Canvas is Virginia Tech's learning management system (LMS). Instructors use Canvas to manage teaching materials like assignments, quizzes, feedback, and student grades. 

• Official courses are automatically created in instructors' Canvas accounts.
• Enrolled students are automatically added.
• Instructors can reuse teaching materials by importing them to a new course site.
• Canvas provides 24-7 support by phone (833-639-7621) and chat (click Help on any Canvas screen).

The Canvas Instructor Guide and the Canvas Student Guide have full instructions on using Canvas. These instructions are specific to Virginia Tech. To see other Canvas topics, please see:

• Using Canvas at Virginia Tech (for Instructors)
• Using Canvas at Virginia Tech (for Students)

Contents

• Background
• Adding New Guests to Canvas
• Tracking Guest Registrations
  • Check Status of Guest Accounts
  • Common Registration Issues
• How Guests Create Accounts
• Adding Expired Guest Accounts
• Adding Existing Guests to Canvas
• Getting Help

This article covers how to add a non-VT guest to Canvas. If the person you're adding is a VT affiliate (such as a current instructor or student), see Adding VT Affiliates.

Background

Who Can Be Added as a Guest?

• Only non–Virginia Tech affiliates should be added as guests.
• Do not add someone as a guest if they:
  • Have a VT Username (PID), or
  • Will soon receive a VT Username (PID).
• Adding a Virginia Tech email address as a guest will not work.
• Guests can be added in any Canvas role (Student, TA, Teacher, Observer, etc.).

Who Can Add Guests?

• Only Virginia Tech–affiliated Teachers and TAs can add guests to a course.
• A Teacher or TA with a guest account cannot add other guests.

What Guests Must Do After Being Added

• Guests must create their account within VT's Guest Account Management System (GAMS) before they can access Canvas.
• After creating their account, it may take up to 30 minutes for the guest to appear in your course.

Important Invitation Rules

• Invitations expire after 7 days.
• You cannot resend an invitation to the same email address until the current invitation expires.

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Adding New Guests to Canvas

1. Go to the course site in Canvas. 
2. Click People in the course navigation menu.
3. Click +Guests in the top-right of the screen. You’ll go to VT Add Guests tool.
   
   • If you don't see +Guests, see Adding People to Concluded Course Sites.
     

     

4. Click Authorize.

   

5. Click Request Guest to add a single guest (or multiple guests one-by-one) or Upload Guests to add a batch of guests.
   
   • You can upload only 99 guests at a time. If you have more than 99 guests, add them in batches.

     

6. Adding guests:
   Click here for instructions for adding a single guest 

   1. Click Request Guest.
      • If the course site is unpublished, a warning will pop up. Click OK. You’ll go to the Add Guest screen.
   2. Enter the guest user’s full name and email address.
   3. If your course site has more than one section, choose which section to add them to.
   4. Set the guest's role in the site. 
   5. State your reason to add the guest user.
   6. Click Create Guest.
   Click here for instructions for uploading a list of guests

   1. Click Upload Guests. If the course site is unpublished, a warning will pop up. Click OK. You’ll go to the Upload Guests screen.
   2. Open Excel and create a new workbook. Add one column with guest names (First Last) and another column with guest email addresses.
   3. Add up to 99 guests. Split your guests into separate files if you have more than 99.

      

   4. Save the spreadsheet as a CSV (Comma delimited) file. You'll see ".csv" as one of the Save as Type options.
   5. On the Upload Guests screen in Canvas:
      
      1. Choose which section to add the guests to, if your course site has more than one section. Upload different batches for different sections.
      2. Set the guests' role in the site. Upload different batches for different roles.
      3. State your reason to add the guest user.
   6. Click Upload File. Navigate to the CSV file you created in steps 1-3 of 6B and click Open. The file will be listed at the bottom of the Upload Guests window.
   7. Click Start Upload. The VT Add Guests tool will request guest accounts and go to the Guest Uploads tab. 
7. Optional: Send instructions to the guest(s) on how to make their account. See How guests make their accounts below. 
8. Wait for the guest to create their account and for Canvas to update.

