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  5. Importing Your Course

Importing Your Course

If you’d like to import an old course shell, or parts of an old course shell, into a blank new shell in the new instance of Canvas, follow these steps: 

  1. If needed, request a shell from eLearning@seattlecolleges.edu. In your request, please specify what you’d like the shell to be named. We will confirm when your shell has been created, and you will see it on your Canvas dashboard. 

  1. Once you have a shell, open it up and follow this guide for importing parts of or the whole of an old course shell. 

  1. After the import process is complete, navigate through the shell to make sure that the items you imported are there and look correct, and publish the shell when ready.  

  1. If you encounter any issues, please reach out to eLearning@seattlecolleges.edu or book a time with an Instructional Designer for help. 

Points of note: 

  • Avoid overwriting: If you are importing content into a shell with already-existing content, please take care not to write over existing materials. The best way to avoid this is to make sure that you do not have identically-named items such as a “Module Zero” in the shell you’re importing into and a “Module Zero” in the shell that you’re importing from. If you do, Canvas will overwrite the existing materials with the materials being imported. This is usually not irreversible, but it can cause problems and delays. 

  • Errors upon import: If there were any errors during the import, Canvas will display that on the import page and provide you with links to view and resolve the errors. The most common error is a broken link. You can see a sample of that occurrence here. If you have issues with any of the errors, let us know and we’re happy to help.  

  • Quizzes with Images: We have discovered a few issues with faculty using images in quizzes and quiz banks. We have found that the “Copy a Course” import method can break the image links. We suggest doing a full export file of the whole course and then importing via an export package, here is a guide on how to do that. We have found that method works better and maintains image links.