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Spring term is almost wrapped! For many of you, this week includes a familiar mix of final projects, grading, student questions, course wrap-up, and the first pieces of summer or fall planning. This week’s newsletter is meant to help with that transition. You’ll find practical grading reminders, timely Canvas resources, and a few optional summer-facing opportunities to explore when you have capacity.

Before you close out spring term, here are a few grading and Canvas tasks that can help reduce confusion for you and your students:

✔️ Confirm that your syllabus grading information matches your Canvas gradebook

✔️ Check extra credit settings before final grade calculations

✔️ Enter grades and post them in Canvas so students can review feedback

✔️ Review any incomplete arrangements and contact OAI if a student needs continued Canvas access

✔️ Submit final grades by June 16 at 5 p.m.

✔️ Download a copy of your Canvas gradebook for your records. You can also export your course if you want a separate backup or archival copy.

Canvas Guide

A quiz, an exam, a test, or a final...whatever you call this kind of assessment in your course, our Canvas Quizzes guide can help you review setup details before students begin.

Teaching guide

Finals week often brings renewed questions about academic integrity, especially as assignments, tools, and student workflows continue to change. This guide offers practical ways to communicate expectations and support honest student work.

Tech guide

It’s very common to need to email all of your students at once, especially near the end of the term. One easy way to do that directly within Gmail is to utilize your class Google Group - and our guide is here to help.

PSU’s InnovAIte Academy is now accepting applications for a third cohort. This program empowers faculty and staff across all departments, regardless of their previous experience with generative AI, to harness its potential in research, teaching, and operations. No computer science, technology, or programming background is required – our focus is on practical applications accessible to all.

Please complete the program application to join the third cohort, including a brief statement of interest in the program. The application should take approximately 10-15 minutes to complete.

With only 100 spots available across all three tracks, early submission is encouraged. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis, and we anticipate high demand in this transformative initiative. Please submit your application by June 8, 2026.

Looking for a simple way to help students navigate artificial intelligence? OAI has a new student AI literacy Canvas module, Using AI Chatbots for Learning: A Student Guide, that instructors can add to summer courses.

The module gives students a shared starting point for understanding generative AI: what it is, how it works, how it may show up in academic work, and why expectations can vary across courses, assignments, and disciplines.

You can add it as an optional resource, a required participation or pass/fail activity, a graded assignment, or a customizable starting point for your own course-specific AI expectations. The module is editable, so you can adjust it to fit your teaching context.

Find it in Canvas Commons by filtering for Portland State University and searching for “AI chatbot.” It also includes an instructor survey so OAI can learn how faculty are using it and what support may be helpful in future versions.

Summer and fall course prep are good opportunities to build on the progress you've made this year in accessibility. To keep it manageable, we recommend working term by term and focusing on the materials students use most often.

Consider starting with weekly modules, assignment instructions, slides, and videos–places where clearer structure and more accessible formats can make an immediate difference for students.

A few practical steps to take this week:

Use this guide to understand what your Panorama scores means.

Learn best practices for creating accessible video and audio content.

You receive this email because you are an instructor at Portland State University and supported by our office, The Office of Academic Innovation. Writing to you from the Smith Memorial Student Union is your team of teaching support staff. Do you have a teaching question? Get in touch.

The Office of Academic Innovation
Portland State University