What to Do If...
Your Instructional Designer
Every school has a CETL Instructional Designer. Yours will email you within your first week — you do not have to find us.
Business & Management
Felicia Harris-Foster
fharrisfoster@ndnu.edu
Education
Lia Schraeder
LSchraeder@ndnu.edu
Psychology
Kevin Zaragoza
kzaragoza@ndnu.edu
Tech trouble
OIT Helpdesk
(650) 508-3555 — 24/7 for access issues
helpdesk2@ndnu.edu
Things go wrong at inconvenient times. This page is the backup plan — read it now, so that you are not looking for it at 7:55 for an 8:00 class.
I cannot get into Canvas or Zoom and I am about to teach
Call the OIT Helpdesk: (650) 508-3555. The phone line is staffed 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for access problems — nights, weekends, holidays. This is the fastest path when you are minutes from class.
Email helpdesk2@ndnu.edu creates a ticket and is right for anything that can wait. It is not right for an emergency. Call.
The 24/7 remote team can handle:
- Cannot log in to campus systems
- Password reset, or account locked
- Email not working (Microsoft 365)
- Wi-Fi or VPN connection problems
- Canvas access issues
- Multi-factor authentication (MFA) setup
- Software installation help
Hardware needs a person on site, so it is business hours only: a broken screen, a device that will not power on, a classroom projector or AV system, a printer jam, a downed Wi-Fi access point. After-hours hardware tickets queue for the next business day.
Before you call, buy yourself a minute
- Message your students. Even "Give me 5 minutes, I am working on a technical problem" prevents a room from emptying out.
- Have a fallback. If Zoom is down, can you send the reading and a prompt and run the session asynchronously? Deciding this in advance costs nothing.
- Know your own password reset path before you need it: help.ndnu.edu.
I cannot make it to a scheduled class
STAFF NOTE — remove before publishing. This is the single biggest content gap on the site. Kelly explicitly asked for this in the design document: "What if they're unable to make it to a scheduled class? Who should they contact in emergencies? Essentially, an emergency or backup plan…so that instruction can continue or be covered appropriately." CETL cannot answer this — it is a Dean/Program Director policy question. Needed: (1) who to notify and how, (2) how much notice, (3) whether coverage/substitutes exist or faculty are expected to reschedule or go asynchronous, (4) whether the answer differs by school. Until we have this, the section below is a placeholder and should not go live.
Notify your Program Director as early as you can, and message your students through Canvas so they are not waiting in an empty room.
Something urgent is happening
Emergency — danger, violence, or a medical situation: call 911 first, then campus security at 510-852-5877.
A student in crisis: 988 is the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, 24/7. TimelyCare TalkNow connects an NDNU student to a licensed mental health professional in minutes, free, at any hour — you can open it with them.
Note that Public Safety is no longer provided by NDNU — campus security is managed by the property managers. That is the 510-852-5877 number. It is also the line to use if the campus phone system goes down.
Worried about a student but it is not an emergency? Use the Conduct and Student of Concern form. It routes to the Office of the Provost, which sends it to the right office.
STAFF NOTE — remove before publishing. NDNU's Public Safety page lists two numbers with no guidance on which to use: a "Security cell" (669-367-4834) and the property-manager line (510-852-5877). This page uses 510-852-5877 throughout. Confirm which is live before publishing — an emergency page cannot ship with two competing numbers.
Other questions
| My course shell has not appeared in Canvas | Normal until close to the term start. Still missing a week out? Ask your Program Director or your Instructional Designer. |
|---|---|
| I need Zoom | It is not automatic. Request it: helpdesk2@ndnu.edu. |
| Where do I report final grades? | The Campus Portal, not Canvas. |
| Wi-Fi setup | OIT's Wi-Fi guide (NDNU login). |
| A student says they need an accommodation | Refer them to the Disability Resource Center. You cannot grant accommodations without a DRC letter. |
| A parent is asking about their student's grades | Do not share. See FERPA and Student Privacy. |
| I am not sure who to ask | Start with your Instructional Designer. If you are not sure who that is, cetl@ndnu.edu reaches all of us. |
STAFF NOTE — remove before publishing. The design document asks the advisory group: "FAQs you'd like us to address (and will you help us answer them)?" The table above is a starting set drawn from what we could verify. Deans and Program Directors should add the questions they actually field from new faculty — those are the ones worth answering here.
The OIT Helpdesk
| Phone | (650) 508-3555 — 24/7 for access issues |
|---|---|
| helpdesk2@ndnu.edu — logs a ticket; use for anything that can wait | |
| In person | Campus Center Lounge, business hours |
| Service portal | NDNU Helpdesk Service Portal (NDNU login) — tickets and knowledge base |
STAFF NOTE — remove before publishing. OIT's own page contradicts itself on business hours: the contact block says "Monday – Friday (9am – 6pm)" while the Support Hours section says "Mon – Fri (9AM to 7 PM PST)". This page avoids naming business hours for that reason. Ask OIT which is correct, then state it.