Navigating Elentra as a Faculty User

Article Content

This article covers the following topics. Click on the topic to go to that section of the article.

• Introduction
• The Navigation Menu
• The User Icon Menu
• The Sidebar
• The Elentra ME Message Center
• The Dashboard Calendar
• Edit My Elentra Profile & Add a Photo
• Clinical Experience Dashboard

---

Introduction

While "Faculty" may have a particular meaning or title associated with it at your institution; at Elentra, "Faculty" refers to a user group with specific functions and permissions. Faculty users in Elentra can:

• Be assigned teaching events
• Grade assignments & exams
• Participate in course websites
• Review portfolio submissions
• Other typical functions an academic role may conduct

There are four "Faculty" user roles in Elentra.  There are the following permission levels in the faculty permission group in order of permissions from most access to least:

• Faculty:Director
• Faculty:Admin
• Faculty:Lecturer 
• Faculty:Faculty

The following Faculty-focused guides are for Faculty users doing non-administrative functions. Faculty:Admin and Faculty:Director users may need to consult the Elentra Admin guides for greater detail on the administrative functions their role allows. Ask your institution's Elentra administrator if you are unsure what type of Faculty user you are. 

Navigation in Elentra is largely the same for all Faculty user types, regardless of your Faculty role type, with some subtle variations. When you first login to Elentra, you will land on the Dashboard.  From here you can navigate the system with the Navigation Menu and User Icon Menu, see your teaching schedule across your courses on the dashboard calendar, be notified of important messages using the ME Message Center, and use your dashboard as an RSS Reader.  Go to each section in the article to learn about the different parts of the Elentra Dashboard. 

---

The Navigation Menu

• The menu located along the top of the webpage is called the Navigation Menu. 
• It remains constant, no matter where you navigate in the system.  
• This is where you are able to navigate to your
  • Courses by going to the Courses tab
  • You can get to the course website by clicking on the name of the course
  • You can get to your communities by going to the the communities tab and searching for the community you are looking for or creating your own general community 
    • You can also navigate to your Course Website from the Communities page
• You can access 
  • Your learning events calendar by going to the learning events tab and use the filtering capabilities of the system.
    • You can switch back and forth between the List View and the Calendar View on the tab 
  • You can search the curriculum by going to the Curriculum tab and using the Curriculum Search, Curriculum Explorer or Curriculum Matrix. 
  • Navigate back to the Dashboard. 

You may also have a More tab with a drop down menu, the People Search option or an Admin menu depending on the configuration of your Elentra system.  The contents of your Admin menu will vary depending on your particular Faculty user role in Elentra.

---

The User Icon Menu

In the upper right-hand corner of your screen you will find your User Profile Icon & your Assessment & Evaluation Task icon. You may also see a bell icon, if your organization has enabled this feature. This menu remains constant, no matter where you navigate in the system.

Click on the User Profile icon to access different things in the system such as:

• Your Elentra Profile
• My Learners
• Admin Assistants
• Grading Tasks
• Privacy Preferences
• Notification Preferences

---

The Side Bar

The Sidebar located on the left hand side of the page contains the sections My bookmarks, My Communities, Helpful links, and Give Feedback!.  It can be configured differently in each organization in an Elentra instance. So you may or may not see the following sections depending on how your organization has been configured in Elentra: 

There is the

• My Bookmarks Section: This allows you to bookmark pages throughout the system in order to easily navigate to them.
  • To add a bookmark for a page in the system navigate to that page then click Add Bookmark, it will automatically copy the url of the Elentra page you are on and give the bookmark a title.  Adjust the url or title as needed then click submit.
  • You can search your bookmarks by using the search box.
  • You can delete, rearrange or rename your bookmarks by clicking on the cog icon within the My Bookmarks box.
  • To Delete a bookmark click on the trashcan
  • To Rearrange your bookmarks click on the cross arrows icon of a bookmark and drag and drop it into the correct position.
  • To rename a bookmark click on the name of the bookmark, make your change then click on the checkmark next to the name to indicate you are done editing. 
  • Click on the done button when you are done making your changes to your bookmarks
• My Communities Section: Allows access to any general community websites that you are a member of, but not your course websites. You can access your course websites through the courses tab or the Communities tab in the navigation menu.
• Helpful Links Section: Is a list of links curated by your University that you might find helpful. This will only show if your institution has configured it in your Elentra system.
• Give Feedback! Section: Allows you to submit feedback directly to your institution's support team regarding any questions or issues you may encounter while using Elentra.

---

The Elentra ME Message Center

The Elentra ME Message Center lives on the Dashboard and is located under the navigation menu.  It displays any Dashboard Notices for which you have been identified as the audience.

• These notices could be used to communicate things such as events, schedule changes, learning event location changes, course notices, reminders of due dates, and more 
• If you would like to mark any messages as read to remove them from the Dashboard, then mark the checkbox just above the message title that you would like to Mark as Read.  Next, click on the Mark As Read button underneath the Message Center.  
  • If you mark a message as read, then it will no longer appear in the Message Center on the Dashboard.  You can access your previously read messages by clicking on the Previously Read Messages button. 
• Please note that some messages have expiration dates set by the sender and may disappear from your Message Center once the expiration date has passed. 
• Make sure you are checking your message center often.

---

The Dashboard Calendar

For more details, see the Faculty Use of Elentra Calendar & Events article.

---

Edit My Elentra Profile & Add a Photo

Step 1: In the upper right-hand corner of the screen, you will see your User Profile icon> My Profile.

Step 2: The Personal Information tab shows your personal information such as your email address, phone number, address and profile picture.

• On this page you can make changes to your secondary email address, phone number, and address.  If text is not editable, contact your institution's support team to request a specific update.
• You can also view your photo on this tab. Elentra allows there to be two profile photos stored for each user: an official photo and a user uploaded photo. The official photo must be uploaded by an administrative user. If a user's account has both an official photo and a user uploaded photo, the official photo will be used first. User photos appear through out Elentra. Some examples include in People Search and when triggering or completing Assessment and Evaluation forms.
• You may also be required to check a checkbox, indicating your consent to having your events being recorded via lecture capture software.

The Additional Information tab shows your user name, private hash, pin, and date of last login.

• You may be required to set a pin code for use with learner-initiated faculty assessments of students. 
  • In such a scenario, a learner will have initiated a form wherein a faculty member is assessing said learner.  The learner has completed the form on behalf of the faculty member on their own device and presents it to the faculty member for review & submission. 
  • As the faculty member in this scenario, it is your responsibility to thoroughly review & amend any form selections or comments prior to entering your pin to confirm submission.  

---

Clinical Experience Dashboard

Faculty: Admins & Directors will have access to the Clinical Experience module.  For more details see the following articles:

• Introduction to Clinical Experience
• Navigating the CE Dashboard
• Clinical Experience Admin Documentation