Instructor-led classes move through various statuses as they are created and delivered. Understanding these statuses will help instructors determine what actions should be taken as they deliver classes. 

This is the Initial status given to a class as it is created. Students can not access their labs while a class has a status of Scheduled. However, if instructors want to start the class labs prior to class, labs can be started in the Lab Management section. This can be helpful if instructors need to connect to a student's lab prior to class. Depending on the exact configuration of the class labs, they can take a few minutes to start and some instructors find it beneficial to ensure the labs are running before class begins. 

When ready, instructors can allow student access by selecting Begin A Session. 

Once the instructor selects Begin A Session, the class is In Session.  This allows students to connect to their class labs. If the class labs were not previously started, they can be started by the instructor from the Lab Management section. 

During the class, there may be times that instructors want to prevent student access to class labs. For example, after class hours or during extended breaks when no one is available to assist students.  To prevent access to class labs, select End This Session.   If instructors do not select End This Session, students will have access to their class lab.  

On the last day of class, instructors will also have the Finish Class option. This will stop any running labs and therefore should only be done when instructors are confident that students are finished with their work.  

The instructor has selected End This Session. Students can not access their class labs while a class is Not In Session.  If a class is scheduled to run for multiple days, instructors can End This Session at the end of each day to prevent students from accessing their lab. Otherwise, if instructors do not want to prevent access to class labs, they can simply leave the class In Session at the end of the day.  Class labs will pause based on the value of the Inactivity Timeout on the lab template. 

While a class is Not In Session, selecting Begin A Session will allow student access to the class labs. This is typically used at the beginning of each day or after an extended break.

On the last day of class, instructors will have the Finish Class option.   Finishing a class will automatically stop all running labs and should only be done when instructors are confident that students are finished with their work. 

If instructors do not select Finish Class and the class is left running, labs will pause according to the inactivity monitor. While paused labs do not incur the full hourly cloud charges, there will still be some cost associated with labs left paused.

While the class is Finishing, It can take a few minutes for class labs to be backed up and then shut down. While this occurs, instructors will get a message that clean-up tasks are being completed. 

Access to labs is prevented while a class is Finished.  Finished classes will still appear in the main Classes list and can be accessed for at least 7 days until the class is Packed up.   

While a class is stopped, instructors have three choices: