Here is some useful information about common tasks you may need to take care of each semester. If you seem something missing, please send me an email about it

Personal Web Pages

We create a generic web page for you to use. Your page is available to everyone as https://personal.math.vt.edu/PID where PID is your VT PID. To make any changes to this page you would need to edit your index.html file.

You can get access to this by using either the fileshares or some form of SFTP (cyberduck on a Mac).

The fileshares allow you to edit the files directly as if they were stored locally on your computer. More information on using the file shares is available here.

To use SFTP you connect to ssh.math.vt.edu. Your web pages are located in /info/www/people/PID.

Course Contracts

Whether or not you also use Blackboard or Scholar, you are expected to make your course policy statement available in the department's standard place. To do so, use the following instructions.

Save your contract as a html, pdf, or php file with the name NNNN_CCCCC.pdf for a PDF file, NNNN_CCCCC.html for a HTML file, or NNNN_CCCCC.php for a PHP file. NNNN is the course number like 1206 or 2015 and CCCCC is your course CRN.

The contract file must be saved in your class_policy directory on the web server. You can use either the web-pages file share (available on campus only) or SFTP/Cyberduck (available anywhere) to ssh.math.vt.edu for updating your web pages. If you use SFTP or Cyberduck, your web pages are in /info/www/people/PID. More information on using the file shares is available here.

Please remember to delete old course contracts from your class_policy directory.

Once you've updated your course contract, you should be able to go to your Math Department webpage and there will be a link under classes to your contract.

Class Home Pages

The class_homepages directory on the web server is for general course information you want to make available to your students. If you are maintaining this with Scholar, you can create an .html file with a link to the Scholar page. The filenames must follow the same naming conventions as the course contracts.

To link to a page in Scholar, create a html file with the following line in it:

<meta http-equiv="refresh" content="0;url=https://scholar.vt.edu/portal">

You will need to replace https://scholar.vt.edu/portal with the proper URL to your content.

The class_home directory is not used anymore and is a link to course_policy.

Updating Office Hours

  1. From the Math homepage click on Resources at the bottom left side.
  2. Click Update Office Hours
  3. Fill out your PID and your University password at the top.
  4. Fill out your office hours.
  5. Click on the Update Office Hours button at the bottom.
  6. Check your home page to make sure they have been updated correctly.

Downloading Class Lists

  1. Login to Hokie SPA. You can get to Hokie SPA from the VT Home Page or the following link directly Hokie SPA
  2. Click on Faculty Access
  3. Click on Summary Class List
  4. Enter your ID number when prompted
  5. Select the term
  6. Select the CRN you want
  7. You will see your class list. Scroll down to the botom and click on Download Class List
  8. Follow the instructions for the Mac/PC. Make sure you add the .csv extenstion. Make note of where you are saving the file on your computer.
  9. You should be able to open this file in Excel.

Creating Listservs (email)

  1. Login to Hokie SPA. You can get to Hokie SPA from the VT Home Page or the following link directly Hokie SPA
  2. Click on Faculty Access
  3. Click on Create/Update Class Listserv
  4. Select the term
  5. Selet the CRN you want
  6. Make sure your name and email address are set to the owner of the list.
  7. Pick what type of listserv you want to have (Announcement is recommended).
  8. Click the Create Listserv button.

You can now email your entire class using the email address MATHNNNN_CCCCC@listserv.vt.edu where NNNN is the course number and CCCCC is the CRN. example: MATH1206_12345@listserv.vt.edu

Note: This listserv is not automatically updated when people add/drop your class. You can update the listserv by going to Create/Update Class Listser. There will be a button there to update the listserv if your class roll has changed.