Below are frequently asked questions about our Hampshire Zoom accounts. If you have a question not answered below, feel free to reach out to the Help Desk and/or view Zoom's Getting Started for additional assistance.
Employees needing to host Zoom sessions with more than two participants longer 40 minutes can get a Hampshire Zoom licensed account. When you sign in (see below) for the first time, your account is automatically created.
Go to zoom.hampshire.edu and click on "Sign in." When directed to a Hampshire sign in page, enter your Hampshire account information. Once you are signed in you can edit your profile, view and change settings, and schedule meetings. You can also download and sign in to the Zoom App. When signing in to the Zoom App or from zoom.us be sure to select sign in with SSO and enter "hampshire" in the company domain field. You will then be directed to a Hampshire sign in page.
We have not purchased licenses for every employees so if you don't expect to host sessions for more than 40 minutes with more than two participants, let us know you don't need the full account. We can make your account a basic level in the Hampshire system that does not take up a license. There are no restrictions or limitations when attending Zoom meetings.
We can have unlimited basic users (unlicensed) in our account. Students that log into the Hampshire Zoom will automatically get a basic account that does not use one of our licenses. With a basic account, the meetings you host will be limited to 40 minutes if you have more than two participants. There are no restrictions or limitations when attending Zoom meetings.
There are a few instances like TA's, student workers, or divisional projects that a student will require having a Zoom license. Please reach out to the IT Help Desk to inquire about licenses available for your circumstance.
Students using a basic Hampshire Zoom account will have their access removed upon conversion to an alumni account. Alumni can always use a free Zoom account on the non-Hampshire zoom.us site.
If you want to use a departmental account, you can, but please limit the number of licenses your department is using by asking the Help Desk to downgrade any individual accounts to basic accounts when possible. Meetings hosted in a basic account will be limited to 40 mins if you have more than two participants, but there are no limitations on attending meetings. If you would like us to change any account to basic, please email the Help Desk.
We recommend you use and update the Zoom App for the best experience. It is important to check for updates inside of the app on a regular basis, or visit the Zoom download page to always get the latest release.
You can turn on automatic updates right in the Zoom client. Here’s how it works:
For more information about automatic updates, view the Zoom Blog post Get automatic updates in the zoom client.
Many of the advanced features need to be first turned on in your settings. Go to zoom.hampshire.edu, sign in, then click on settings on the left side menu. Scroll through the settings and decide which ones you want to have on or off. If you ever want to experiment with various settings, please ask an IT support staff member to join you in some testings.
With the Pronouns feature, you can add your pronouns directly to your user profile. Note: You must update the Zoom desktop client to 5.7.0 or greater to use the Pronouns feature. When you add pronouns to your profile, they are visible to your Zoom contacts as part of your Zoom profile card in the Zoom desktop client and mobile app. You can also choose when or if your pronouns are shown during a meeting that you host or join, or webinar that you are the host or panelist for. Webinar attendees’ pronouns are never visible.
For more help with the Pronouns feature, please visit the Adding and sharing your pronouns help article in the Zoom Help Center.
Co-hosts do not have access to the following controls as they are only available as host controls in a meeting:
Co-hosts also cannot start a meeting. If a host needs someone else to start the meeting, they can assign an alternative host in the meeting set up. This alternative host must have a Hampshire licensed Zoom account. For more information, view the Zoom help center article and video Host and Co-Host Controls in a Meeting.
Yes, our Zoom/Moodle integration makes it easier for you to display the meetings and recordings related to a particular course in one place that is readily available to you and your students. Any meetings you create from a Moodle course will display only in that course and not in others. Please view our Zoom/Moodle Integration page in The Moodle Guide for Faculty for steps to add a Zoom activity to your course.
Zoom has a variety of options for creating closed captioning which provides subtitles of the spoken in-meeting communications. In meetings, the host or another meeting attendee assigned by the host can provide manual captioning, an integrated third-party closed captioning service can provide the captioning, or Zoom’s live transcription feature can automatically provide captions. If you are unable to provide captioning manually or with a third-party service, the live transcription feature can be used, but has limitations.
To start Closed Caption or Live Transcript in a Zoom meeting or webinar:
or Live Transcript , if that feature is enabled. For more details about these options, please visit the Enabling and managing closed captioning and live transcription page in the Zoom Help Center.
