Course Preparation

Fall 2026 course shells are available to faculty in Canvas. To view your course shells, click Courses on the global navigation menu. Then, click All Courses. You may also view current courses and courses you've marked as favorites on the Dashboard.

Fall 2026 courses will be made available to students on the first day of classes at 12:00 am. Faculty may access and update fall courses now.

If you do not see your courses, check with your department to ensure that you have been officially assigned to the courses in Banner. Course assignments will update from Banner to the LMS automatically within 3 to 4 hours. 

Barnes and Noble Textbook Access

Digitally delivered materials will be available to students via the LMS. Faculty must ensure that BNC Course Materials is added to the course menu of each course so students can access their digital course materials. In addition, the Follett Discover course menu item should be removed from all courses.

For assistance with digital course materials, contact the bookstore.

Fully Online Courses - Master Courses

Master courses are fully developed "consensus courses" managed by master course coordinators and academic programs. They help ensure essential program goals, course content, and curricular requirements are present in online courses. These courses typically require minimal, if any, changes made to the structure, content, and assessments to be ready for fully asynchronous online delivery. Master courses are managed by schools and programs. All master courses are created by faculty experts nominated by their chairs and deans. All sections of a course will use the master course as the general design but customization is possible. If you have questions about your department’s master courses, please contact the department chair and work with the Course Coordinator.

Access to Master Courses   

In spring 2021, a Master Course Portal was launched with master courses developed from spring 2020 and onward. Updates are made each semester. Use the Portal website to:

Access a database of completed master courses you can search for specific master courses.
Request to have a master course copied into your course shell.
Use our Master Course Readiness checklist to see if your master course is ready to go.

For assistance with the master course portal, contact the Extended Campus.

Access to Existing Online Course Content

Hundreds of online courses have been previously developed and taught at A&T. If you are scheduled to teach a completely online course for the semester and you are not using master course content, there is likely online course content that can be used for your course. Check with your department chair or the Extended Campus  to find out if the course has been previously developed for online delivery. If the course has been previously developed or taught online, you can request a master course copy into your course shell. Course copy requests may take 24-48 hours for completion, so please plan accordingly.  

If you desire content from a previously taught course shell, contact the instructor on record or the department chair to seek approval to use the content. Email that approval, the course ID for the source course, and the course ID for the course you are teaching to the ITTD team. Course IDs should include the subject, course, section, and term.

Course copy requests can be sent to: 

David Whitehead (dfwhitehead@ncat.edu), Danielle Crosby (dacrosby@ncat.edu), Keia Pannell (kdpannell@ncat.edu), Dr. Bessie Nkonge (bessien@ncat.edu) or Dr. Tracie Lewis (tolewis@ncat.edu).
 

Access to Content from Previous Semesters 

Faculty who taught courses in previous semesters may wish to use that content to build current courses. Spring 2025 through Spring 2026 courses have been migrated into Canvas and can be used to build future courses upcoming terms. To copy content from an existing Canvas course into a new Canvas course shell:

  1. Open the Canvas course into which you would like to copy content.
  2. From the course Home page, click Import Existing Content on the right side of the page. 
  3. Under Select Content Type, choose Copy a Canvas Course. 
  4. In the Search for a Course field, enter the name of the Canvas course that contains the content you want to copy and select it from the list. 
  5. Choose whether to Import All Content or Select Specific Content.  
  • Import All Content copies all available content from the source course.  
  • Select Specific Content allows you to choose only the content you want to import after the import process begins.  
  1. If desired, check Adjust events and due dates to automatically update assignment due dates and calendar events for the new course.  
  2. Click Import.  
  3. Monitor the Current Jobs section to view the import status.  
  4. If you selected Select Specific Content, click Select Content when it becomes available, choose the content you want to import, and then click Select Content to begin the import.  

Note: Depending on the amount of content being copied, the import process may take several minutes to complete. Refresh the page if necessary to view the updated status.

If you wish to use content taught by a colleague in a previous semester, contact that colleague for approval to use the content. (If the instructor is no longer available, contact the department chair.) Email that approval, the course ID for the source course, and your course ID (including the subject, course, section, and term) to the ITTD team. The course will be copied within 24-48 hours of the request.

Canvas Course Templates   

The Canvas Commons includes NCAT course templates that can be used when building your Canvas courses.

  1. Log in to Canvas. 
  2. From the Global Navigation menu on the left side of Canvas, select Commons. 
  3. If prompted, authorize Canvas Commons access. 
  4. In the Commons, use the search bar to search for one of the available NCAT templates: 
     
    NCAT Canvas Home Page 
    NCAT Online Course Template 
    NCAT Standard Course Template 
  5.  Select the template from the search results. 
  6. Review the template description and preview the available content. 
  7. Select Import/Download on the right side. 
  8. Choose the course where you would like to use the template. 
  9. Select Import into Course. 

Canvas will begin importing the template content into your course. The import process may take several minutes depending on the size of the template. 

After the template has been imported: 

  • Add your course-specific content and materials. 
  • Customize modules, assignments, pages, and assessments as needed. 
  • Review course navigation and settings. 
  • Verify accessibility of all course materials before publishing. 
  • Remember to publish your course content and modules before students access the course.