Understanding User Roles

Tandem uses a simple set of roles to ensure everyone has access to what they need—and nothing they don't. This guide explains who does what.

The key roles

Most of your daily interactions will be with Course Owners, Offering Admins, and Students.

Tandem Tertiary Administrator
These are the university-level system administrators. You will only need to contact them when you need to create a new course. Once the course shell exists, you can manage everything else yourself.
Course Owner
Course Owners have complete control over a subject. They can create new offerings for each teaching term, manage the teaching team, and authorise assessments. This role is typically held by Course Coordinators.
Offering Admin
Offering Admins manage a specific instance of a course (e.g. Semester 1). They can author questions, grade assessments, and manage student enrolments for that period, but they cannot create new offerings.
Student
Students have read-only access to the assessments that are published for them. They can complete their work and view their grades once released.
Tutor
Currently, the Tutor role has the same permissions as a Student. We recommend adding tutors as Offering Admins if they need to help with grading or content creation.

How permission works

Tandem checks your role every time you try to access a page. If you are a Course Owner, you will automatically have access to all offerings for your course. If you are an Offering Admin, your access is limited to the specific terms you have been invited to.

If you need to upgrade someone's access (e.g. promoting a student to a tutor), a Course Owner or Offering Admin can do this instantly from the Manage Users tab.

The key roles

Most of your daily interactions will be with Course Owners, Offering Admins, and Students.

Tandem Tertiary Administrator

These are the university-level system administrators. You will only need to contact them when you need to create a new course. Once the course shell exists, you can manage everything else yourself.

Course Owner

Course Owners have complete control over a subject. They can create new offerings for each teaching term, manage the teaching team, and authorise assessments. This role is typically held by Course Coordinators.

Offering Admin

Offering Admins manage a specific instance of a course (e.g. Semester 1). They can author questions, grade assessments, and manage student enrolments for that period, but they cannot create new offerings.

Student

Students have read-only access to the assessments that are published for them. They can complete their work and view their grades once released.

Tutor

Currently, the Tutor role has the same permissions as a Student. We recommend adding tutors as Offering Admins if they need to help with grading or content creation.

How permission works

If you need to upgrade someone's access (e.g. promoting a student to a tutor), a Course Owner or Offering Admin can do this instantly from the Manage Users tab.