Pathways allow you to group topics together for a single learning experience.
A pathway represents a collection of topics which learners can be enrolled into as a group. They can then work their way through each of the topics in the pathway to complete the entire pathway.
Learners may be enrolled into each topic in the pathway immediately or admins can choose to schedule topic enrolments.
Pathways appear on the learner homepage as a collection of topics, with a separate pathway title and pathway status.
How do I create a pathway?
Note: You must be an administrator to create a new pathway.
In the Admin area of your portal, proceed to the Knowledge section and change to the Pathways tab. From there, click the 'I want to...' button and select the 'Create a new pathway' option.
When you create a new pathway, you must...
Give it a title.
Select topics for the pathway by dragging-and-dropping topics from the list into the 'Mandatory knowledge' and/or ‘Optional knowledge’ sections for the pathway. You can also drag-and-drop to remove or reorder topics in the pathway.
Save your pathway by clicking the 'Create Pathway' button, and it's ready to go.
What are the options for mandatory and optional knowledge?
Each topic in a pathway is either 'Mandatory' or 'Optional'.
Mandatory knowledge is listed first. These are topics which MUST be completed by a learner to complete the pathway. You must have at least 1 topic in your list of mandatory knowledge
You can use the checkbox option in ‘Edit knowledge’ panel for a pathway to allow learners to complete mandatory topics in any order or to force completion in the order listed (if so, topics are locked until prior topics are completed).
You can create a pathway with just mandatory topics if you like.
Mandatory knowledge, must have at least 1 Topic. If you want a Pathway that just contains 'optional' knowledge, there is still a requirement to add a Topic to the mandatory list. You can just have an short topic to introduce the Pathway and the optional content as this item if needed.
Optional knowledge is listed second. Completion of these topics may not be required to complete the pathway. By default, optional topics are purely optional - they may represent extra knowledge which may be useful, but not critical, to the pathway.
You can use the checkbox in the ‘Edit knowledge' panel in a pathway to set a required number of optional topics for completion. For example, you may require that learners complete 1 of the 3 optional topics you provide in order to complete the entire pathway.
Learners can always access optional topics at any time in the pathway.
You can create a pathway with just optional topics if you like.
Note: When learners are enrolled in a pathway with optional topics, the optional items appear on their learner dashboard (within the pathway), however, they're not enrolled in those items until they access the topic.
Scheduling topic enrolments
Enrolment into each topic in a pathway can be scheduled. For example, learners enrolled in a pathway may have a new topic released to them every couple of days, each week, or on specified dates.
To schedule topic enrolment:
Click the 'Topics are not scheduled' drop-down menu when editing your pathway and select an alternative option:
Topics are scheduled by date - requires you to then specify the date each topic enrolment will take place.
Topics are scheduled by days from enrolment - requires you to then indicate the number of days from enrolment each topic enrolment will take place. For example, '0' indicates the topic will be released to learners as soon as they're enrolled into the pathway, '1' indicates the enrolment will take place the following day, '2' indicates the enrolment will take place two days after the pathway enrolment, and so on.
Click 'Save'.
Notes:
Scheduled enrolments are available for mandatory and optional topics in a pathway.
When scheduling enrolments, keep in mind any due date and reminder notifications enabled for the pathway or topics.
How does scheduled release work for learners?
Learners enrolled in a pathway with scheduled topics see details of each topic in the pathway on the 'Training' tab of their learner homepage. However, topics that are scheduled for release cannot be accessed until their release date is reached, and instead appear with a lock symbol and details of when they’ll be made available.
Each time a new topic is released for a learner, they receive an email to notify them.
How do I enrol learners in a pathway?
Enrolments in pathways are managed the same as enrolments in topics - you can learn more in this detailed article.
How can I view learner progress for a pathway?
When you view each pathway in your Admin area, there is a dedicated Explorers tab which shows all enrolled learners in that pathway, along with their overall pathway status (Unexplored, Exploring, Completed) and per cent complete of the entire pathway.
You can also click on the pathway status link to review more detailed information on each learner's progress through a pathway (including which topics have been completed and when).
What is the 'Pre-enrolled' progress phase?
When you enrol a learner in a pathway, we also 'pre-enrol' them in any mandatory topics. This allows the platform to link topic enrolments to a specific pathway enrolment (which is critical for retakes). It also improves your topic reporting by more accurately reflecting actual and future enrolments in topics.
When a learner is pre-enrolled in a topic, it does not trigger due dates or notifications. It is a 'preparation' phase only. Topic due dates and notifications will be triggered only when the learner reaches the Unexplored or Exploring phases in that topic.
How do I unenrol learners from a pathway?
From the Enrolments tab in a pathway, you can filter and select learners before clicking the 'I want to...' button and selecting 'Unenrol from knowledge'. You can also view the profile of any person and unenrol them via the Pathways tab of their profile (when you select the pathway and then click 'I want to...' before selecting 'Unenrol'.
Note that when you unenrol learners from a pathway, they will remain enrolled in any topics they have already started to explore or have already completed. Those topics will remain on their Training tab, but will be displayed as individual topics rather than grouped in the pathway:
If you want to delete progress the learner has already made, you will need to unenrol them from the specific topics.
If a learner has not started exploring a topic in a pathway (it is in the 'Pre-enrolled' phase), they will be unenrolled from that topic when they are unenrolled from the pathway.
IMPORTANT - Making changes to pathways will impact all currently enrolled people - not just future enrolments. So if you swap a module in your pathway after the pathway is created, those who are already enrolled (as well as those who have completed the pathway) will then be changed to 'exploring' in that pathway. They will need to complete the newly inserted topic to get back to 'completed' status.
A notification can be sent to learners who are affected by changes to a pathway. For more information, click here.
Can I use pathways with library topics?
YES! That's one of the best uses of pathways in fact.
You can group Development, Compliance, Foundation and your own topics within a pathway. This might be to group similar Development topics based around a theme, or Compliance topics for a specific role.
You could also combine a Compliance topic with a topic of your own. This might be a Compliance topic on, say, Anti-Bullying which is then followed by a short topic of your own which contains your organisation's Anti-Bullying code and asks the learner to confirm they have read the code and agree to it.
Can I have notifications, due dates and certified dates for pathways?
You sure can! Pathways can have due dates, certified dates and notifications in the same way topics can. You can choose due dates to be based on the day of enrolment or a fixed date.
What happens when I add or remove topics from a pathway?
When you add or remove a topic from a pathway, you can choose to notify learners, however, learners are only notified if their status changes from complete to incomplete (for example, if they'd previously completed the pathway but are now incomplete as a new topic that they haven't already completed has been added).
In this case, the affected learners will receive an email explaining that they are no longer complete and what has changed.
Learners who remain incomplete or complete are not notified, and those who become complete due to a topic being removed will receive the standard pathway completion email instead.