Did you know that your (Windows) computer, and Microsoft Office Applications come with many “accessibility” features built-in? Well, they do!

…we put “accessibility” in quotes as we strongly feel that these features are not just for those with disabilities – they are features that help everyone work in their best way. Features that help everyone thrive!

LEARN Tutorial

To help users get acquainted with these “accessibility” features and the benefits they provide, we’ve put together a LEARN tutorial.

Whether you’re looking for a way to type faster (using voice dictation), read what’s being said around you (with live captions), or are looking for ways to reduce eye strain from extended computer use – this tutorial has you covered!

Check it out at rrc.ca/WindowsAccessibility

Welcome! Welcome to the 2025-2026 Academic School Year. …yes we know we’re a little late in posting that, but we wanted to wait a bit to give students a chance to settle into a routine (and find our blog!).

What is this blog about?

For those of you who are new to our blog, Tech Tips: Work Smarter, Not Harder is a blog dedicated to making your academic (or work) life easier. We do this by highlighting available technologies, or ways of using those technologies.

When do new posts come out?

Typically we post bi-weekly.

However sometimes around special times of year we may post more or less frequently.

Stay in the loop!

You can sign up to receive email notifications when new blog posts come out. It only takes a quick minute, and this way you’ll be reminded of new posts.

1. Go to Red River College Polytechnic – Newsletter Subscriptions
2. Enter your email address in the text box
3. Check off the boxes for any newsletters you want to subscribe to
   • Note: with the above link “Accessibility Tech Tips” is already checked off – this is Tech Tips: Work Smarter, Not Harder
4. Select subscribe at the bottom of the page

Howdy folks, and welcome back to these here Tech Tips blog posts! …translation: Hi, welcome back to our Tech Tips: Work Smarter, Not Harder blog posts. 🙂

Summers are always a slower time of year at the College with less programs running, and less students around. But, that didn’t mean that the posts stopped over the summer!

So, for those that missed our summer posts, here’s what you may have missed:

• Marking Teams Messages as Unread
• Pinning Teams Chats
• Muting a Teams Chat
• Pinning in HUB
• Formatting Messages in Teams
• Scheduling a Post in Teams
• Important Teams Messages

Side Note: Happy 3-year anniversary to the blog!

Important! This blog post is important!

First, because this will be the last blog post of our Teams theme.

Second, because this blog post is about marking messages in Teams as important.

How to Mark Messages as Important in Teams

1. Draft your message
2. Then select the plus + icon to the right of the text box
3. In the drop-down menu, select “set delivery options”
4. A new window will pop up where you can select:
   • Standard – this is how all Teams messages are sent
   • Important – messages are given a red exclamation mark and a “important” label
   • Urgent – recipients are notified every 2 minutes for 20 minutes about the message

Muting Teams Chats

Now that we’ve taught you how to mark messages as urgent – where recipients are notified every 2 minutes (for 20 minutes), let’s remind you how to mute Teams chats!

Tech Tips blog post on Muting Teams Chats

Sometimes you know you need to send a message, but, the timing just isn’t right. Perhaps you remember in the middle of the night something that you need to send to the group, but don’t want to potentially wake anyone up who may have their phone on. Or perhaps you want to wait to send a message until after class, or at the end of the work day.

Well no problem! You can draft that message, and schedule it to be sent at a later time.

How to Schedule Send a Teams Message

1. Draft your message
2. Then select the plus + icon to the right of the text box
3. In the drop-down menu, select “schedule message”
4. A new window will pop up where you can select the date and time you’d like the message to be sent at.

Subscribe to the Blog!

View this past Tech Tips: Work Smarter, Not Harder blog post on Subscribing to the Blog!

Last week we took a short break, but now we’re back on our blog post theme of Teams!

Do you ever accidently hit enter, and send a message, when you just wanted a new line or paragraph? Then you’re scrambling to edit the message before anyone sees it? Happens to us all of the time… So what can we do?!

Formatting Options

Open the formatting options in the text box! With the formatting options open, you are able to format your message in a variety of ways:

• Bold text
• Create a list
• Change font size
• Change font color
• etc…

But most importantly, now when you hit enter, a new line will be started! No more accidently sending messages before you were finished!

How to Open Formatting Options in Teams

From within the textbox, select the format icon (a captial letter A with a pen).

You can also use the keyboard command of CTRL + Shift + X

Last blog post we spoke about pinning chats in Teams. Now this week we’re going to talk about pinning items in HUB. While these may be “small” or “simple” changes, they help with organization and may even save you time!

How to pin Items in HUB

1. Sign into HUB
2. Locate the “launchpad” – it should be on the left-hand side of your window
3. Navigate through your applications until you find the one you want to pin
   • we suggest pinning applications you use often – for example: LEARN or Office 365
4. To the right of the application, there is a push pin icon – select the push pin to “pin” that application. It will now appear at the top of the launchpad in a “pinned items” section.

How to unpin Items in HUB

1. Locate the application you wish to unpin – it should be in the top “pinned items” section
2. Select the push pin icon to the right of the application

Subscribe to the Blog!

View this past Tech Tips: Work Smarter, Not Harder blog post on Subscribing to the Blog!

Do you ever find yourself distracted by the constant notifications from a chat in Teams?

Ding. Ding. Pop-up. Pop-up.

Since we use Teams for work or school, it might not be practical to just up and leave that Teams chat. It could send the wrong message. Or you could miss important information.

But the dinging or pop-ups are distracting you from the task you are trying to work on. What do you do? Mute the Teams chat!

How to Mute a Teams Chat

1. Go into the chat
2. Select the ellipsis (three horizontal dots) – “More Chat Options”
3. Then select Mute

How to Un-Mute a Teams Chat

Follow the same steps, but this time select “Unmute”

Continuning with our theme on Teams…

Do you have a lot of Teams chats? Are some more important than others? Do you find it frustrating to scroll and search when needing to message someone? Are there certain people or groups that you often message?

If you said yes to any of the above, you should try pinning Teams chats!

How to Pin a Teams Chat

1. Locate the chat in your list of chats (the list on the left side of Teams)
2. Select the ellipsis (three horizontal dots) icon next to the chat you want to pin
3. Select “pin”

Ta-da!

How to Un-Pin a Teams Chat

Follow the above steps and then select “unpin”.

Another ta-da!

A previous blog post titled “Read or Unread Emails” wrote about some reasons why you might want to mark an email as unread:

• Forgetting to respond unless it’s marked as unread
• Reading an email, but not having time to respond

Or maybe you use unread emails as a reminder of things that you need to do. Regardless of the exact reason, marking emails as unread may be a useful strategy. But, where else could you utilize this strategy?…

Well, the title of this blog post did give it away… but you can also mark Teams messages as unread!

How to Mark Teams Messages as Unread

1. In teams, right-click on the message you want marked as unread
2. Select the option to “Mark as Unread”

Theme on Teams!

Stay tuned for more upcoming blog posts on Teams!