Course Settings

The Featured Questions tool is a great way for content creators to prominently surface important questions and answers to learners in their custom courses. Content creators can choose to feature inquiries that have already been posted in the course Q&A, or write and publish new featured questions.

This article outlines how content creators can select, write or remove Featured Questions for their custom courses.

• Learn how to create a custom course.

How to select an existing question in the Q&A as a Featured Question

If you wish to select a question and answer that has already been posted in the course Q&A as a Featured Question, follow these steps.

1. From the home page of your account, click Teach in the top right corner to navigate to the Courses page.

2. Click Communications on the left-hand side and select Q&A.Use the search tool on the left-hand side to find the question and answer you wish to select as a featured question. Use the search tool on the left-hand side to find the question and answer you wish to select as a featured question. 

3. Use the search tool on the left-hand side to find the question and answer you wish to select as a featured question.

4. Click the three dots on the right-hand side of the Q&A question and select Add to Featured Questions. 

The question and answer will be moved to the Featured Questions section of that lecture’s Q&A, which is located above the All questions section.

How to write and publish a Featured Question

To write a question and answer for the Featured Questions section, follow these steps.

1. From the Communications page in your account,  select Featured Questions.

2. Next, click Create new Featured Question on the right-hand side. 

3. Enter the applicable course information, as well as the question and answer.

4. Click Publish new Featured Question and confirm you wish to publish the question.

The question and answer will be moved to the Featured Questions section of that lecture’s Q&A, which is located above the All questions section.

How to remove a question from the Featured Questions section

If you wish to remove a question from the Featured Questions section, simply do the following.

1. Navigate to the Communications page in your instructor account and select Q&A or Featured Questions.

2. Locate the applicable question, using the search tool, and click the three dots on the right-hand side. Select Remove from Featured Questions.

Common questions

Who can create or select featured questions for a custom course?

Only content creators with Q&A permissions granted for the applicable course can create or select a featured question for it. Permissions can be accessed and edited in the course Settings page.

How many featured questions can be created or selected for a custom course?

Content creators can create or select as many featured questions for a custom course as they wish.

How do featured questions appear to learners?

The Featured Questions section is located prominently and above the All questions section of the applicable lecture’s Q&A.

Can learners reply to featured questions?

Yes. Learners can reply to featured questions or upvote them if they wish, just as they can with other questions that are posted in the Q&A. Learn more about how content creators can review and respond to questions in the Q&A dashboard.

The Questions & Answers (Q&A) dashboard is designed to help custom course creators monitor and respond to learner questions with ease and efficiency. 

• Depending on your organization’s settings, the features to contact the instructor may be disabled. If this is the case, please contact your account’s administrator for additional information or assistance.

Accessing the Q&A dashboard

To access the Q&A dashboard, follow the steps below:

1. From the home page of your account, click Teach in the top right corner to navigate to the Courses page.
2. Click Communications on the left-hand side and select Q&A.

Here are some highlights:

• Review and respond to questions across all of your courses using either the single or double pane view.
• Filter for unanswered or unread questions. This allows you to get back to learners faster, keeping them more engaged in the course. 
• Mark a response as the Top Answer to indicate the top response to other learners, or select a question and answer as a Featured Question.
• Access the lecture where the learner asked the question and view timestamps of when a question was asked and responded to.  All of this provides additional context to learners’ questions to help you respond more efficiently.

Managing the Q&A dashboard

Marking your questions as "Read"

The message should automatically be marked as read when any of the below events happen:

• Course creator puts their cursor in the reply text field
• Course creator clicks anywhere in the message (to see all replies, open the discussion post, go to the learner’s profile, mark as helpful etc.)

The course creator can also manually mark the question as read or unread by clicking the dot at the top of the question.

​The difference between unread and unanswered

Unread indicates that you, as the course creator, has not yet marked the question as "read". Unanswered means that no response has been marked as "Top Answer". Only the course creator and original poster can mark responses as "Top Answer". 

Sorting by oldest to newest

When a course creator sorts questions by oldest to newest, the question time will be determined by the most recent response time.

Upvote a question or answer, or sort by most upvoted

You can recommend questions or answers you believe others should see by clicking on the upvote (arrow) icon.

You can also find and prioritize questions that have received upvotes from your learners, by using the Most upvoted filter.

Getting context for the question

If the learner asked a question within a particular lecture, you will see a link to the lecture right underneath the course title.

A custom course can have more than one instructor as co-instructors can be added and assigned various permissions, which enable them to access certain information and features related to the course. 

Only the course creator, who is the primary instructor, however, can edit their own permissions. In addition, the primary instructor cannot be removed from a course by a co-instructor.

• Learn how to create a custom course.
• Leadership Academy: learn about the different admin roles on our cohort learning platform and the permissions granted to each admin.

Table of contents

• How to send a co-instructor invitation
• Pending invitations
• Managing instructor permissions for the custom course
• Removing a co-instructor

How to send a co-instructor invitation

To invite someone to join your custom course as a co-instructor, follow the steps below.

