Ask any educator where they would prefer to focus their time and we bet most, if not all, would prioritize engaging with their students. Unfortunately, their time is often diverted to administrative and manual duties, such as writing assignment instructions, organizing content into course modules, sending reminders, and other time-consuming activities. Balancing teaching with these tasks remains an ongoing challenge for educators.
Inspired by the growing demands on educators’ time and the need to focus on driving student outcomes, we launched IgniteAI in 2025. Embedded directly within Canvas, IgniteAI reliably handles many time-consuming tasks that consume educators' schedules, like drafting rubrics or reviewing discussion posts. But we know the best support comes from conversations, so we created IgniteAI Agent, which empowers educators to complete complex tasks effortlessly in a single prompt. This gives educators back what matters most: time and energy to dedicate to their students.
IgniteAI Agent is rolling out in phases this year, and we are already seeing real results. Over the past few months, we’ve listened to faculty and administrators already using the Agent in Canvas. What stands out is not novelty or experimentation for its own sake. It’s actually useful. Educators are using the Agent to reclaim time, reduce friction, and move faster on work that has traditionally been tedious, manual, and error-prone.
A conversation we recently had with Dr. Amanda Marbury and Brandon Mitchell from Hinds Community College in Mississippi, who both have been using the Agent in their day-to-day, reflects on how the tool has been a positive influence on how they approach tasks.
Rebuilding a course without starting from scratch
Dr. Amanda Marbury teaches biology and recently faced a challenge that many instructors know well: adopting a new textbook edition that required significant course updates. New theory sections, updated background content, revised structure, and a fresh accessibility review. Historically, this kind of change means hours of manual rebuilding.
Instead of starting from a blank page, Dr. Marbury worked directly inside Canvas with the IgniteAI Agent. She pointed the Agent to an existing assignment page and asked it to generate a companion page with the relevant background and theory. Within moments, she had a fully structured page with clear Heading 2s and Heading 3s, organized sections, and WCAG-compliant formatting.
Speed mattered, but it wasn’t the whole story. The content was accurate, well-organized, and accessible by default. After reviewing the output, Dr. Marbury used it as the foundation for two additional pages, accelerating the rebuild of her course far beyond what she expected.
One detail she called out is something we intentionally designed. Before making changes, the Agent paused and asked for confirmation. That moment reinforced instructor control. The Agent did the heavy lifting, but the instructor stayed in charge.
The result was time saved, cognitive load reduced, and confidence that the course met both academic and accessibility standards.
From a single page to a full module
Brandon Mitchell from Hinds Community College approached the IgniteAI Agent with a different question: how far could it go?
He started by giving the Agent a single webpage and asking it to build a complete module. The Agent generated learning objectives, pulled relevant content from the page, created a discussion prompt, and built an aligned quiz. According to Brandon, the quality and alignment were strong enough that no edits were required.
Then he pushed further.
When Brandon asked what the Agent could do with HTML and CSS, it didn’t respond with a list of capabilities. It showed him. The Agent generated working Canvas components like tabs, callout boxes, accordions, hover cards, and navigation buttons. Brandon doesn’t write HTML or CSS himself. The Agent made advanced page design accessible without requiring technical expertise.
Accessibility was another immediate win. As his institution updates font sizes to align with Department of Education guidance, the Agent can apply those changes across pages at scale. What would normally take hours of manual work becomes a prompt and a review.
What these stories tell us
These examples are not aspirational. They are happening today.
Educators are using the IgniteAI Agent to rebuild and expand course content quickly, generate accessible and well-structured pages by default, create full modules from existing materials, design rich Canvas pages without technical expertise, and make bulk accessibility updates efficiently. All while staying firmly in control.
From a product perspective, this is exactly where we want to be. The Agent doesn't replace instructional expertise. It amplifies it, working where educators already are, respecting their judgment, and removing the repetitive work that slows them down.
As we continue to develop the Agent, stories like these shape our roadmap. They ground our decisions in real classroom needs and reinforce why thoughtful, instructor-centered AI matters.
And we’re still early. The most interesting use cases are often the ones customers show us next.
The IgniteAI Agent is available now for admins in the US & LATAM, and it’s free to try through June 30, 2026.
Follow these instructions to give it a try today!
