By default, Canvas will display up to 20 courses that are active (not concluded) - this includes both published and unpublished courses for whatever terms are active. A course will automatically "conclude" at the end of the term*. If an instructor wishes to end a course before then, they can manually conclude the course (see below).
You have two options for how to remove courses from your dashboard:
- Set up "Favorites" (instructors and students): Click on "Courses" in Global Navigation, then click on "All Courses". Each course has a white star next to it. Choose which courses you want to see on your Dashboard and click on the star for those (it will turn orange). When no courses are starred/favorited, Canvas defaults to displaying up to 20 courses for whatever terms are currently active. More details here: How Do I Customize My Courses List?
- Conclude the course (Instructors only): This would be an option if you would like to "end" a course before the course is automatically concluded at the end of the term. Concluding the course not only removes the course from your dashboard (and your students' dashboards), it also makes the course read-only. No enrolled users, including the instructor, will be able to interact with the course or make any further changes, including grades. Steps described here: How do I conclude a course at the end of a term as an instructor?
- After the end of the term date, you will not have the option to manually conclude the course because it is already concluded. Students will continue to have read-only access to the course. If you are interested in blocking all access to the course after the end of the term, see: How do I restrict student access to a course before or after the course dates? (Note: this is a setting you must adjust *before* the course is concluded)
- You will not have the option to manually conclude a course if you changed the course Participation from "Term" to "Course"
*As of November 2023, the term end date is being defined in Canvas as a few weeks after the end of final exams. This means that, for students, at that point the course will become read-only, and will not be on their dashboard anymore. However, for instructors, full edit-access is now allowed for a full calendar year after the student end date. Therefore instructors will see courses from the previous semester on their dashboard for that entire period. To remove them from view, use one of the methods listed here.