Canvas: Use the Manual Section Enrollment Tool in Your Course Site

Teachers, Teaching Assistants, Designers, and eligible collegiate academic technologists can use the Manual Section Enrollment tool to add students already enrolled in an academic course site to manually created sections. Manually created sections are frequently used to: 

• facilitate makeup of incompletes
• accommodate students with disabilities, or 
• to differentiate assignment configurations (i.e. undergraduate versus graduate students).

With the Manual Section Enrollment tool you can randomly distribute students across sections or upload a CSV with sections and enrollments. Then you can move and remove individual students. Manual Section Enrollment identifies students who dropped the course and need to be removed from a manually created section.

In this article:

• Adding the Manual Section Enrollment tool to your course site
• Creating manual sections and enrollments 
• Uploading a CSV with manual sections and enrollments 
• Adding and moving students among manual sections
• Removing dropped students from a manual section 
• Editing section names
• Manual Section Enrollment Tool Usage Notes

Note: This tool does not manage (create, edit, delete) PeopleSoft associated sections. All PeopleSoft section-management issues should be addressed by your local PeopleSoft course scheduler.

Adding the Manual Section Enrollment tool to your course site

If you do not see Course Admin Tools in Course navigation, follow the steps in How do I manage Course Navigation links? to enable that feature.

Creating sections and enrollments

Manual Section Enrollment can create sections and randomly distribute students across those sections. The sections will be named S001, S002, S003, and so on. Optionally, you can edit section names later.

1. Go to the Course navigation menu and select Course Admin Tools. Select the Manual Section Enrollment tool. The Manual Section Enrollment window appears.
2. If there are no manual sections created, you will be in the Section Creation tab by default. 
3. Select a distribution method and enter the maximum number of students per section or number of sections.
   
4. Select Submit. A confirmation message appears detailing how students will be divided among sections.
   
5. Select Accept. A message indicating the number of sections created appears.
   

Uploading a CSV with sections and enrollments

1. Go to the Course navigation menu and select Course Admin Tools. Select the Manual Section Enrollment tool. The Manual Section Enrollment window appears.
2. Select the Import CSV tab.
   
3. Select the link to Download a pre-filled template. The downloaded file lists all the students in the course and leaves a column where you enter the Section Name.

   "Section Name","Email","Role","Emplid","Name"
   "","[email protected]","Student","0000001","Walteria, Patientia"
   "","[email protected]","Student","0000002","Duluthopus, Cicero"
   "","[email protected]","Student","0000004","Crookstone, Nona"

4. Enter the Section Name for each student. Add rows for TA, Non-Editing Instructor, or Undergraduate TA. Save as a CSV.

   "Section Name","Email","Role","Emplid","Name"
   "Maroon","[email protected]","Student","0000001","Walteria, Patientia"
   "Gold","[email protected]","Student","0000002","Duluthopus, Cicero"
   "Gold","[email protected]","Student","0000004","Crookstone, Nona"
   "Gold","[email protected]","TA","0000003","Rochestern, Marc"
   "Maroon","[email protected]","TA","0000005","Morrist, Tre"

5. Upload the CSV to the Upload your Enrollments field. A progress bar appears. The process may take a few minutes while the tool validates the data and creates the sections and enrollments.

Adding and moving students among manual sections

Once manual sections have been created, you can manage the enrollments in the sections. 

1. Go to the Course navigation menu and select Course Admin Tools. Select the Manual Section Enrollment tool. The Manual Section Enrollment window appears.
2. Select a section from the drop-down list. The page displays a list of users in the selected section on the right. Students, teachers, and TAs not enrolled in the selected section appear on the left.
   
3. Double-click the named tiles on the left to add them to the section. Double-click tiles on the right to remove them from the section. 
   • You can add a user to multiple sections.
   • Toggle the Available People control to show users who are not already enrolled in a manual section.
   • Use the search field to filter by name.
4. Select Save.

Removing dropped students from manual sections

When students drop a course, they are automatically removed from the PeopleSoft section but are not automatically removed from manual sections. 

It is important to remove dropped students because students enrolled in a manual section will continue to have access to the course and receive notifications about the course.

1. Go to the Course navigation menu and select Course Admin Tools. Select the Manual Section Enrollment tool. The Manual Section Enrollment window appears.
2. The Manual Section Enrollment tool will detect users no longer associated with a PeopleSoft section and offer to remove them from manual sections.
3. Select Fix This to remove users individually or Fix All to remove all users dropped from PeopleSoft sections.
   

Editing Section Names

You can edit the default section titles provided by the Manual Section Enrollment tool.

1. Go to the Course navigation menu and select Settings. Select the Sections tab. A list of all PeopleSoft and manual sections appear.
2. Select a manual section. Details of the section and the enrollments appear.
3. Select Edit Section.
4. Edit the Section Name and select Update Section.
   

Manual Section Enrollment Tool Usage Notes

The Manual Section Enrollment tool is not available to non-academic courses.