Learn - Assign a Course so that it is mandatory for Groups of Users, and/or individual Users

In this article, we'll explain how to assign Courses as mandatory for learners. There may be instances where you need to assign a Course to individual Users or a specific Group due to unique training requirements that don't align with their current Group memberships.

Mandatory Courses appear in 'Courses I have to do' and stay there until they are completed. Managers will also see progress in the manager dashboard and can share kudos and manual reminders as required (automated reminders can also be configured).

Courses can be made mandatory in two ways. Assign a Course to a Group(s) and it is mandatory for all current and future Group members. Assign a Course to a User(s) and it is mandatory for that User.

A few things to know about assigning mandatory learning:

• Lessons are added to Courses, which are then assigned to learners
• Learners are assigned a Course only once, regardless of membership in multiple Groups
• Courses can be mandatory for some Groups, and optional for others
• Mandatory Courses appear in 'Courses I have to do' and stay there until they are completed
• Managers will also see progress in the My Team panel (and send manual reminders if needed)
• Automated reminders can be configured

Most often, Courses are assigned to Groups. Group rules are then used to automate Group membership. As soon as a learner is added to a Group, they will be assigned all mandatory and optional learning assigned to the Group. 

Steps to make a Course mandatory for one or more Groups

In the following steps, we will browse to a Course and show how to assign one or more Groups. Alternatively, you can browse to a Group and assign one or more Courses. Either way, the outcome is the same: when a course and group are assigned, the learning becomes mandatory for all group members.

1. Browse to the Course area of Learn admin:
2. Select the title of a Course to open. Use the search options to filter the list of Courses if required
3. Select Group from the Course Administration menu. If the Course is already assigned to any Groups, they will be listed here:
4. Select Edit. Groups will be listed in two categories - Current (the default view) and All.
5. Select All to view all Groups in Learn LMS
6. Select the Group or Groups to assign. Use the search options to filter the list of Groups if required:
7. Select Submit to save the changes

Note: to unassign a Group, select 'Current' at step 5 and uncheck one or more Groups. 

Steps to make a Course mandatory for one or more individual Users

1. Browse to the Course area of Learn admin:
2. Select the title of a Course to open. Use the search options to filter the list of Courses if required
3. Select User from the Course Administration menu. If the Course is already assigned to any Users, they will be listed here
4. Select Edit. Users will be listed in two categories - Current (the default view) and All.
5. Select the User or Users to assign. Use the search options to filter the list of Groups if required
6. Select Submit to save the changes

Please note that if you assign a Course to your own administrator account for testing, Learn treats it as if you personally selected the Course (similar to choosing it from the 'All Courses' area as a learner). As a result, it will appear under 'Courses I've chosen to do' in your account. This is not a bug but expected behaviour. For any other Users you assign the Course to, it will show up under 'Courses I have to do'.

Get deeper learning in The Academy

View ‘Share optional learning with your people’ and 'Share mandatory learning with your people' for the bigger picture of learning assignment including troubleshooting, best practice, and tips from the Kallidus team.

If you're just setting up your Learn view ‘Big picture - build and curate learning’ to see more about Lesson types, and how to organise content in your Learn LMS - including an explanation of the differences between Courses, Catalogues and categories.

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