The Virtual Background feature allows you to display an image or video as your background during a Zoom meeting. This feature works best with a physical green screen and uniform lighting to allow Zoom to detect the difference between you and your background, although a physical green screen is not required. You can upload your own images or videos as a virtual background, or use nothing and just blur the background instead.
Visit Changing your Virtual Background image in the Zoom Help Center to learn all about using virtual background images in Zoom. You can browse and download virtual backgrounds from a collection curated by Zoom here.
The sharp increase in the use of Zoom has exposed some security concerns either with Zoom's own security protocols or with bad actors infiltrating meetings to cause mischief or spread malware. Zoom has created a list of guidelines to ensure that your meeting is secure, but below are some important ones we want to call your attention to.
Starting September 27 2020, Zoom requires that all meetings have a Passcode or a Waiting Room enabled for all paid accounts. Please visit the Zoom support page FAQ Meetings Waiting Room and Passcode Requirements, September 27, 2020, for additional details and suggestions.
It’s best practice to generate a random meeting ID for your session, so it can’t be shared multiple times. This is the better alternative to using your Personal Meeting ID, which is not advised because it’s basically an ongoing meeting that’s always running. Avoid using your Personal Meeting ID (PMI) to host public events. When you share your meeting link on social media or other public forums, that makes your event … extremely public. ANYONE with the link can join your meeting.
Meetings should require passcodes for an added layer of security. Passcodes can be set at the individual meeting level or enabled at the user, group, or account level for all meetings and webinars. View the Zoom Help Center article on Meeting and Webinar Passcodes for more details and instruction.
Zoom recently updated the default screen-sharing settings for education users to give instructors more control over what students see and prevent them from sharing random content. Sharing privileges are now set to “Host Only,” so teachers, by default, are the only ones who can share content in class.
However, if students need to share their work with the group, you can allow screen sharing in the host controls. Click the arrow next to Share Screen and then Advanced Sharing Options. Under “Who can share?” choose “All Patricipants” and close the window. You can also change the default sharing option to All Participants in your Zoom settings at zoom.hampshire.edu.
By default we have enabled the option to display "If you cannot download or run the application, start from your browser." when joining a meeting. Click on the start from your browser to join the meeting in your browser instead of the app. We suggest you use Chrome as other browsers do not let you join the computer audio. You can find instructions for uninstalling the Zoom software on a Mac here, but note that two different procedures depending on which version of the Zoom client you have.
Zoom comes pre-stocked with numerous security features designed to control online classrooms, prevent disruption, and help educators effectively teach remotely. Here are some best practices provided by Zoom for securing your virtual classroom. Check out this Zoom blog posted on April 8, 2020, to review the new enhancements for ensuring the security and privacy of your account. To update to the latest version of Zoom, visit their download page. To get more tips and tricks for securely using Zoom, check out Zoom’s YouTube page or the Zoom Blog.
According to the Zoom Meeting and webinar comparison help page,
The Meeting and Webinar platforms offer similar features and functionality but have some key differences.
Meetings are designed to be a collaborative event with all participants being able to screen share, turn on their video and audio, and see who else is in attendance. Webinars are designed so that the host and any designated panelists can share their video, audio and screen.
Webinars allow view-only attendees. They have the ability to interact via Q&A, Chat, and answering polling questions. The host can also unmute the attendees. Attendees in webinars, can not rename themselves as well.
For more detailed webinar information and feature comparison, please view Zoom Meeting and webinar comparison.
We use a dedicated IT account for scheduling and managing webinars up to 500 participants. If you have an event you believe would benefit from being in the webinar format, please send an email to Rae Ann Wentworth-Cadieux with the details of your event.
All Zoom hosts can record locally to their computer unless this feature has been disabled by their Zoom account owner or admin. Hosts who are Licensed can also record to the Zoom cloud. In a Zoom meeting, press Record to start the recording. Learn more about local recording and cloud recording.
By default, local recordings are saved to your documents folder. Cloud recordings can be found on the Recording page of your Zoom web portal. Learn more about locating your recording.
If you have any questions or problems, please let us know at helpdesk@hampshire.edu or enter an IT Ticket (login required). Additionally, Zoom has excellent documentation and video tutorials on their Zoom Help Center.
Join Zoom for a live training to learn the basics of Zoom and ask questions live.