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[Proposal] Author Profile Page for Open edX platform

[Proposal] Author Profile Page for Open edX platform

GitHub issue: https://github.com/openedx/platform-roadmap/issues/512

Overview

Add a public-facing author profile page to Open edX – a learner-accessible page that displays an author's identity (name, photo, credentials, biography) and aggregates all courses and programs they have authored into a single hub.

Problem

In Open edX platform, course authors (instructors, teachers, subject-matter experts) are not first-class entities from the learner's point of view. While an author's name appears on course about page, there is no profile page that aggregates their full catalog, biography, credentials, or external presence.

Use Cases

User Story

AC

User Story

AC

As a learner interested in a specific topic,

I need to enter the Author profile page

in order to evaluate the instructor's credibility and teaching style before enrolling.

  1. The user can open an Author profile page by clicking the author name on the Course about page.

  2. Author profile page consists of:

    1. Author name

    2. Author photo

    3. Author title and affiliation

    4. Author biography

    5. Credentials and areas of expertise

    6. External website and social links

    7. Courses authored by the author

    8. Programs authored by the author

As a learner who enjoyed a course,

I need to find other courses by the same author

in order to continue learning from an instructor whose approach works for me.

  1. Once the user enters the Author profile page, the user can filter/sort the author's courses by:

    1. Metadata that was created in the CMS → Taxonomies (tags)

    2. Newest courses

    3. Most popular courses (number of enrollments)

As a learner,

I need to see an author's programs alongside individual courses

in order to understand the full range of learning experiences they offer.

Described above.

As a platform admin,

I want to mark a user as an author,

So that this user can manage a personal author profile and be displayed as an author within the platform.

  1. The platform admin can mark an existing platform user as an author through Django Admin.

  2. Once a user is marked as an author, the system creates or enables an author profile record connected to this user.

  3. The author profile can include the following information:

    1. Author name

    2. Author photo

    3. Author title and affiliation

    4. Author biography

    5. Credentials and areas of expertise

    6. External website and social links

  4. The admin can manage the author profile data through Django Admin.

  5. A user who is not marked as an author must not have access to the author profile editing page.

As a user with author rights,
I want to manage my author profile
So that I will be recognized among other users within the platform.

  1. A user marked as an author can open the author profile editing page.

  2. The author can edit personal profile information based on the Author Profile Editing Page prototype, including:

    1. Author name

    2. Author photo

    3. Author title and affiliation

    4. Author biography

    5. Credentials and areas of expertise

    6. External website and social links

  3. The author can save changes made on the profile editing page.

  4. After saving, the updated information is displayed on the public Author Profile Page.

  5. The author can edit only their own author profile.

As a user,
I want to have a page with a list of authors
So that I can find the interesting to me author and enter their profile.

  1. The user can open a dedicated Author Directory Page on the LMS.

  2. The page displays a list of authors available on the platform.

  3. Each author card displays key information:

    1. author photo;

    2. author name;

    3. title;

    4. affiliation;

    5. short biography or description;

    6. areas of expertise;

    7. number of authored courses;

    8. number of authored programs.

  4. The user can search authors by name.

  5. The user can filter authors by affiliation.

  6. The user can filter authors by area of expertise.

  7. The user can click an author card to open the related Author Profile Page.

Proposed Solution

How we'll solve it

Build an author profile page as a new route in an existing Open edX micro-frontend (Catalog MFE). The page displays the author's identity, metadata, programs, and a filterable course catalog.

Current UX

The current learner experience:

  • Current state: No author profile page exists.

  • Learner sees an instructor name listed on a course about page (often with a short bio embedded in the course "About" section in inconsistent formatting).

  • No way to see an instructor's full catalog, credentials, or institutional identity in one place.

  • No way to navigate from an instructor's name on one course to their other courses.

  • Must browse individual course cards scattered across the catalog and rely on keyword search.

Author data is currently only visible through:

  • Course "About" page (inline bio text entered per-course, no canonical source).

  • Course team entries in Studio → Course Team Settings (staff-only).

Proposed UX

Author Profile Page – a dedicated page at /author/<author_slug> showing the author's photo, name, title, affiliation, biography, external links, and a paginated, filterable list of their courses and programs.

Author Directory Page – future phase. A searchable catalog page at /authors listing all authors on the platform with photo, name, title, affiliation, and course count.

Author Profile Editing Page – future phase. An authenticated page at /author/<author_slug>/edit where authors manage their own profile – photo, biography, title and credentials, affiliation, website, and social links – without going through a platform administrator. Organization administrators can edit profiles of authors affiliated with their organization, and platform administrators retain full edit access for moderation.

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Author Profile Page prototype
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Author Directory Page prototype
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Author profile editing page

Implementation Plan

Milestone 1 – MVP: Author Profile Page

A learner can visit an author's profile page and see the author's identity along with a paginated list of their courses and programs.

What learners can do:

  1. Open an author profile page at a stable, shareable URL.

  2. See the author's photo, full name, title, and credentials in a clear header.

  3. See the author's affiliation (organization) and click through to that organization's profile page.

  4. Read the author's biography.

  5. Visit the author's external links – personal website and social media.

  6. See at-a-glance counts of how many courses and programs the author has on the platform.

  7. Browse all programs authored by this author as a set of program cards.

  8. Browse all courses authored by this author with pagination ("load more") so long catalogs stay navigable.

  9. Filter the course list by tags to narrow results to a topic of interest.

  10. Sort the course list by newest, enrolled status, or title.

What administrators can do:

  1. Create and manage author profiles from the admin panel, including photo, biography, title and credentials, affiliation, website, and social links.

  2. Have an author's courses and programs appear on their profile automatically once the author is added to the course team.

  3. Turn the feature on or off per deployment via a feature toggle, so operators can adopt it on their own timeline.

Milestone 2 – Author Directory and Discovery

Learners can browse all authors on the platform from a single directory page.

What learners can do:

  1. Open a directory page that lists every author publishing on the platform.

  2. See each author at a glance: photo, name, title, affiliation, and how many courses and programs they offer.

  3. Search authors by name to jump straight to a specific person.

  4. Filter authors by affiliation or area of expertise to narrow the list.

  5. Click any author card to open their full profile page.

Long-Term Ownership and Maintenance

Maintenance will be handled by the maintainers of the repositories where any potential changes are added.

Contact

@Anastasiia Abyzova

Competitive Research

LearnDash LMS

image-20260501-100559.png

Ships an Instructor Role add-on with a dedicated instructor profile page. Profiles include social account handles and links for Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube displayed on the instructor profile page, plus configurable introduction sections for achievements and credentials.

Coursera

image-20260501-102244.png

Includes a specialized Faculty Identity module with a public-facing educator landing page. Profiles support integrated professional social links and external portfolio URLs displayed prominently in the header, plus modular narrative sections for detailing industry expertise, research history, and formal academic honors.

Udemy

image-20260501-102420.png

Features a unified Educator Identity interface with a dedicated public landing page. Profiles include verified social connectivity and external website linking, plus dynamic bio sections for articulating professional trajectory, technical competencies, and educational philosophy.

LinkedIn Learning

image-20260501-102938.png

Displays a professionalized Expert Identity page integrated within the LinkedIn ecosystem. Profiles include direct synchronization with the instructor’s primary LinkedIn network and professional headline, plus a narrative bio section that bridges the gap between their industry career and their instructional content.