Use of organizations and departments is optional. If your initial deployment is small and your institution does not require that level of compartmentalization, you do not need to create them immediately. As your deployment grows, you can add them and categorize your courses accordingly.

Furthermore, organizations can exist without departments, and departments can exist without organizations.

The location for viewing, adding, deleting, and editing your organizations and departments is the Institution Settings page available from the Settings menu, accessed as shown in the figure below.

Institution Settings provides at-a-glance access to the hierarchical structure in your institution.

Basic Info, under General, is displayed by default. From here, you can manage all the necessary items at the Institution level.

Below General is Organizations & Departments. The figure below shows several organizations, and one of these organizations has been expanded to display its departments.

Organizations are shown with an caret to the left, indicating they are expandable, to show the departments associated with them (and to create a new department for that organization if necessary).

Clicking the vertical action menu reveals additional options action icons allowing you to Add Department (plus sign), Edit Organization or Department (pencil), or Delete Organization or Department (trash can).

Departments that are not associated with an organization appear under Standalone Departments. This is shown in the figure below.

Create an Organization or Department

Typically, organizations exist as sub-divisions of the Institution, such as a medical school or school of journalism. Departments typically exist as sub-divisions of the organization. But you can apply these segmentations as needed to your institutional structure. You may want to refer to Defining the EchoVideo Hierarchy for information on how the organizational structure is often used in the system.

To create an organization or department

1. Log into EchoVideo as an administrator.
2. Click the Settings icon in the upper-right corner of the screen.
3. From the Settings menu, select Institution Settings.

   General settings appears and Basic Info is selected by default.

4. Click Organizations and Departments.
5. Click New Organization, then enter a Name for your organization and click Add.
   
6. Click New Department then select an Organization for your department or select Standalone Departments.
   
7. Click Add.
8. Alternatively, if the department is to reside under an existing organization, you can click the vertical action menu and then Add Department, as shown in the figure below.
   
9. Enter a Name for your department. Department names must be unique to the Institution, regardless of whether or not they reside under an organization.
10. Click Add.

Edit an Organization or Department

Editing an organization involves editing the name of the organization.

Editing a department allows you to edit the name of the department, and / or select a different organization for the department to reside in.

To edit an organization or department

1. Click Settings in the upper-right corner of the screen.
2. From the Settings menu, select Institution Settings.

   General settings appears and Basic Info is selected by default.

3. Click Organizations and Departments and scroll through the list to find the organization or department you want to edit.
4. Click the vertical action menu and then Edit Organization, as shown in the figure below.
   
5. In the Rename Organization dialog box, edit the name of the organization and click Save.
   
6. Click the vertical action menu and then Edit Department. If the department resides under an organization, you will need to expand the organization to find it.
   
7. In the Edit Department dialog box, you can select a different Organization to which the department belongs, and / or edit the Department name.
   
8. When finished, click Save.

Delete an Organization or Department

Deleting an organization or department simply removes that item or level from the hierarchy. It does not delete any associated objects. Departments and / or Courses that belonged to a deleted object are changed to None for the department or organization as it applies.

To delete an organization or department

1. Click Settings in the upper-right corner of the screen.
2. From the Settings menu, select Institution Settings.

   General settings appears and Basic Info is selected by default.

3. Click Organizations and Departments and scroll through the list to find the organization or department you want to delete.
4. Click the vertical action menu and then Delete Organization.
   
5. A Warning message appears. Click OK to delete the Organization and all Departments within it.

   Any departments in the organization will move to Standalone Departments and are functional and able to be edited.

6. Find the department you want to delete, and click the vertical action menu and then Delete Department. If the department resides under an organization, you will need to expand the organization to find it.
   
7. A Warning message appears. Click OK to delete the department.

Any courses in the department are now only associated with the organization in which the department resided, or if the department was not within an organization, the courses exist with None as their organization and department.