The Associated Students of Madison University Affairs Committee met Tuesday to discuss the possibility of UW-Madison adopting the learning management system Canvas as an alternative to the university's current systems, Desire2Learn and Moodle.
The committee passed the Course Affordability Resolution March 3, which would remove mandatory programs such as Top Hat that require students to pay subscription fees for course codes, textbooks and resources from third parties.
“Students are being forced to pay for Top Hat and it’s simply a way to take attendance,” said committee member Madison Laning.
Committee members said they met with the university’s Faculty Senate Committee Monday to advocate for their resolution and introduce Canvas. The faculty members pushed back against these ideas, interrupting the students’ presentation with their concerns.
“The pushback is mostly due to a fear of the unknown that they can’t do the things that they’ve been doing, but they can,” said University Affairs Committee chair Sally Rohrer.
Like Top Hat, Canvas has a polling system that allows professors to quiz students in lecture and display results in real time. University Affairs committee members, however, said Canvas will cost less for students. Rohrer added that Canvas is easier to use than the university’s current system, Learn@UW, which is paid for by Desire2Learn.
According to information distributed by the committee, “Canvas will allow professors to access affordable open-educational resources from institutions across the country and includes ETextbook reader which will allow us to negotiate lower prices with textbook companies.”
Committee members emphasized that their primary goal is to eliminate additional student fees for certain courses, not to require professors to adopt new programs. Laning felt this confusion was the main cause for the negative sentiment from the Faculty Senate.
“Faculty don’t necessarily have to use Canvas as long as they’re not using Top Hat and iClicker,” Laning said.
Members agreed the next step in rallying support for their resolution is to educate faculty members. They plan to send students to speak directly to department heads.
“We need them to buy into it up front, so we have to show them the importance of our plan,” Laning said.