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Tracking Guest Registration

Guest users must register their accounts within 7 days of being added to Canvas.

Check Status of Guest Accounts

Track whether guests created their accounts by looking at the Status column in the Add Guests tool. 

1. In your Canvas site, go to the People tool and click +Guests to see a list of invited guests.
2. Look in the Status column. There are three possible statuses:
   • Pending – Waiting for guest to: access email invitation, create account, and set their password.
   • Expired – Guest did not create an account within 7 days, and the invitation is no longer valid. Re-invite them.
   • Enrolled – Guest successfully created an account. It can take up to 30 minutes before the guest is added to Canvas and they appear in your roster.

Common Registration Issues

• Guest cannot locate email invitation
  • Have the guest search for an email from "iam@vt.edu" in their inbox.
  • Have the guest check their Spam, Junk, or Trash folders in their email.
  • If they cannot locate the invite and need access now, consider using another email address to invite them. Otherwise, you can resend the invite 7 days after the initial invite.
• Guest doesn't know if they created an account
  • Have them go to Virginia Tech Account Manager to see if they can do a password reset.
  • If they receive a "Reset passphrase not allowed for this account" message, this means that they have not yet set up their account. Direct them to locate the email from the guest system (the sender is iam@vt.edu).
• Guest is enrolled but cannot log in
  • If a guest has had a Canvas account in the past, their password has most likely expired and the login credentials are invalid.
  • Their account may have "Expired" appended to their name and email address.
  • To help them create a new account, see Adding Expired Guest Accounts to learn how to send a new invite.

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How Guests Create Accounts

If your guest is having trouble creating an account, below is a template that you may use to guide them.

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Adding Expired Guest Accounts

A Virginia Tech guest who had a Canvas account in the past but hasn't used it in a while may get an error about an invalid account/password when they try to log in. First, make sure they are on the correct Canvas instance (Canvas vs PDN Canvas). If they still can't log in, proceed with the instructions below.

• A Virginia Tech guest account goes into an expired state in Virginia Tech's Guest Account Management System (GAMS) and Canvas if they do not update their password annually.
• VT affiliated teachers in a Canvas course can resend a new invitation to guests to set up a new guest account.

1. Go to the People tab in the Canvas site where you need to re-add the guest.
2. Click on +Guest.
3. Click on Request Guest.
4. Type in the Guest's information and click Create Guest.
5. You'll see a popup that says they're already in the system. Click Continue to send them the invitation.
6. Make sure they respond to the invitation and set their new GAMS password. Canvas will update with their enrollment.
7. The guest should now be able to log into Canvas using their new password.

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Adding Existing Guests to Canvas

When adding guests via the Guest tool, you may get the below error message:

User already exists. Please use the People tool to add this user to your course.

This means that someone else at VT has already added them as a guest on another site and they have already created a Canvas account. To add an existing guest account to your site:

1. Go back to the People tab on your site.
2. Click on the +People button.
3. Under Add user(s) by, click Login ID.
4. Guests use their email address to log into Canvas, so enter their full email address in the Login IDs (required) field.
5. Choose the role and section for the guest and click Next.
6. Review the confirmation page and click Save if everything is correct.

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Getting Help

For instructions on resolving common issues with Canvas, see:

• Troubleshooting Canvas (for Instructors)
• Troubleshooting Canvas (For Students)
• Recommended Browser Privacy and Security Settings for Canvas

Instructure, the creators of Canvas, provide 24-7 Canvas support, including live chat and a support hotline.

To get Canvas help, click Help on any Canvas screen and choose from help options:

• Search the Canvas Guides: Search Canvas documentation. 
• Chat with Canvas Support: Open a chat window in Canvas (or call the phone number). 
• Contact Virginia Tech 4Help: Submit an incident on 4Help or call 540-231-4357.
• Browse Virginia Tech Resources: See other Canvas Knowledge Base articles.
• Report a Problem: Submit a Canvas support case by filling out a short form.
• Ask the Community: Go to Canvas user community resources. 
• Submit a Feature Idea: Search a list of current feature idea conversations. Add to an existing conversation or start your own!

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