# How courses work

> Sections, topics, and Draft, Published and Archived.

Source: https://paatya.net/docs/courses/how-courses-work

A course is everything a student learns on one programme. This page explains how a course is put together, and the three statuses that decide who can see it.

## How a course is built

Every course has three layers:

| Layer | What it is | Example |
| --- | --- | --- |
| **Course** | The programme as a whole, with a title, description and cover image. | "Python Programming for Beginners" |
| **Section** | A chapter of the course. Sections keep topics in order. | "Week 1: Introductions" |
| **Topic** | One lesson. | "Greeting people" |

A topic can hold any mix of:

- **a video**, with chapter markers students can jump to
- **a quiz**, with a passing score
- **documents**, such as PDF notes or worksheets
- **links** to pages elsewhere on the web
- **a lesson description** that students read before they start

> **Tip:** Keep topics short. One idea per topic, with a 5–15 minute video, is easier for students to finish than one long lesson.

## Draft, Published and Archived

Every course has a status. You see it as a coloured badge on the **Courses** page.

| Status | Who can see it | When to use it |
| --- | --- | --- |
| **Draft** | Only admins, and [instructors](https://paatya.net/docs/instructors/how-instructors-work) it's assigned to. | While you build the course. Every new course starts here. |
| **Published** | Admins, and the students enrolled on it. Visitors can see it on your public website, unless you turn off **Show on your website** for the course. | When the course is ready to teach. While nobody is enrolled, you can **Unpublish** it to take it back to **Draft**. |
| **Archived** | Only admins, and instructors it's assigned to. Students' progress is kept. | When you stop teaching a course but want to keep its records. |

Topics have a status too. A topic is **Draft** until you publish it, and students only see **published** topics. That lets you add a new lesson to a live course and publish it only when it's ready.

Sections can be published or unpublished too. When you unpublish a section, students see none of its topics, even the published ones. When you publish it again, its published topics come back. Each topic keeps its own status the whole time.

> **Note:** A course can't be published until at least one of its topics is published.

> **Tip:** Click **Preview** at the top of a course to see it exactly as an enrolled student does. See [Preview a course as a student](https://paatya.net/docs/courses/publish-archive-delete).

## What students need to finish a course

A student finishes a course when they have completed every **required**, published topic in it.

- A topic with a video is complete when the student has watched it to the end, or clicked **Mark as Complete**.
- A topic with a quiz is only complete once the student **passes the quiz**. If it has no video, passing the quiz completes it.
- A topic you have marked as not required (in the topic's **Settings** tab) is optional. Students see it marked **Optional**, and it doesn't count towards finishing.

Students can open the sections in any order. To make them go in order, turn on **Students must finish earlier sections first** under **Access** on the course's **Details** tab: a student then opens the next section once they have finished every required topic before it.

When a student finishes a course, Paatya issues their [certificate](https://paatya.net/docs/courses/certificates) straight away.

## Where to go next

- [Create a course](https://paatya.net/docs/courses/create-a-course)
- [Build the curriculum](https://paatya.net/docs/courses/curriculum)
- [Publish, clone, archive or delete](https://paatya.net/docs/courses/publish-archive-delete)