Impact
Faculty, staff and students are invited to drop in to office hours! Bring your questions and ideas to Microsoft experts and WPI IT staff.
Benefits
Teams enables collaboration for clubs and organizations, projects, courses and labs, departments and working groups, and more!
Action Needed
Consult with IT and Microsoft experts in our virtual Teams Office Hours. If you are ready to create a Team, the Related Article "Get Started with O365 Teams" has step-by-step instructions. The WPI Learning Academy also contains numerous videos, books and articles for staff and faculty (search Teams for Education).
Details
Benefits
Teams enables collaboration! It can be used through any web browser on various devices. Members can participate with WPI logins, or external accounts. Use as few or as many features as needed to build a successful team. "There is a robust user community outside of WPI and you can easily give feedback to Microsoft on features that you would like to see. " -WPI Faculty
Here are favorite features from WPI Teams users:
- Chat: Easy to text one or more people; can even make a phone call or video call with one click! Teams chat will replace Skype for Business when Microsoft retires it in 2021. Voice and or video calls with one or more people can also be started from a chat. "Really has reduced email within our working group." -WPI Staff
- Files: No more searching multiple sites and folders for the minutes or files you shared at the last meeting. Teams stores files within the Team and they can be sorted into folders or channels. Another option for minutes is the Notebook that is automatically created.
- Tools and Links: Add tabs for tools and sites you frequently use. If you prefer Kanban-style organization, Planner is available. Need to take a quick poll of Team members? Polly is easy to use. Sketch or write on a shared digital Whiteboard. Non-Microsoft apps, such as Zoom and GitHub, can also be used in conjunction with Teams.
- Channels: Within a Team, Channels can be used to focus conversations, files and all other content. With the option to be open or private, Channels enable the appropriate information to be available to members. "I love having the opportunity to easily pose a question to a general channel and get feedback from my colleagues." -WPI Faculty
These additional Teams features enhance academic use:
- Class teams have unique permissions and features for teachers and students. As owners of the team, teachers assign work, share class content, start meetings, and control who can post in the team. Each class team is also linked to its own OneNote Class Notebook.
- WPI IT has automated Class Team creation! A Class Team exists for all WPI courses in Microsoft Teams. Faculty are already enrolled in these Teams, and students are uploaded from the class roster and updated weekly by IT. Faculty activate the Class Team to make it available, and it will be archived [2 weeks] after the term ends.
- Incorporate video, even augmented reality!
- Integration with Canvas enables faculty to invite your class to join you in a web conference from your Canvas course site.
Our new Related Article O365 Teams for Classes contains more details.
Office Hours
You are welcome to join one or more of our office hours on:
- Tuesday, September 29 from 11 AM to Noon
- Tuesday, October 6 from 11 AM to Noon
- Tuesday, October 13 from 11 AM to Noon
An expert from Microsoft and WPI IT staff will be available to answer your questions and demonstrate Teams usage. If you are interested, please contact us using the form in Timeline and Updates so we may provide the meeting link to you.