Center for the Advancement of Faculty Excellence (CAFE)

About LMS Integrations

What are Canvas Integrations

Canvas integrations add extra services to Canvas. For example, many textbooks have Canvas integrations that allow students to do textbook assignments, and faculty to grade them, within Canvas.

Adopting a Canvas integration involves several campus departments, including CAFE, IT, the Bronco Bookstore, and Procurement. Every potential integration must be evaluated to ensure that the technology is secure, maintains user privacy, is accessible to users with disabilities, and does not place Cal Poly Pomona at risk in some way. Many integrations require payment. In short, adopting a Canvas integration is a significant decision.

Canvas Integration Procedures

The integration evaluation and adoption procedure may take several months and will require significant input from the person or group requesting the tool. For questions about this process, please email Ann Loomis (CAFE LMS Administrator).

Integration Evaluation and Adoption Procedure

  1. Cal Poly Pomona faculty or staff request a Canvas integration through the CAFE Request Form. Questions on the form include:
    • Indicate the name of the integration.
    • Provide website for the integration
    • Provide the vendor name and contact email if possible
    • Provide any cost information if possible (eg cost per student or institutional cost)
    • Describe the need for the integration, including its institutional benefits. What benefit is there to integrating with Canvas? If you have been using the tool outside Canvas, what has been the benefit? If you have been using a different tool or strategy to meet a similar goal, please describe.
    • Estimate how many instructors and/or staff would use the integration.
    • Estimate how many students would be impacted.
  2. A CAFE staff member reaches out to the requestor for consultation. The consultation will include:
    • Explanation of integration process
    • Discussion of any other solutions
    • Discussion of equally effective alternative access plan
    • Provide a template letter to indicate department and/or college support for the integration as a necessary technology. Letter will include explanation of the cost model (e.g., commitment of funding from department or college, estimation of license fee, cost to students, etc.)
  3. Requestor must submit department/college support letter to CAFE to move the process forward into the evaluation and testing phase.

  1. CAFE staff gather information from requestor and vendor to support reviews:
    • Accessibility (Voluntary Product Accessibility Template, accessibility roadmaps, Equally Effective Alternative Access Plan)
    • Security (Higher Education Cloud Vendor Assessment Tool (HECVAT)
    • Procurement (End User License Agreement)
  2. CAFE staff will notify relevant groups:
    • The Bronco Bookstore is notified if the potential integration is publisher-related or requires student payment.
    • IT project management is notified
  3. CAFE submits request for IT security review. If security is acceptable, IT configures the integration in a Canvas test environment and CAFE performs basic functionality testing.
  4. CAFE submits request for IT accessibility testing.
  5. If integration passes IT Accessibility testing, permission is given to proceed to Procurement step.
  6. Requestor works with Procurement to identify funding (if necessary), review the End User License Agreement (EULA), and approve purchase. CAFE can support Requestor as needed in this process.
  7. All integration evaluation results and supporting documentation are brought before the IT Change Management committee for approval.
  8. CAFE and IT perform final usability testing and schedule the integration to “go live” in Canvas.

  1. Integrations must provide institutional benefit beyond one class or faculty member. This is because evaluating and maintaining integrations demands significant human resources.
  2. If the integration costs money, funds must be identified before the evaluation process starts.
    Students may be expected to pay under certain circumstances such access to textbooks or for specific classroom tools. Requestors are urged to carefully consider cost/benefit when proposing an integration to be paid for by students.
  3. Integrations must meet Cal Poly Pomona IT standards for security and accessibility.
  4. Integrations must not have negative impacts on other Canvas functions (i.e., the tool does not “break” Canvas).
  5. Procurement must approve End User License Agreement terms. This limits Cal Poly Pomona’s risk and the requestor’s risk.