Virtual Office Hours in Teams

Owned by Laurie Fox
Last updated: Sept 06, 2024 by Laurie Fox
2 min read

This self help document offers tips for holding virtual office hours with Microsoft Teams.

Before You Start

Microsoft Teams does not have a Personal Meeting ID to share with your classes. If you would like to offer your students virtual office hours, there are two ways to do so.

  1. Provide instructions for your students on how to contact you via their Microsoft Teams app. You can then start a video or audio call inside that private chat. We have included sample instructions below.

  2. Create a recurring meeting in Google Calendar and share the link with your students.

Sharing Teams Information with your Students

If you want to make it easy for people to chat with you or start a video call with you, you can share a link with them that allows them to chat or call you in Teams. 

Sample communication for your syllabus:

Virtual office hours are available between 3pm - 5pm on Tuesday. If you would like to meet with me during that time, send me a message in Teams via this link: https://teams.microsoft.com/l/chat/0/0?users=username@geneseo.edu Once I have confirmed I am not meeting with another student, we can start a video call. You also may find it convenient to ask me a question in Teams any time! I will respond to questions submitted outside of office hours within 1 day.

Creating a Recurring Office Hours Meeting in Google Calendar

The way to do this is to create a recurring meeting for the office hours using Google Calendar. 

  1. Create a new meeting in Google Calendar and add Microsoft Teams Video Conferencing.

  2. Before you save the meeting, click on Meeting Options in the Google create meeting window.

  3. Change the following options:

    1. Who can bypass the lobby? Set to Only me and co-organizers

    2. Who can present? Set to Only me and co-organizers if you would like to prevent students from admitting their classmates from the lobby

    3. Allow meeting chat. In-meeting only
      This prevents students from seeing each other's chat during meetings with you

  4. Save the Google meeting.

  5. Launch the Teams meeting in the app to get the meeting link information.

    1. The invitation link can be found at the top of the "People" tab.

  6. Copy the meetings link from your Teams app. It should look like https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3ameeting_MGFiYjM2NzUtYmJmOC00MmQwLTk4MTgtYmE3YWVkN2NkNDlj%40thread.v2/0?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%2202ce934f-066a-4d00-b828-cedba7cf4f79%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%2205b67ceb-ce25-4791-b482-b80fea7b46fd%22%72d

  7. You can create a go.geneseo.edu link to share with your students. Visit https://go.geneseo.edu/urls/admin/add_url.php Select an easy-to-share link like https://go.geneseo.edu/foxofficehours

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