As of Fall of 2016, Rio Hondo College has adopted the Canvas online student-teacher interaction program to replace Blackboard Learn. The switch undoubtedly surprised, and, depending on the hour of the day, annoyed some students who had trouble accessing their blackboard page. While a formal announcement may have not been made on Twitter, Canvas is now Rio Hondo’s campus wide course management system (CMS).

Information regarding California Community Colleges (CCC) conversion to Canvas was provided by Michelle L. Pilati, a professor of psychology at Rio Hondo who also teaches online courses. In an exchange of emails, Pilati explained the Online Education Initiative’s (OEI) search for a new online course management system, some of the advantages that colleges get with adopting Canvas, and also her personal experience with the program.

The OEI is, according to their website, an online collaboration between CCC to offer the best possible online education for higher education students.

Many of Rio Hondo’s students have utilized the OEI for online courses. The OEI chose Canvas as their new course management system after interviewing and seeing demonstrations from three companies. Pilati, who worked on the CMS selection process, attested that after Canvas’s presentation there was a unanimous support for its adaptation.

The OEI webpage states that “The selection of Instructure’s Canvas as the CCMS [College Course Management System] was nearly unanimous among the OEI CCMS Committee charged with selecting a CCMS, including overwhelming support from student participants.”

Pilati maintains that at the time of the OEI’s decision to implement Canvas as their CMS, she was unaware of how Rio Hondo College decided to use the program as well.The incentive for Rio Hondo to adopt Canvas as the campus wide CMS may have been in the guarantee that the OEI would cover the cost through the 2018-2019 school year.

Pilati’s own experience, and student feedback towards Canvas has been favorable. She lists that Canvas offers a wide range of features that makes online courses easier for both faculty and students. This includes weekly support calls, an active Canvas Community that maintains contact with Canvas to suggest new features, and the opportunity for online students and teachers to manage courses from several community colleges in one place.

“This is a real benefit for our students who take courses at more than one college – and for faculty who teach at more than one college”, wrote Pilati.

Students can access Canvas through their accessrio page. The login for Canvas is the redundantly the same as your accessrio login (great security, fellas.)

The program’s notification feature allows students to edit their course progress notifications. Depending on their preference, students can be notified of assignments, grades and class announcements as soon as they are posted by the professor.

If a student does not want to be pestered with daily email updates they can set the notifications to weekly updates or, for those rebellious students who don’t care about grade management, they can simply turn off the notification feature.