Use of organizations and departments is optional. If your initial deployment is small, and your institution does not need that level of compartmentalization, you do not need to create them right away. 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 below figure.

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

At the top, is the institution node, which is selected by default. From here, you can manage all the necessary items at the Institution level.

Below the institution are all of the organizations and departments already configured. The below figure shows the Institution at the top, several organizations, and one of the organizations expanded to see the Departments within it.

Organizations are shown with an icon 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).

Hovering over each organization or department reveals action icons allowing you to add a department (plus sign), edit the organization or department (pencil), or delete (trash can) the item. These icons appear in the above figure.

Departments that are not associated with an organization appear directly in the list with no "expand" icon to the left. This is shown in the below figure.

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 Echo360 Hierarchy for information on how the organizational structure is often used in the system.

To create an organization or department

1. Click the Settings icon in the upper-right corner of the screen.
2. From the Settings menu, select Institution Settings.
3. Click NEW ORGANIZATION, then enter a Name for your organization and click SAVE.
   
4. Click NEW DEPARTMENT, then select an Organization for your department or select None.
   
5. ALTERNATELY, if the department is to reside under an existing organization, you can click the plus sign icon for the organization in the list, or expand an empty organization and select New department. In either case, the Organization selection in the New department dialog box is pre-populated with the organization.
   
6. Enter a Name for your department. Department names MUST BE UNIQUE to the Institution, regardless of whether or not they reside under an organization.
7. Click SAVE.

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 (or None) for the department to reside in.

To edit an organization or department

1. Click the Settings icon in the upper-right corner of the screen.
2. From the Settings menu, select Institution Settings.
3. From the left panel of the Institution Settings screen, scroll through the list to find the organization or department you want.
4. Click the edit icon (it looks like a pencil).
   
5. In the Edit organization dialog box, edit the name of the organization and click SAVE.
   
6. Find the department you want to edit, and click the edit icon. 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 (or select None), 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 the Settings icon in the upper-right corner of the screen.
2. From the Settings menu, select Institution Settings.
3. From the left panel of the Institution Settings screen,  scroll to find the organization or department you want to delete
4. Click the delete icon (it looks like a trash can).
   
5. A Warning message appears. Click OK to delete the organization.
   Any departments in the organization are now not associated with any organization and appear in the Organizations page at the top level.
6. Find the department you want to delete, and click the delete icon. 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.