Faculty guide for issuing alerts

  If you have students who:

  • Have never attended your course
  • Have been absent or have not logged in to Canvas for two weeks
  • Have not submitted any assignments or suddenly stops submitting assignments for more than two weeks

We are asking that you issue an alert in the Navigate system.  This will inform the student's academic advisors, who will then research what is going on with the student and contact them if necessary. 

How to issue an alert

In order to issue an alert please complete the following steps:

1. Log in to Navigate

After logging in to Navigate, you will arrive at your “Professor” home page

Screenshot of Navigate homepage for professors, with a class listing section, a students in my classes section, and a menu on the right hand side.
Screenshot of the professor homepage in Navigate, with a Class Listing section, a Students in My Classes section, and a menu on the right-hand side showing an actions section and a Quick Links section. 

2.  Select your students in one of two ways

The first way is to use the list of students in your courses, select the students you want to send an alert about, and then click the arrow next to Actions to pull down the actions menu.

Screenshot of the Students in My Classes section of Navigate, showing a drop-down menu to issue an alert
Screenshot of the Students in My Classes section Navigate, with the Actions drop-down menu open. The drop-down menu has several available options, including an "Issue Alert" option. 

The second way is to click “Issue Alert” on the right-hand side of your screen and type in the student's name.

Screenshot of Navigate homepage for professors, with Issue an Alert selected from the Actions menu on the right-hand side.
Screenshot of the professor homepage in Navigate. On the right-hand side, the actions box has a clickable Issue an Alert option. 

3. Select a reason for your alert

Once the Alert pop-up box is up, go ahead and pull down the reason menu and select your reason. If you have selected the second way to identify a student, you will also need to select the specific course.

Screenshot of Issue an Alert pop-up box
Screenshot of the Issue an Alert option in Navigate. A list of reasons why an alert is being issued is open from the drop down menu. Three items are highlighted: No response to emails or outreach in web campus; Non-attendance (in-person) and Non-attendance (virtual). 

Things to consider in writing alerts

  • Alerts become a part of a student’s permanent record and can be subpoenaed by a court of law.
  • Comments are not shared with students but are a part of the permanent record. Please utilize generalized language if you would like to communicate information to the recipient of the alert.
    • Utilize terms such as "student shared they are facing a personal challenge", "student stated they are experiencing mental health issues", "concerned student might need academic support", etc.
    • Students may share extremely private information with you during your conversation.  Please do not share all of the details in a comment, as this will be available to multiple people. If you are concerned about a student's well-being, we recommend you connect with the SIT team.
  • Please utilize professional language and write in complete sentences to ensure that readers can understand the messages and follow up as needed.

4. Press submit

Screenshot of the Alert pop-up with a reason selected and the submit button highlighted.
Screenshot of the Alert pop-up with a reason for the alert selected and a Submit button in the lower right-hand corner of the pop-up highlighted. There is also a field for a student's name, an optional-drop down menu to associate the alert with a specific class and an additional comments box.

Please contact Emilly Borthwick-Wong (eborthwickwong@unr.edu) or your college contact for questions or support on how to issue alerts.