Moodle Rollover and Archiving Process - FAQ

In 2024, we changed the way the new academic year is handled in Moodle. The old ‘refresh’ process and archive snapshots has been retired. New copies of course pages are now created for each academic year, while the old ones are archived within the main moodle.lse.ac.uk site.
LSE Moodle academic year rollover

Please read through our FAQ for further details. If you have any questions that aren’t covered, reach out to eden.digital@lse.ac.uk

What does the new process look like and How can I navigate it?

The video below was created to support users changing to the new system and provides a comprehensive overview of the new Moodle and archiving process. We've included numerous interface shots to give a clear understanding of what the new system looks like and how it functions.

Why did the process for handling the new academic year in Moodle change from the old system of archives?

The process was updated to better reflect the needs of the School. Under the new system:

• Editors have a longer window to work on pages for the next academic year.

• Student work and activities during the summer months is not lost.

• Reusing material from old courses is easier.

• Managers no longer need to manually refresh any courses.

• Moodle does need to be taken offline as in previous years.

From a technical point of view, there are also security benefits to no longer maintaining separate archives, and performance improvements to creating new pages rather than repeatedly refreshing old ones.

When will new courses be available to edit and who can edit them?

The process to copy courses will run in June each year, after summer exams. Courses will be available to edit in mid-June unless an agreement has been made with the Digital Education team for an early or late rollover. Announcements of the exact date on which courses will be available each year will be emailed to departments and posted to the Moodle front page.

Those who had Manager or Teacher (Editor) roles in a course for the previous year will also have them on the new copy.

What do the new courses contain?

The new courses are exact duplicates of the copied course (as they appeared on the day the course was copied) except for student data.

They will contain all files, activities, and resources from the previous version. They will not contain student contributions, assignment submissions, forum posts, or logs.

Are all courses duplicated?

All courses are duplicated unless they have been opted out by your department. Examples of courses which have been opted out include:

• Old courses no longer in use. These will be archived one last time but not copied.

• Permanent courses where enrolment data does not change, such as staff resource pages. These are moved with all their existing data to the Moodle section for the new academic year.

• Courses that have already been created by special request before the June rollover.

The Digital Education works with departments to identify such courses. If you are unsure about any of your courses, please reach out to eden.digital@lse.ac.uk

Are new courses visible to students?

No. On creation, the new courses are hidden. The course will not appear on students' dashboards or in search results until an editor unhides it.

How are Lecture Recordings and Reading Lists affected?

Many Moodle courses contain links to Echo360 Lecture Recordings and Leganto Reading lists. The rollover process affects each slightly differently:

Lecture Recording activities are copied over, but will no longer be linked to a video. You will need to replace these by re-linking to recordings. Embedded video links will continue to work. Archived courses will continue to link to the same recordings that were linked in the year in which the course originally ran. See Lecture recording (Echo360) guides

Reading Lists will automatically update to link to the correct year for your course, without any need for manual intervention, as long as that reading list exists in Leganto. The library creates reading lists for the new academic year in late June.

I want to start editing my course before the rollover. Can I do that?

Yes. If you want to prepare material early, you can do this in the existing course and it will be copied to the new version of the course during rollover. However, please bear in mind that any changes you make will affect existing students who may request access to the older version of the course for future resits or revision. Please do not delete any material these students may need. You may wish to hide any new resources you make before duplication, and then unhide them in the new page once it is available.

You can also request an early copy of your course by contacting eden.digital@lse.ac.uk

Do we still need to use the ‘Do Not Refresh’ tag?

No. The new process replaces the need to refresh courses. The ‘Do Not Refresh’ tag is no longer necessary and departments will no longer need to manually reset any courses.

What happens to old versions of Moodle courses?

Existing courses for a given academic year continue to be available and visible throughout the summer until their end date. (This is set by default to the end of August for most courses.) They are then moved to the Moodle archive section, where they can be accessed with certain restrictions.

Access to these courses will change in the following order:

• After the June Rollover it is no longer possible for students to self-enrol in these courses.

• After IRDAP, courses reach their end date and move to the ‘past courses' section of the ‘Course overview’ area on users' Moodle dashboards. Students entering the course will see an archive label.

• Six weeks after their end date, courses automatically enter ‘read-only’ mode. It is no longer possible to edit, add, or remove any material.

What is the difference between the ‘end date’ and the ‘read-only’ date?

The end date is the point at which a course moves from ‘In Progress’ to ‘Past’ in a user’s course list in Moodle. Existing students and teachers can still interact fully with the course.

The ‘read-only’ date is calculated based on end date + six weeks, allowing enough time for extensions, marking, and feedback. After this date, interaction with the course beyond basic viewing is heavily restricted. (See below ‘What is ‘read-only’ mode?')

What is ‘read-only’ mode?

When accessing a course in archive mode, users still have permission to view anything they could before, but can no longer make any changes.

Archive mode is used to ensure course materials remain unchanged for students who need to refer back to them for revision or resits, or for teachers and editors who wish to see how a course looked in a previous year.

A course can be temporarily taken out of archive mode on request to Digital Education.

Can I change the date on which a course goes into read-only mode?

Yes. The best way to do this for multiple courses is by contacting Digital Education to discuss your needs.

On an individual course basis, changing the course end date will change the date at which it enters read-only mode (as this is always end date + six weeks). Please remember that it is important for the integrity of our archives that editing be disabled on courses in a timely manner. Changes to course end date should never be pushed far into the future.

If you need a course to be placed into read-only mode immediately, without a waiting period, contact Digital Education.

Will archived courses be hidden?

No. Archived courses are not hidden by default.

Editors have the ability to hide or unhide courses at any time until the course enters read-only mode.

Once a course enters read-only mode, its visible/hidden status can only be changed by Digital Education or a manager with special permissions.

Important: Departments that wish to have all courses hidden by a certain date should contact Digital Education before September to make arrangements.

Who can access archived courses?

Unhidden archived courses are accessible to anyone who was actively enrolled in the course at the end of summer term of the year in which the course was active. They can view, but not edit, course contents.

No new students can access the course without permission from the department, who should send a request to eden.digital@lse.ac.uk to manually add the user.

How long will archives be retained?

Archives will be retained for three years after the year in which they are live.

For example, the 2023/24 archive will be decommissioned and removed from the site in September 2027.

Can I reuse material from archived courses?

Yes. Reusing material, activities, or whole sections from old courses is now much simpler as you can use the Import function. Material imported from a read-only course is fully editable in the course into which it is imported.

Will Lecture Recordings and Reading Lists work in the archive?

Yes. The links to lecture recordings and reading lists in archived courses continue to work just as they did when the course was live and continue to point to the correct year.

How can I tell which version of a course I’m viewing?

There are features that should make it very easy to tell which version of a course you are viewing:

• All courses new include the academic year in their title.

• All archived courses display a banner at the top telling you which year’s archive you are in.

• You will know you are in an archived course, and not the live version, if your permissions are restricted and you no longer have any options to edit the course.