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We have a catalog with two learning plans.  We would like the second learning plan to show as locked with a padlock, until the first learning plan has been completed.   Is this possible?

This can be achieved using courses.  I have enabled ‘Only Admins can enroll learners’ for the course. 

In Advanced Settings > Catalog Options

Then set up a group for users who have completed the courses in the first learning plan.

Followed by an enrollment rule for the group (above) and a course. 

When the first learning plan and the course are displayed via a catalog to a user (who has not completed the courses in the first learning plan) the course is locked.  

There does not appear to be an equivalent  ‘Only Admins can enroll learners’  for learning plans.  I have tried using an enrollment rule for the second learning plan and the group but the second learning plan is not locked and no padlock is displayed.

If I put the locked course into the second learning plan, the user can click on the learning plan and enroll into the course even if the user has not completed the first learning plan.

 

I have two ideas for workarounds, but I will be the first to acknowledge that they are imperfect and quite possibly not viable for your use case:

  • If your courses have one SCORM (or AICC/TinCan/Video file) each, then one option would be to instead bundle all the SCORMS for your learning plan into a single course, which would for most intents and purposes serve as the learning plan.
  • Alternatively, you could consider having a different catalog for the Level 2 learning plan, and use the group you made (using the enrollment status for the courses within the learning plan) to prevent others from even seeing the second learning plan until they’ve completed the first.

The disadvantages and tradeoffs for each are fairly obvious, but I share them just in case you hadn’t thought of them yet, and just in the tradeoffs are worth it for your context. Best of luck with this.


Thank you Ian.  The second option could be a possibility - do you mean lock the courses in the second catalog which acts as a learning plan?  Currently we are using the padlock on a visible course as an incentive to complete the first learning plan.  


Happy if this helps in the slightest, Laura!

That’s not exactly I what I meant, though. I meant to put the second learning plan itself in the second catalog, and only assign that catalog to people who have completed the first learning plan (using enrollment based conditions).

You’re right that this hides the second learning plan altogether, as opposed to dangling the locked version like a carrot, but it would nonetheless “unlock” the second learning plan upon completion of the first.

It could of course mean that you have to update your page designs to include that second catalog, and so on, but that is the nice thing about catalogs generally: if a user is not assigned to a catalog, they cannot see its contents.


Thanks again for taking the time Ian to reply.  Could you please explain how to assign the second catalog to people using enrollment based conditions?  


Oh, apologies. I may have misinterpreted something you said in your original post: “Then set up a group for users who have completed the courses in the first learning plan.”

I meant just that, create an automatic group using enrollment-based conditions (one condition for each course in the learning plan: Enrollment Status is “Complete” for First Course], Enrollment Status is “Complete” for pSecond Course], etc.) – admittedly this can get a bit trickier if the learning plan has some more flexible logic in it (e.g. complete course A or course 😎, but should still be doable in most cases.

And then, when you create your second catalog containing the second learning plan, you would assign this new group to the catalog (but nobody else, naturally). If the learning plan is only in that special catalog, it will be invisible to users who do not meet these enrollment-based criteria.

Hope this helps, I’m on mobile at the moment so can’t do screenshots I’m afraid (if they’d be needed, that is).


This gave me some great ideas for the future… thank you for sharing @Ian!


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