One of the most important things to know about managing your Canvas courses is that your courses do not become inaccessible when a term ends, even though they will disappear from your Dashboard. Even after an enrollment has concluded, instructors retain access to their past courses for several years. While these courses can no longer be found on or added to the Dashboard, they remain accessible from the All Courses page, allowing instructors to review content, reuse materials, and reference past work.

Canvas manages course visibility on the All Courses page by separating active, unpublished, and past enrollments. Active-term courses appear at the top of the All Courses page and can be favorited for display on the Dashboard, while unpublished courses, such as sandboxes or Moodle-migrated courses, appear lower in the list. Courses from concluded terms are grouped under Past Enrollments and intentionally excluded from the Dashboard to prevent instructor dashboards from becoming overwhelmed as instructors accumulate dozens of courses across multiple years.

To view or access any past course, instructors simply navigate to Courses and then All Courses, where every course they have access to is listed regardless of term status. If there is a specific need to display a past course on the Dashboard, EdTech can assist through a helpdesk request. This behind-the-scenes organization ensures that instructors always have long-term access to their Canvas courses while keeping daily navigation manageable.

To learn more about how Canvas manages your All Courses page, watch the video above.