Featured & Mandatory Courses

Courses can be marked as Featured or Mandatory in the LMS. Mandatory Courses will be prioritized immediately within your Learners' My Courses and Catalog menus. Both Mandatory and Featured Courses can be highlighted in the Learner Dashboard using the Course Ribbons feature. This is a great tool for Courses which Learners are required to complete, and Courses that you feel would be valuable and interesting for them. It also works well in tandem with the E-Commerce feature.

Important Note

This feature is available for Online Courses, ILC, Curricula, and Course Bundles. However, Course Bundles only have the the Featured Course toggle. You can configure the individual Courses within a Course Bundle to be Mandatory. 

Enabling Mandatory and Featured Courses

The Mandatory and Featured Courses features are configured at the Course level. Follow these steps to do so:

1. Navigate to Courses from the Courses tab on the left, then select Add Online Course on the right. This will open the Add Online Course menu. The following steps are the same if you are editing an existing Course.
   
   
2. Expand the Catalog Visibility tab and turn ON the toggle for Mandatory and/or Featured Course.

Notes

• Featured Course Sort Order defines the placement that this Course will display in the Featured Course Ribbon on the Learner Dashboard.
• The Featured Course toggle has additional optional fields for the Start and End Date of featuring this Course, which is useful if you are running programs or promotions related to this Course. 
• A maximum of 20 Featured Courses will be displayed on a Learner's Dashboard. If a Learner adds additional Featured Courses beyond the first 20 selected, the oldest Featured Course will be removed.
• Enabling the Mandatory Course toggle will add an exclamation point (!) icon to the Course in the Learner Experience. This icon will appear on both the Course thumbnail and next to the Course Name in the Search view.

Adding Mandatory and Featured Ribbons

You are able to customize your Learner Dashboard and add a Course Ribbon to display Mandatory or Featured Courses. Please follow these steps to do so:

1. Navigate to Templates from the Setup tab on the left, then select the Department Template that you would like to edit. Then, select Edit from the Actions menu on the right. This will open the Manage Template menu.
   
   
2. Select the Private or Public Dashboard tab and expand the Content tab.
   
   
3. Scroll down and click on the Add New Container button, then select the Container type Ribbon. 
   
   
4. Select the Ribbon type drop-down menu and then select Featured Courses or Mandatory Courses. 
   
   
5. Click on Save at the bottom of the Content section.

Note

Any changes made to your Dashboard will be lost if you navigate to a different tab or move onto a different page before clicking Save.

The following screenshot shows how a Featured Ribbon appears on a Learner Dashboard.

A Mandatory Course Ribbon is nearly identical, but Mandatory Courses will have an exclamation point icon on both the Course Thumbnail and next to the Course Name in the Search results: