How to Do a Course Copy in Canvas

Step 1: Login to Canvas and Navigate to your Courses Dashboard. 

Step 2: In Canvas, the course copy process works by going to the destination course first (the one receiving the content), then once inside that course, importing the content from the source course (the one where the content is being copied from). If you do not see the destination course on your dashboard, try clicking on the "Courses" button, then select, "All Courses." 

Step 3: You will see a list of all the courses you are listed in as the instructor. If the course you want to copy into is not visible, it means either A) you are not listed as the instructor in Colleague or B) the course shell doesn't exist yet. 

If A) You can either ask your program secretary or the Registrar about whether or not you are listed as the instructor in Colleague. If B) Wait until the shells have been created. 

Step 4: However, if you do see the shell you want to copy into, go ahead and click on the title to enter the course. Once inside the course, click on "Settings" in the left-hand menu: 

Step 5: Once there, click "Import Course Content" in the right-hand column: 

Step 6: Click on the dropdown menu under "Select Content Type," and then select "Copy a Canvas Course." 

Step 7: Once you have selected "Copy a Canvas Course," you can either "Select a course" (which will show you your previous courses you were an instructor in) or you can "Search for a course," which allows to type search for a course. Select the appropriate source course from the course list, then select "+ Add to Import Queue." 

Step 8: Once you select "+ Add to Import Queue" you will see the course copy added to the queue. You will see a progress bar showing the status. 

Once complete, you will see "Completed" under the status bar. Frequently you will see a little red window pop up next to the "Completed" button that says how many issues Canvas encountered during the course copy. Most of the time, these are relatively meaningless. You can feel free to ignore the issues, but do make sure to look over your course before publishing it in order to see if anything seems overtly missing. 

Your course copy should now be complete. However, there may be a few extra steps you need to take before your course is ready to publish. 

• You may need to set your home page to be the one that was in your previous course. Most of the time, Canvas will automatically set the home page as the one it was in your previous course, but if not, you simply need to go to the "Pages" tab, then click "View All pages," find the home page from the previous course, then use the three dots to the far right to set it as your default. 
• You will need to adjust the due dates of your assignments.  You can bulk edit the assignment dates by going to the assignments tab, clicking on the three dots in the upper right hand corner, then selecting, "Edit Assignment Dates."

Finally, when you are ready to publish, you can go to your home page. In the upper right hand corner you can publish your course: