The Quercus course life cycle outlines what happens to a course in Quercus from its creation through the end of the course and transition to read-only access. Use this resource to understand key Quercus events and identify tasks to complete before, during, and after your course.
Standard Course Life Cycle
Courses associated with a ROSI session follow the standard Quercus course life cycle outlined below.
At a Glance
- 4 months before Fall / 8 months before Winter: Course creation and setup
- 1 week before first class: Course publication
- During the course: Course delivery
- End of term: Course wrap-up and access changes
- 1 month after end of term: Read-only for students, teaching assistants, and designers
- 1 year after end of term: Read-only for instructors
Before the Start of Term
Approximately 4 months before the Fall term and 8 months before the Winter term.
What Happens in Quercus
- Courses are created in Quercus.
- Instructors and students are automatically enrolled in courses from ROSI.
Suggested Instructor Tasks
- Review the Quercus (Canvas) Quick Guide and other Quercus support resources, and register for Quercus training sessions.
- Cross-list course sections, if applicable.
- Set up your course. Copy course files and settings from a previous course, if applicable.
- Add and organize course content.
- Add teaching assistants and other course staff.
Before the First Class
Approximately 1 week before the first class.
Suggested Instructor Tasks
- Publish your course to make it available to students.
During the Course
Suggested Instructor Tasks
- Export the Gradebook regularly to keep a record of grades. Note: Letter grades are not included in the export.
- Download recordings made to Zoom Cloud within 120 days.
At the End of Term
What Happens in Quercus
- Students can no longer be added to course sections through the + People feature. Refer to the instructions on how to add people to a course section after the end of term.
- Instructors can no longer message students in the course through the Inbox.
Suggested Instructor Tasks
- Export the Gradebook. Note: Letter grades are not included in the export.
- Export course content and save the course package to your computer or Microsoft 365 OneDrive.
- Submit final grades to your department.
After the End of Term
What Happens in Quercus
- 1 month after the end of term: The course becomes read-only for students, teaching assistants, and designers. Read-only for Students means that the course is no longer available for submitting assignments, posting discussions, or other action-based tasks within the course. Students will no longer receive notifications for course updates.
- 1 year after the end of term: The course becomes read-only for instructors. Read-only for Instructors means that the course is no longer available for editing items, uploading files, grading, or other action-based tasks within the course.
Courses That Run Beyond ROSI Sessions
For courses that run longer than the ROSI-defined term length, instructors can override the default course end date in Quercus within one year of the course’s end date. If a course has already entered read-only status for instructors, contact your Divisional Support Contact for assistance with changing the course dates.
Change the Course End Date
To enter a new end date:
- In Settings, select Course Details.
- Scroll down to Participation.
- If Term is selected, select Course from the drop-down menu.
- Enter the new end date.
- Select Update Course Details to save your changes.
Note: If the course Participation is set to Term, the dates displayed in the Start and End boxes show the student participation window offsets, not the term dates.
Contact your Divisional Support Contact for assistance with overriding default course end dates, and visit the Canvas guide on Changing Course Dates for more information.
Important note for admins: Do not modify the Term in Quercus course settings to extend course access. This setting is directly linked to course configurations in ROSI and changing it can have unintended consequences. To extend course access, adjust the course Participation dates using the instructions above.