Students having issues editing documents attached to assignments on Teams.

Question

Like many educators across the world, our district has gone to distance learning due to the current health crisis. We are relying on Teams as the primary delivery method for our instruction.

It appears there's been a change in how students edit Word documents that are attached to assignments created on Teams. For example, I created an assignment and attached a new Word document. I have it set that students edit their own version of the file. When I go to edit the master document prior to assigning, it opens in my Teams window and I can make necessary edits. 

After I assign it to students, they open it on their side, click on the attached document, but can't make any changes to the document. I had one student who said she had to click on the three dots near the top of the right corner which gave her the option to edit the document in three different places. Other students reported not having the option to edit the document. 

Any guidance on how to fix this is appreciated. Ideally, Teams would go back to the previous way (as of like two weeks ago) of editing attachments. Students would simply click on the attachment and it would open in Teams and be editable. 

This issue is impacting numerous teachers in our district and thousands of students.

Thanks for your assistance-

Answer 1

Here's a response I got via email from Microsoft. Thought I'd share if anyone else has this issue:

Hi {{user_name}}, <br><br> <br><br>Thanks for reaching out to Microsoft Education Support. <br><br> <br><br>To best support our Microsoft 365 Education customers worldwide and accommodate new growth and demand during these unprecedented times, we are making a temporary adjustment to Office document behavior within Microsoft Teams for students and teachers. <br><br> <br><br>How does this affect me? <br><br>For students and teachers working with Office documents in Microsoft Teams, we are beginning to roll out a temporary change where there will be an additional step in order to edit a document. This is a change from current behavior that allows users to go straight<br> to edit mode when clicking on a document in the "Files" tab of a channel, a conversation, or from inside an assignment. <br><br> <br><br>In all cases, upon clicking on the document, users will first see the document in view mode - they will be able to see the document content, but not make changes. <br><br> <br><br>In order to edit the document, users need to click on the options in the top right of the white bar above the document content and select "Open in Browser" or (for users with Office for Windows installed on their device) "Open in Desktop App". This will open<br> the document in Office in a separate window from Teams and allow the user to make changes. <br><br> <br><br>For updates on when this feature will become available again, please refer to the O365 Admin message center, or reach out to IT Administrator. If you have any additional questions or need help with anything else please do let us know. <br><br> <br><br>Best Regards, <br><br>Sai

Answer 2

Outrageous. This is a major issue for us right as we are ramping up the use of Teams in the school. What are they thinking??

"As we announced earlier this week, to best support our Microsoft 365 Education customers worldwide" NO... you have broken it. How is that "best support"??

Very, very, annoyed.

Answer 3

Dear Grant,

Thanks for sharing the important information here as it may help other users who are experiencing the similar issues.

It seems that you have opened a support ticket to our related team and dues to the current situation with Coronavirus COVID-19, they have temporarily made a temporary adjustment to Office document behavior within Microsoft Teams for students and teachers. Sorry for the inconvenience the change caused in your environment. I suggest you use the workaround the related team provided to move forward currently.

We will also keep eyes on this issue in Microsoft Teams and will share some updates here if we get some updates as well.

Thanks for your effort and we really appreciate it.

Cliff

Answer 4

Dear Kelley A,

It seems that you are experiencing another issue with different symptoms. I suggest you post a new thread on our forum so that we can follow up with you on the newly created thread and provide further help.

Best Regards,

Cliff

Answer 5

The browser will not let me mark up (draw) on the document to edit.  The desk top app will not save the changes.