Name: Why use the LMS for linear systems?
Brand: ergodicity.net
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Why use the LMS for linear systems?

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It’s been a bit of a whirlwind since the last post but I made my course website and “published” it. Rutgers has basically forced all courses into their preferred “Learning Management System” (LMS) Canvas. Even the term LMS has some weird connotations: is it a management system for learning or a system for managing learning? A system for students to (barely) manage to learn? Canvas in particular seems terrible for things math-related (one semester the entire LaTeX rendering engine crashed with no notice) or engineering-related, and in general the whole question management system is garbage.
So if Canvas is so awful, shouldn’t I use something else? Maybe. It helps to imagine (with some dramatic liberties) the evolution of the course website:
So why am I still using Canvas? The main reason is that it benefits the students, not because it is good, but because they have been using it for 2 years and they are used to it. They can see all their due dates on a single dashboard. If you are reading this and scoffing, think about how terrible and non-interoperable almost every calendar system is. If you say “you’re just bowing to peer pressure” you’re more or less right. If you say “but it builds character for students to have to manage their due dates” then I’d ask if the goal of your class is to teach the material or to teach time management. If you say “both” then does your class explicitly teach students time management skills? I’m guessing not.
In this new class format, there are 28 class sessions. In 26 of them there is a conceptual quiz students have to take before class as well as an in-class assignment for which they have to upload solutions. Then there are homeworks, quizzes, and projects/labs. Compared to the old 8 problem sets, two midterms, and a final, that’s more than a 6x increase in things to keep to track of for &gt; 200 students. It behooves me, as someone who cares whether students learn the material, to try and make keeping track easier.
Ultimately a university “adopting” any LMS is coercive because if students use it for all their introductory classes then using something else is almost deliberately making their lives harder with no real benefit. I don’t think I’m going to William F. Buckley it up and stand athwart with my bag of PDFs (even if it is on github). Ultimately I think using the LMS the right thing to do by the students. I’m going to be super salty about it though.

It’s been a bit of a whirlwind since the last post but I made my course website and “published” it. Rutgers has basically forced all courses into their preferred “Learning Management System” (LMS) Canvas. Even the term LMS has some weird connotations: is it a management system for learning or a system for managing learning? A system for students to (barely) manage to learn? Canvas in particular seems terrible for things math-related (one semester the entire LaTeX rendering engine crashed with no notice) or engineering-related, and in general the whole question management system is garbage....

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Why use the LMS for linear systems?

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