Canvas Free-for-Teacher was created in the early days of Instructure as a commitment to openness and equitable access to learning management tools for educators across the globe. Instructure saw it as a way to give back to the education community, where educators could deliver their courses leveraging many of the vital tools that Canvas provides at no cost.
Fast-forward to 2020, and the sudden shift of the educational landscape caused by the COVID-19 Pandemic. The need to expedite access to that equitable space and support distance learning has proved essential to thousands of teachers and students. Regardless of the organisation type, be it Higher Education, schools, or business organisations, the ability to collaborate remotely and engage in learning opportunities has proven both necessary and challenging by the remote and hybrid environments.
Further, within this free environment, it is imperative that educators have enough time to utilise new tools and deliver them to their students to measure growth in learning over this challenging period. Canvas Free-for-Teacher allows for users to leverage the platform without an automatic expiration, granting peace of mind of continued, ongoing access to the familiar platform to achieve those learning goals.
While many other VLE vendors have disabled registrations for instructors, or have capped usage at 30 days per account, Free-for-Teacher continues to deliver an unlimited and free learning environment. In fact, there are now two dedicated spaces for Higher Education and schools, so that those teachers and students are better served with segment-specific resources.
While other VLE providers have scaled-back or eliminated their free platforms, Instructure understands the importance of continuing to offer this opportunity to educators everywhere. Let’s take a look at some of the statistics that show just how Free-for-Teacher has supported back-to-school efforts in 2021 alone:
- 80,000 Instructor Role Signups between August and October
- Over 500,000 Students Supported
- Over 90,000 Courses Created
- 2,000,000 Daily User Free-For-Teacher Session Hours
For a variety of reasons, including technical support and hosting costs, Instructure could have pivoted to re-configure or sunset its free version of Canvas altogether when the pandemic caused a spike in usage in March of 2020. Instead, Instructure has continued to offer it to educators and learners around the globe, implementing a new product in Impact into the free environment which offers in-app support and messaging, all while actively encouraging new users to take advantage of a feature-rich and free version of Canvas.
Instructure anticipates ongoing support of Canvas Free-for-Teacher, with continued differentiation for different types of learners and a growing number of resources to help teachers and students continue to best utilise the platform.
With the introduction of the Instructure Learning Platform, the company is committed to amplifying teaching, elevating learning, and intensifying the impact through its unparalleled suite of solutions. Canvas Free-for-Teacher is a unique indicator of that commitment; giving educators everywhere the opportunity to elevate their teaching and learning environments with a free solution that can help foster the connection and collaboration that has proved so meaningful throughout recent years.
The back to school rushes of 2020 and 2021 indicate that hundreds of thousands of users need equitable access to a VLE on an ongoing basis. Through Canvas Free-for-Teacher, Instructure aims to provide that access in an unrivalled way, giving teachers and students everywhere an opportunity to collaborate, grow, and learn at no cost.
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