18.5. Ending a Course#

This topic describes how to complete several end-of-course tasks.

For more information, see the following other topics about certificates.

18.5.1. Sending a Farewell Message#

As you prepare for the end of your course, you can send learners a course farewell email message.

18.5.2. Assigning Final Grades#

To assign a final grade to each learner enrolled in a course, you generate grades after the course end date and time have passed. For more information, see Generate a Grade Report for All Learners in a Course.

The learner’s final grade and the grading configuration you set in Studio determine whether the learner has earned a certificate for the course.

18.5.3. Issuing Certificates#

Note

Before you can issue certificates, the administrator for your instance of Open edX must configure the platform to allow course teams to generate and issue certificates. For more information, see Enable Automatic Certificate Generation and Enabling Course Certificates in Installing, Configuring, and Running the Open edX Platform.

The platform can automatically generate certificates for both self-paced courses and instructor-paced courses. When certificates become available, options for learners to view their certificates are available on the learner dashboard, the learner Profile page, and the course Progress page.

You can specify when you want to make certificates available.

  • For self-paced courses, by default, certificates are generated for learners when they have completed enough of the course, and with a high enough grade, to qualify for a certificate.

    If you want to generate certificates only after learners have completed the course, you can disable this feature. For more information, see Allow Learners to Receive Early Certificates.

  • For instructor-paced courses, three options are available.

  • By default, certificates become available to learners 48 hours after your course end date. If you change your course end date, Studio automatically adjusts the date for certificates as well.

  • You can specify a different date to make certificates available. For more information, see Specify a Different Certificates Available Date.

  • You can allow learners to receive their certificates when they have completed enough of the course, and with a high enough grade, to qualify for a certificate. For more information, see Allow Learners to Receive Early Certificates.

18.5.3.1. Issue Certificates on a Specified Date#

If you do not want to generate certificates 48 hours after the course end date, you can specify the date when you want the platform to generate certificates. You can change this date at any time.

For more information about how to specify a day to issue certificates, see Specify a Different Certificates Available Date.

18.5.3.2. Allow Learners to Receive Early Certificates#

If the administrator has configured the site correctly (see Enable Automatic Certificate Generation in Installing, Configuring, and Running the Open edX Platform), self-paced courses issue certificates to learners as soon as learners have completed enough of the course, with a high enough grade, to earn a certificate. You do not have to change any settings.

Earlier Open edX versions had an Enable Student-Generated Certificates option in the LMS instructor dashboard; this option has been removed.

18.5.3.2.1. Allow Learners to Download Early Certificates#

To allow learners to download early certificates, you modify the Certificates Display Behavior advanced setting in Studio.

  1. In Studio, on the Settings menu, select Advanced Settings.

  2. On the Advanced Settings page, locate Certificates Display Behavior.

  3. In the Certificates Display Behavior field, enter "early_no_info". Be sure that you include the double quotation marks.

  4. Select Save Changes.