[Using Sakai] Does anyone allow instructors to edit/change their course site title

[Jeff Ziegler]

At UMich we do not allow instructors to change course site titles in order to enforce naming standards, although we do allow instructors to request that a course site be renamed.  We like to retain a modicum of control over the site title because:

1)  We've found that students who register for MYCLASS 101 001 look for a site tab that says "MYCLASS 101 001".   When they see a tab that instead says "Basic Math Concepts" it tends to result in multiple support contacts asking why they can't find "MYCLASS 101 001".  

2)  Some of the renaming requests I've seen over the years have been somewhat questionable and would likely have caused larger support issues had the instructor been able to make the change.  Had a contact on this once where the instructor wanted the site title to be a mini course description, over 97 characters as I recall.  Of course we have a character limit unless you change title through admin Sites tool so this could not have happened even if we allowed instructor to change titles but it's indicative of what problems might arise.  

We do allow users to change Project site titles and I've seen issues where users have changed the title of the site, forgot they did so, and then reported that their site had been mysteriously deleted.

I think a lot depends on the established policy.  I'd imagine Ithaca would get a lot of pushback if they were to change their policy such that site could no longer be renamed.  And IU might run into the situations described above if they changed to allow title renames.  However, any change is manageable if you plan your communications well and are willing to commit the resources to make sure it goes right.



J



On Sep 12, 2013, at 2:50 PM, Marilyn Dispensa <mdispensa at ithaca.edu> wrote:

> We do it and I think faculty like it.
>  
> Here’s a response from our Sakai Admin.
>  
> Ithaca is a small Longsight installation (~7k total users).  We use the cmapi  and must allow faculty to change course titles because they have the ability to add any combination of their rosters to any course site.  So far in two years of production we haven't had any significant problems.  I'd make one caveat— we don't allow users to delete sites. Non-standard naming could cause big problems in that scenario.  
>  
> Also people don't tend to make sites with the same titles for the same term and the site drawer in 2.9  makes the distinction between terms clear. (We order from most recent term to latest.) Users can also view terms in My Workspace -> Worksite Setup and our provided roster/course names appear in Site Info regardless of what's on the tab. Additionally in the cmapi there's an option for the faculty to include the official course name/number— if they do, that info is populated into the Site Information Display.  Of course they can delete it later…
>  
> From a support perspective—  we (try to) have our help desk capture the course site URLs/Site Ids  for tickets rather than the course titles anyway so that's a workflow I'd definitely recommend if you allow faculty to change course names. 
>  
>  
> Mary Jo Watts
> Instructional Technology Specialist
> Ithaca College
> Ithaca, NY 
>  
> PH: (607) 274-5191
>  
>  
> From: sakai-user-bounces at collab.sakaiproject.org [mailto:sakai-user-bounces at collab.sakaiproject.org] On Behalf Of Ward, Lynn E.
> Sent: Thursday, September 12, 2013 11:25 AM
> To: sakai-user at collab.sakaiproject.org
> Subject: [Using Sakai] Does anyone allow instructors to edit/change their course site title
>  
> HI everyone,
>  
> At Indiana University, we allow site owners to edit their site titles for portfolio sites and projects sites, but not for course sites.  All of our course sites use the same naming convention: semester campus department course_number section_number (e.g.,  FA13-IN-CHEM-C106-21206) and this is what shows up in the tabbed navigation.  Over the years we've received complaints from faculty and students that it's hard to distinguish between courses offered in the same program because the course titles are not descriptive.  More recently we've had a request from one of our schools to turn on the ability to edit course site titles under Site  Info > Edit Site Information. 
>  
> Does anyone else allow their faculty to change alter the title of the site in official course sites?  And if so, has this created any significant support issues?  IF this has proven to be a Pandora's Box at other schools, we probably don't want to open it.
>  
> Best regards,
>  
> Lynn
>  
> ==========================
> Lynn Ward, Principal Systems Analyst
> Instructional Technology Systems and Services
> University Information Technology Services
> Indiana University
> Information Technology and Communications Complex (IT 342K)
> 535 West Michigan Street, Indianapolis, IN 46202
> Phone: 317-278-5713  E-mail: leward at iu.edu
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"New != better.  Different != better.  Only better == better."

---------------------------------------------------------------
Jeff Ziegler 
CTools Service Manager
Business Systems Analyst Associate
ITS Teaching and Learning Group
University of Michigan

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