Questions
- How do I schedule office hours at Bowdoin?
- What tools are available for letting students book appointments with me?
- What is the difference between Personal Bookings and Microsoft Bookings?
- Is there an alternative to Calendly at Bowdoin?
- Can I use Canvas to schedule office hours?
- How do I set up an appointment booking page for students?
- How do I use Campus Groups for office hours scheduling?
- Which office hours scheduling tool should I use?
Environment
This article applies to all Bowdoin faculty and staff. All four tools described below are available to the Bowdoin community at no cost. The right choice depends on how much setup you want to do, which calendar systems your students use, and whether you need scheduling for just yourself or for an entire department.
Resolution
Microsoft Personal Bookings (Recommended for Most Faculty)
Personal Bookings is part of Microsoft 365 and is the simplest option for one-on-one scheduling. It creates a personal booking page where students can choose an available time slot, and confirmed appointments appear automatically in both your Outlook calendar and the student's calendar.
- Best for: Individual faculty scheduling 1:1 office hours appointments
- Setup effort: Minimal — an office hours meeting type may already be configured the first time you open it
- Calendar sync: Automatically adds confirmed meetings to both your calendar and the student's Outlook or Google calendar
- Supports: In-person and remote (Teams/Zoom) meeting types
Open Personal Bookings (Bookings with Me) →
For setup instructions, see Microsoft Personal Bookings in the Related Articles section.
Microsoft Bookings (For Departments and Shared Scheduling)
Microsoft Bookings is a more full-featured scheduling tool designed for offices and departments that need to manage appointments across multiple staff members. It works similarly to Personal Bookings but requires more initial configuration — you define services, assign staff, and set availability before publishing the booking page.
- Best for: Departments or offices that want a shared scheduling page with multiple staff members
- Setup effort: Moderate — requires configuring services, staff, and availability
- Calendar sync: Integrates with Microsoft 365 calendars
For a step-by-step guide to using Bookings for office hours, see Scheduling Office Hours Using Microsoft Bookings in the Related Articles section.
Campus Groups Meeting Scheduler
Campus Groups includes a meeting scheduler that offers similar functionality to the Bookings options, with the added benefit of calendar integration for both Microsoft 365 and Google Calendar.
- Best for: Faculty or staff who work with student organizations or prefer the Campus Groups platform
- Calendar sync: Integrates with both Microsoft 365 and Google Calendar
Open Campus Groups Meeting Scheduler →
See the Campus Groups help articles on creating a meeting scheduler and synchronizing your calendar for setup instructions.
Canvas Scheduler
The Canvas calendar includes a Scheduler tool that lets students sign up for appointment slots directly within Canvas. This is convenient because it lives alongside your other course tools and students are already in Canvas regularly.
- Best for: Faculty who want office hours tightly integrated with a specific course
- Calendar sync: Limited — students must manually subscribe to the Canvas calendar feed to see appointments in Google Calendar or Outlook; appointments are not added to their external calendar automatically
Open Canvas Calendar →
For instructions on setting up appointment groups, see the Canvas Community article How do I add a Scheduler appointment group in a course calendar?
Additional Help
If you need further assistance, you have several options:
- Bowdoin Bot: Chat with Bowdoin Bot directly from any KB page for instant answers.
- Phone: Call the Bowdoin College Service Desk at (207) 725-3030.
- In person: Visit the Tech Hub in Smith Union during business hours.
- Submit a ticket: Request assistance through the Service Catalog.