Live classes

DeanDesk includes a built-in video classroom, so courses can meet live without any external video service or extra accounts. Teachers start a class from the course page, students join in one click, and attendance can be recorded automatically from time spent in the call. To set up when a course meets, see Scheduling a live session. This page covers what happens in the call itself.

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Joining a class

Every course page has a video button in its action bar:

• Course staff see Start Call (or Start Video Call on mobile).
• Students see Join Call (or Join Video Call).

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The pre-call lobby

Before entering the call, everyone lands in a Join Call lobby to check their setup:

• Permission status — indicators show whether Camera and Microphone access is Allowed, Denied, or Unavailable, with a Retry button and instructions if access was denied in the browser.
• Video preview — a live preview of your camera, with buttons to mute your microphone or turn your camera off before joining.
• Microphone Level — a live meter so you can confirm your mic is picking up sound.
• Device pickers — Camera and Microphone dropdowns to switch devices. Your choices are remembered for future calls.

Click Join Call when you’re ready, or Cancel to return to the course. You can join with only a camera or only a microphone — just one of the two needs to be available.

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Starting a class as a teacher

When a teacher or admin joins, a Start Live Class dialog asks: “Would you like to notify students that the class is now live?”

• Yes, Notify Students — enrolled students are notified that the class has started.
• No, Don’t Notify — the class starts quietly (useful for test runs or one-on-one sessions).

Once in the call, a green Live indicator appears in the header.

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In-call controls

A toolbar along the bottom of the screen provides: The toolbar also shows the participant count and a connection quality indicator (Good, Fair, or Poor).

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Video layout and screen sharing

Participants appear in a grid of video tiles. You can pin any tile to make it large; with many participants, extra tiles paginate. When someone shares their screen, the shared screen automatically takes the spotlight and camera tiles shrink around it. Screen shares appear as their own separate tile — when you share your screen, your personal tile keeps showing your camera, so the class still sees you alongside your screen.

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Recording a class

Teachers and admins see a record button in the toolbar. While recording, the button pulses red. Only one recording can run at a time per course, and an in-progress recording continues even if the person who started it reconnects. When you click Stop Recording, DeanDesk processes the video and automatically saves it to the course’s Materials tab as “[Course title] - Recorded Session”, where enrolled students can watch it later. Processing takes a few minutes depending on the length of the class.

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Ending class and finalizing attendance

Teachers and admins see a red End class button in the call header, next to the Live indicator. This is different from Leave Call:

• Leave Call just removes you from the call — the session continues.
• End class ends the session for everyone and finalizes attendance.

Clicking End class opens a confirmation dialog — “End class and finalize attendance?” — explaining that the call session will end and student attendance will be calculated from their time in the call. On confirming, you land on the course’s Attendance tab with the session’s records already filled in. Time in call is tracked automatically for every participant throughout the session, so no roll call is needed. For how statuses are assigned and how to adjust the automatic records, see Automatic attendance from video calls.