This lesson will guide you through the process of using online course requests.
Note: Control Panel should be dated to the Academic Year you are setting up course requests for.
If you see that Online Course Requests is not yet enabled for your site, please contact support by sending in a ticket to ISIsupport@illuminateed.net for that to be turned on.

1. Click on the Scheduling tab.
2. Under Course Requests, select Online Course Request.

1. Select Student Choices from the navigation bar.
2. Add a new choice by selecting Add Choice.

1. Choice Name- Complete the name of the choice. The choice name will be visible to students.
2. Description (Not Required)- Provide directions or other supportive text to aid students in their completion of the course request selection (400 characters max).
3. Courses- Select one or more courses for students to select from. Most users create a choice for similar choices (i.e. ELA courses, Science courses, Elective courses, etc.). Students will select one course request from the choice.
4. Priority- Set the scheduling priority. If you are unsure what priority to set, set all choices to 1.
5. Term- The default term is ‘Any’. Only select a term if you want all course requests from that choice to be term specific.
6. Allow 2nd Choice- Set to ‘Yes’ if students are allowed to select an alternate course request. The 2nd choice will serve as an alternate to the first course request. Students will not be placed into both courses; the student scheduler will attempt to satisfy one of the two course requests.
7. Click Save.

You will receive a success message at the top of the page.
To Edit a Choice, click on the Choice Name. To Delete a choice, click on the Trash Can button.

1. Select Window Dates from the navigation bar.
2. Click Add Window Date.

3. Select the Start Date. This is the date the window opens to students in the student portal.
4. Select the End Date. This is the date the window closes to students in the student portal.
5. Enter a Description (Not Required). Enter a brief description of the submission window (i.e. 9th grade course request window).

You will receive a success message at the top of the page. To Edit a window, click on the Window Dates. To Delete a window, click on the Trash Can button.
1. Select Student Choice Groups from the navigation bar.
2. Click Add Choice Group.

1. Enter the Choice Group Name - The name is displayed to the students through the portal.
2. Link a Student Group - Select a student group. (For more information on student groups, see the help document HERE.)
3. Description - Use the description to clarify expectations and provide directions. 400 characters max. Descriptions will be visible to the students in the portal.
4. Select a Date Range - Select one of the date windows.
5. Next, press the Logic tab.

6. Enter the Logic and click Save or move to the Exclusions tab.
Logic- The logic expression establishes which choices a student must make before submitting course requests. The logic expression is what makes the student choice groups adaptable and impactful.
Use the Choice IDs along with the the operatives of AND, OR, and parenthesis to set up choice logic.
Logic expressions can get quite complex. Some users may prefer to create multiple choice groups for the student rather than use extremely complex choice grouping logic. See the examples below for some ideas how to write logic expressions.
Examples | Explanation |
---|---|
1 AND 2 | Students must make 2 choices before submitting requests. |
1 OR 2 | Students will only make one choice before submitting requests. |
1 AND 2 AND 3 | Students will submit a total of 3 course requests. |
1 OR 2 OR 3 | Students will submit 1 course request from the 3 choices offered. |
(1 OR 2) AND 3 | Students will submit a total of 2 course requests. All students will submit a response to 3, but some will respond to 1 and some will respond to 2. |
(1 AND 2) OR 3 |
Some students will submit 1 course request, others will submit 2. If a student selects a course from choice 1, they must select a course from choice 2, and will not be permitted to select from choice 3. Other students will only submit a course request from choice 3. |
(1 AND 2) or (3 OR 4) |
All students will select two course requests, but they will be from two different groupings. The courses in choices 1 and 2 will never mix with the choices from 3 and 4. |
1 AND (2 OR (3 AND 4)) |
All students will submit 2 or 3 course requests. All students will select from choice 1, but some students may chose a course from choice 2, and others will chose a pair of choices from 3 and 4. |

7. Exclusions- Use exclusions to make exceptions to the Student Choice Group. Exclusions work much like they do in course request packages. Select one or more student groups to exclude from the Choice Group. Click Save when finished.
Because portal is not available in Sandbox sites, if you are wanting to test what your online course requests setup will look like for students in portal, you can:
- create a test Student Group
- place one (real) student in that group
- link that test Student Group to the Student Choice Group
Then, when the window is live for that Student Choice Group, you can navigate to the Student Profile > Portal View widget to see what the layout will look like for that student. This is an option for testing before pushing out to the entire grade level or school site.

Refresh- Use the green Refresh button on the Student Choice Group screen to update student choices. Refresh will update the Student Groups and Exclusions used in the course group. Use the refresh button periodically to ensure that students are assigned to the right choice groups.
Edit- To edit the Choice Group, click on the blue name. Group Name, Description, Date Range and Exclusions can be edited at any time.
Student Group and Logic can only be edited before students start interacting with the choice group. Once a student submits course requests through the group, the student group and logic will be locked. If you need to edit the student group or the logic, turn off the incorrect choice group by selecting the null value in the date range, and rebuild a new choice group with the correct student group or logic.
Delete- Use the red Delete button to delete a Student Choice Group. The delete option is not available after students have started using the choice group. Turn off a choice group by setting the date range to the null value.
Next Steps
Now that you have conducted Student Course Requests using our Online Course Request Tool, go explore Reports: Course Requests.
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