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The FCLT and our wonderful friends over at IT are very excited to announce some big and exciting changes coming to Zoom inside of Canvas for the Winter 2021 term. In fact, the changes occurred earlier this week (FYI, for those teaching non-credit or prepping their courses for winter)! I will try and keep this post short and sweet. Don’t miss the critical information toward the bottom of this post about how Otter.ai is affected by this change. Let’s dive right in!

Background (AKA, why is this happening?)

For the past few years our Zoom accounts have been managed by ConferZoom through the CCC Tech Center. The CCC Tech Center actually managed the majority of the California Community Colleges accounts, and with this year’s forced move to remote instruction, it became clear that their small team would not be able to continue to manage and support all of these accounts. Additionally, nobody at Mt. SAC had local administrative control over ConferZoom, so account-level changes to the account could only be done at the state level by the folks at the CCC Tech Center. On December 15th, that changed when all of our ConferZoom accounts were migrated over to our shiny new sub-account. The two major benefits to this are that 1) Our local IT team now has local administrator access to Mt. SAC’s Zoom account, which means they will have the capability to provide additional support for this tool. Yay! And 2) We are now able to use the new and improved Zoom LTI in Canvas.

TechConnect Zoom is REPLACING ConferZoom

So uh, remember this thing? 

ConferZoom in Canvas

Yeah, that’s being replaced with a brand new version of the tool that, aside from being better optimized to work with our new sub-account, brings a much needed facelift to how Zoom sessions are scheduled and accessed from within your Canvas courses. First off, the new tool LOOKS BETTER and is much MORE INTUITIVE. In fact, it looks almost exactly like what the Zoom website and desktop app look like. See below:

TechConnect Zoom in Canvas

The visual facelift should allow for an easier and more intuitive approach to scheduling meetings and access previous meeting recordings. 

In addition to the new user interface, the tool also provides a better user experience for your students. More specifically, Zoom meetings scheduled from your Canvas course will be easier for your students to find because they will be automatically available in the following places:

  • the TechConnect Zoom link in the course navigation menu
  • the Course Summary in the Syllabus
  • the Canvas Calendar
  • the To-Do and Upcoming lists

These shortcuts are placed automatically upon scheduling a meeting using TechConnect Zoom in Canvas, no additional work is required by the instructors. How cool is that?!

Important Stuff: PLEASE READ!

Otter.ai NEEDS to be RE-SYNCED to get live transcripts in your TechConnect Zoom meetings!

Otter.ai Logo

An unfortunate side-effect of moving to the new Zoom sub-account is that integrations with third-party apps have to be re-done, which means Otter.ai needs to be re-synced to your TechConnect Zoom account. Basically, you login to your Otter.ai account, go to Apps, and “disconnect” your Zoom account, and then re-add it. If you were using Otter.ai to provide a live transcript during your Zoom meetings, then you are likely already familiar with how to do this. You can find the full step-by-step instructions inside of the TechConnect Zoom page inside of the Faculty Center in Canvas, or on the Otter.ai webpage from the Mt. SAC website. If you have any questions or run into any problems doing this, please contact the Mt. SAC IT helpdesk at helpdesk@mtsac.edu, or by calling 909-274-4357 during normal business hours.

Where to Find General Information about TechConnect Zoom

We have been working on updating our TechConnect Zoom page inside of the Canvas Faculty Center. Many of you are likely already enrolled or have at least visited the Faculty Center. Moving forward this will continue to be our go-to resource for Mt. SAC faculty looking to learn more about the various tools and resources available for teaching with technology.

TechConnect Zoom info in Canvas Faculty Center

We hope you’re as excited about the new Zoom upgrades as we are! This migration would not have been possible without our wonderful friends over at Mt. SAC IT. As always, the FCLT and IT teams are available if you have any questions about this transition. If you do encounter any technical issues, please be sure to contact the Mt. SAC IT Help Desk at helpdesk@mtsac.edu, or at 909-274-4357 during normal business hours. “See you” in Winter 2021!

Comment below to let us know what you think about the new TechConnect Zoom LTI in Canvas or if you have a suggestion for a future blog post!

Faculty Center for Learning Technology | Mt. San Antonio College

0 thoughts on “From ConferZoom to TechConnect Zoom: What you Need to Know!

  1. I was able to schedule a Zoom meeting for my class but cannot figure out how to offer appointment slots where students can sign up for their own appointments.

  2. Appointment slots are created in Canvas Calendar (in the global navigation menu) This has several advantages: it allows appointment slots across multiple courses, and it integrates into Canvas notifications and lists of what is Coming Up. We have added a link explaining how to do this in the Canvas Faculty Center Zoom Page under the first accordion bar "Getting Started & Using TechConnect Zoom" in the "Scheduling Meetings" section. It is a downloadable PDF called "Office Hours and Appointment Bookings through Zoom" Here's the link to that page: https://mtsac.instructure.com/courses/54/pages/conferencing-with-techconnect-zoom-and-otter.

  3. Appointment slots are created in Canvas Calendar (in the global navigation menu) This has several advantages: it allows appointment slots across multiple courses, and it integrates into Canvas notifications and lists of what is Coming Up. We have added a link explaining how to do this in the Canvas Faculty Center Zoom Page under the first accordion bar "Getting Started & Using TechConnect Zoom" in the "Scheduling Meetings" section. It is a downloadable PDF called "Office Hours and Appointment Bookings through Zoom" Here's the link to that page: https://mtsac.instructure.com/courses/54/pages/conferencing-with-techconnect-zoom-and-otter.

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