Authorization and Access Issues
Due to the Canvas outage in May 2026, integrated tools like Hypothesis were reset for security reasons. While most reauthorizations were seamless, Hypothesis may require additional steps to reauthorize your account.
Canvas Features to Explore
New & Enhanced Features
- Speedgrader received a performance upgrade that reduces load times and improves the grading experience.
- Enhanced Rubrics is a modernized version of the Rubrics tool with a new interface, drag-and-drop criteria ordering, and the ability to duplicate criteria. You can enable it under Course Settings > Feature Options. Enhanced Rubrics will become default Canvas functionality on December 19, 2026.
- Custom Navigation Links: You can now use Navigation Links to add custom links directly to your course navigation without needing an external tool or the old Redirect tool.
- Discussion Checkpoints allows instructors to set multiple due dates or checkpoints for graded discussions to accommodate different stages of the discussion process, such as the initial post and follow-up replies. Checkpoints can be set for Graded Discussions.
- Differentiation Tags allow instructors to discreetly tag and organize students based on learning needs, progress, or preferences. These tags are invisible to students but help instructors tailor content delivery, assignments, and assessments.
Microsoft Education LTI 1.3
The previous Office 365 integration in Collaborations has been replaced by the new Microsoft Education LTI 1.3. When setting up a new Office 365 collaboration, select Microsoft Education from the menu. Visit Canvas Collaborations - UW-IT to learn more.
New Quizzes
Have you tried New Quizzes? New Quizzes offers an improved experience, advanced accommodation settings, a wider variety of question types, enhanced collaboration tools, and streamlined migration options. Learn more in the FAQ: New Quizzes.
You don’t have to rebuild from scratch: migrate quizzes individually or bulk migrate multiple quizzes via course copy. Important: Migrating question bank content to item banks involves a separate process.
Enable New Quizzes under Course Settings > Feature Options, then choose between New Quizzes/Surveys or Classic Quizzes when you add a quiz.
Canvas Portfolio (replacing ePortfolio)
Canvas Portfolio will replace the current ePortfolio tool beginning December 30, 2026. It is part of the core Canvas experience at no additional subscription cost and appears under Account in Global Navigation alongside the existing ePortfolio option. Portfolio provides expanded functionality, including:
- Seamless integration with Canvas courses and SpeedGrader
- Flexible portfolio assignments supporting both individual and programmatic assessment
- The ability to tag evidence to skills and competencies
Two Portfolio Types: One of the most significant additions is the introduction of two distinct portfolio types:
- Evaluation Portfolios allow instructors to support structured assessment and track learner progress over time.
- Showcase Portfolios give students a space to highlight their growth and tell their stories.
Prepare for ePortfolio retirement: Although ePortfolio remains active until December 2026, we recommend trying Canvas Portfolio now and backing up any ePortfolios you wish to save. Backups will be available the next business day.
Canvas Portfolio Guides
For Instructors:
For Students:
Help, Office Hours, & Tech Support
Support from Learning Technologies
If you have questions about Canvas, Panopto, Zoom, Poll Everywhere or other centrally-supported tools:
Gradescope Events
Gradescope helps instructors efficiently, grade and provide feedback for paper exams, programming assignments, and bubble sheets.
Join us for upcoming workshops or office hours where you can learn more about Gradescope 1.3 and, for existing users, migrating assignments from 1.0 to 1.3. Register below: