The transition to the Learning Management System (LMS) Canvas has been a topic of conversation for Arkansas State University students, faculty, and stage for over the past month.

“In September 2022, I was tasked with being the project lead over this Blackboard to Canvas transition, with the anticipated ‘go live’ date of July 2023. I am confident that we have delivered a solid foundation for a successful rollout of Canvas across our campus both from a faculty and student perspective,” said Chris Boothman, senior associate vice chancellor for distance education and technology.

A-State Online (AOS), Information Technology Services (ITS), and the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL) worked together to train and provide support to faculty, staff and students during the transition.

Carmen Lanos Williams, PhD., a professor for the College of Liberal Arts and Communication, said CETL’s faculty and staff training allowed the implementation of Canvas to succeed. Because of this training, she said Blackboard and Canvas are incomparable and instead should be looked at and judged separately. 

“I don’t have an expectation that this platform is going to be identical to what I just used. If you modify your expectations that this platform isn’t going to be exactly like the other, then, it’s really not that hard. Just learn what it does and do the things that work for you.”

For Williams, these “things” are stackable course building tools, the ability to communicate in a singular platform, and the delayed announcement feature.

Students share a similar perspective to the new LMS. Of the students that were informally polled, 70% of students preferred Canvas, while 30% preferred other LMS, referring to Google Classroom, Blackboard, and Moodle.

Taylor Sims and Wren Watson are two first year students majoring in nursing and interdisciplinary studies. While they used Google Classroom in high school, they found Canvas to be very similar, due to the easily accessible and organized interface.

Seventy percent of students in the informal poll had similar responses, with the software described as “user friendly,” “easy to use on the go,” and “easier to keep up with.”

Some students even reported having better grades due to the organization and overall aesthetic of the software, specifically mentioning the mobile app.

However, this is not the opinion of the entire student body.

Lake Summers, a sophomore art major from Marion, described the software as “cluttered,” “slow” and “frustrating.”

“Its mobile version is far more functional than its predecessor, however, the login process has many unnecessary steps. While it is a step up for Blackboard, it is a convoluted app and still just as dysfunctional of a program,” Summers said.

Features like the lack of automatic deletion on completed assignments and a disorganized to-do list continually came up in conversations with the student body, as well as the frustration surrounding the lack of familiarity professors are facing with the software.

“I don’t have the wealth of knowledge about this system that I had with the previous one, but I don’t feel like it is inaccessible to me,” Williams said.

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