Embedded Files
Did you know that faculty & staff Google Calendars now include our daily schedules that are automatically synchronized from mySchoolApp (Blackbaud)? That means faculty & staff availability during school hours are now more accessible to CA colleagues and students when we need to schedule time for meetings and appointments. We will be looking at the new scheduling aids within Google Calendar in this Tech Tip!
Scheduling appointments
Scheduling appointments
Open Google Calendar in any web browser on your Mac, and look at the left navigation pane (if you don't see it, tap on the 'hamburger' button at the top left).
You should see the new "Meet with..." option.
Enter any CA faculty/staff member's name you wish to meet, select them from the list, and it should automatically show their calendar (in a randomly selected color) highlighting free/busy time blocks of their current calendar:
2. Alternatively, if you started with a new calendar event, there is an option to "Find a time" to help coordinate your guests/participants schedules with your event.
Simply add the participants to your event under "Add guests", then the scheduler will open to let you see all participants' availability side-by-side, and you can start marking the time slot you wish to create the event:
Calendar and event privacy for Faculty & Staff
Calendar and event privacy for Faculty & Staff
By default, CA faculty & staff Google Calendars will only show the "Free"/"Busy" status in event blocks - details of events and appointments are not displayed unless you explicitly shared your Google calendar's details with a CA faculty or staff member.
(CA students' calendars are completely private, unless they explicitly shared their calendars with another CA user)
You can change your Google Calendar's privacy level by going into its "Settings" menu, by clicking on the gear/cog icon at the top right side of the web interface (we recommend making these changes on your computer instead of the mobile app).
Along the left navigation pane of your Google Calendar Settings menu, under the "Settings for my calendars" section, click on your name - it is usually the first entry. This will expand the options for your CA calendar and you will find both the default calendar access permissions within the CA community, as well as explicit sharing options for specific users:
Calendar and event privacy for CA Students
Calendar and event privacy for CA Students
By default, CA student calendars are not visible to anyone. Students are able to see faculty and staff calendars' free/busy time slots to easily request for their own appointments with CA faculty and staff.
Here is an example of what students will typically see when scheduling appointments in Google Calendar:
1. In a new Calendar event, when setting up an appointment with a faculty or staff member, they should first use the option to "Add guests". They can search for faculty or staff by name.
On the other hand, if they try to search for their fellow students' calendars, those calendars will not be shown, as noted:
2. Once they add the guests, each will have a random color assigned, and they will have the option to "View schedules" or let Google Calendar automatically offer "Suggested times" for the appointment:
"View Schedules" overlays everyone's calendars together so that students can look for available time slots for each attendee of the meeting/event, and the time blocks are colored differently for easy reference:
"Suggested times" allows Google Calendar to automatically search for openings within every invited guest's schedules to find the most compatible open time slot for every attendee:
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