The university changes its learning platform

Mid Sweden University's strategic goal is to "be nationally leading and internationally recognized in the development of and quality in flexible forms of education and technology-supported learning". The strategy also mentions that the university should take advantage of and develop the opportunities of digitalisation. The switch to Canvas (Sunet LMS) facilitates this considerably, as Canvas provides the conditions for creating an attractive digital learning environment that is at the forefront of technological development, says Nicolette Karst, university pedagogical developer and project manager for the Canvas implementation project and Niklas Brinkfelt, group leader for pedagogical development at FUS, and change leader in the Canvas implementation project.

"Canvas is a service that Sunet offers to Swedish higher education. A major advantage is that over 30 higher education institutions are connected to a national network for collaboration and co-creation in Canvas, where everyone shares and utilizes resources, training and educational materials. There is also good international collaboration around Canvas," says Niklas Brinkfelt.

Why we are changing the learning platform

"Another reason why we are changing is the functionality of the learning platform and the needs of students and teachers. As a start to the investigation of the future learning platform, we made a needs capture, which looked at the needs of both teachers and students. Among other things, we conducted forum days with teachers, a survey to the students and student projects. What emerged then formed the basis for the recommendation to switch to Canvas," says Nicolette Karst.

The recommendation was endorsed by both faculty boards and the central collaboration group, and the decision to implement Canvas was subsequently made by the Vice-Chancellor. Another reason for the change is security, as the current version of Moodle would require a major update to meet security requirements. Updates in Canvas, on the other hand, are made continuously and automatically by the supplier Instructure.

Differences between Canvas and Moodle

"The biggest difference between Moodle and Canvas is the structure of courses. With Canvas, you as a teacher, and as a student, get a more manageable structure for your course. The pedagogical idea behind it is clearer in Canvas, where you work with modules. The basic structure will be uniform, which means that students will be met with information in the same places regardless of which course they are studying, something that has been requested by the students," says Nicolette Karst.

Last but not least, accessibility is well developed in Canvas. As a teacher, it is easy to meet the legal requirements for accessibility when you build your course through a simple built-in tool, Accessibility Checker.

Support for teachers before the change

For teachers, the change means that you need to adopt a new way of thinking when building your course room, but based on your pedagogy and the structure of the course. One of the goals of the implementation project is to reduce the administrative burden for teachers, according to Nicolette Karst.
"At the Division of Educational Development, we will offer support and several training sessions both during the implementation and afterwards. This will take the form of guides/self-study courses in Canvas, as drop-in sessions at the beginning of the implementation, as scheduled workshops and as tailor-made workshops for teaching teams or departments, if needed. In addition, Instructure, the company that provides Canvas, has its own very detailed FAQ that you as a teacher can use," she says.

Welcomes pilot users

During the autumn semester of 2024, the technical implementation will take place first, to get the platform in place and ensure that other systems that interact with Canvas work. 
"We also welcome early pilot users in the latter part of the autumn semester. This phase is important to us and enables adaptations in the learning platform based on the user needs that emerge in the pilot users' tests," says Niklas Brinkfelt.

During the spring semester of 2025, the educational developers will offer pilot courses in Canvas. Subjects can register interest in using Canvas as a learning platform for one or more of their courses. The goal is that all courses starting in the autumn semester of 2025 will be given in Canvas. Courses that have already started in Moodle and are completed in the autumn semester of 2025 will be allowed to complete in Moodle, after which Moodle will be put into study mode until the spring semester of 2026. This means that teachers and students can see the material there, but that nothing can be created there anymore.  

More information, which is updated regularly, about Canvas can be found on miun.se/canvasinfo (Swedish), miun.se/canvasinfoeng (English) and miun.se/canvasinfostudent (for students). At the Division of Educational Development, questions, reflections and constructive criticism are welcome, and are happy to present the work with the implementation and the learning platform at APT meetings or similar.

Contact pedagogical development at pukontakt@miun.se