1. While accessing Udemy Business on a browser, navigate to the applicable course management page, and click the course settings gear icon at the top right.

2. Scroll down the page to the Manage instructor permissions section and click Add instructor on the right-hand side. 

3. Enter the email address that is associated with the Udemy Business account of the person you wish to invite, and select the applicable permissions (see below for more information).

4. Finally, click Send invitation. 

• The invitee will receive a notification via email, in which they can accept or decline the invitation to join the course as a co-instructor. 
• If the person accepts the invitation to join the course as a co-instructor,  the instructor, and any other co-instructors with manage permissions for the course, will be notified by email.

Pending invitations

Instructors can view pending invitations they have sent by accessing them on the course management page. The pending status will also be reflected in the Manage instructor permissions section for the course. 

If you need to revoke a pending invitation you have sent, click Revoke.

Managing instructor permissions for the custom course

Below is a list of the various permissions you can enable for co-instructors. As outlined above, the instructor permissions for a course can be accessed by navigating to the course settings page. 

Visible: The instructor will be seen as an active instructor for the course. Their profile picture and name will appear wherever the course is visible in your Udemy Business account. Users will be able to send a message to the instructor if direct messaging is enabled.

Manage: A co-instructor with the Manage permission can modify course content and settings. They have full visibility and editing access to all course management functions, including the ability to upload and delete lectures, make changes to how the course displays in the marketplace, and create coupons for the course.

Performance: instructors with this permission enabled can access applicable data and information related to that course in their Performance tabs.

Q&A: This permission controls whether instructors can view and answer questions from learners in the instructor Q&A dashboard.

Assignments: Instructors who are enabled with the Assignments permission will receive notifications when students submit assignments, and will be able to provide feedback for them if they wish.

Reviews: Instructors with the Reviews permission will be able to view and respond to student course reviews in the Reviews section of the Instructor Dashboard 

• Please note: in order for an instructor to respond to reviews, they must also be categorized as a visible instructor.

Removing a Co-instructor

Co-instructors can be removed from a course by clicking Remove under their respective name.

• If a course instructor has the Manage permission active, they will have the ability to remove co-instructors. The course creator, however, cannot be removed from a course.
• Any co-instructor can remove themselves from the course, regardless of whether they have the Manage permission enabled or not.
• When a co-instructor is removed from a course the instructor, and any other co-instructors with the manage course permission enabled, will be notified by email. 

Your course title can be changed at any time. The change will happen immediately.

How to Change the Title of a Course

1. Navigate to the course page
2. Click Course Landing Page on the left-hand side
3. Rename the course in the first box
4. Click Save at the top of the page

Direct Messaging is a tool that users use to ask the instructor any questions about the course content. This is a tool that users and instructors can use to ask and answer questions about the course content, and for instructors to use to get dedicated feedback on the course. This is meant for 1:1 learning and feedback, not to promote or market to users. 

Instructors – Detailed Guidelines

• DO answer questions politely and in a timely manner.
• DON’T send rude, aggressive, or threatening messages to users.
• DON’T use Direct Messaging for mass-messaging users about promotions; the use of coupons, external links, marketing messages or references to the same are prohibited. We understand that users can reach out with questions or requests, and it is important for instructors to be responsive. When users reach out with specific questions, you can feel free to answer them and direct them to appropriate resources. However, this is where we will take context into account.
  • For example, if an instructor is encouraging users within the course to send them Direct Messages asking for coupons, then it is considered a violation of our policies when an instructor provides the coupon code through Direct Messaging.
  • On the other hand, if a user reaches out with a question about additional material, it is not a violation if the instructor sends a link to their website where there is more information.
• DON’T ask for or post personal information about users.

Users – Detailed Guidelines

• DO ask instructors questions politely, if you’d prefer not to participate in public course discussions.
• DON’T send rude, aggressive, or threatening messages to instructors.
• DON’T use Direct Messaging to spam or request free coupons or other material unrelated to the course.

When an instructor is clearly going against the spirit of Udemy policies in an attempt to game the system or if we see a severe negative impact on the user experience (high unsubscribe rates or refund rates) it will be considered a violation of our policies.

Escalation Policy

Learn what happens when there is a violation of our policies here.

Instructors have the ability to make the enrollment page for their courses private. To gain access to the course, users will need to enter a password, or request access.

How to change a course enrollment’s privacy settings

1. Navigate to the course page. 
2. Click on the course settings gear icon at the top right.
3. Select Public, Private (Invitation Only) or Private (Password Protected).
4. If you select Private (Password Protected) you will need to enter a password in the box below.
5. Click Save.

Types of enrollment privacy

• Password Protected

After receiving your course URL, a user must enter the created password on the course landing page in order to access your course.

• Invitation Only

A user must request an invitation to the course from the course landing page and you can also send an invitation to the user directly. To send an invitation, click on "Invite Users" on the right hand side of the Users page. If a user requests an invitation for the course, however, then a notification will appear on the left hand side of the page by "Users".