Submitting scenarios for review and publishing updates

Publishing a scenario in SimChat goes through a short review, so that someone other than the author has looked at a scenario before learners see it - and so that authors can keep editing while feedback comes in. This article explains the flow for authors and for the people who review their work.

Owners, administrators and assistant administrators can still publish a draft directly and edit live scenarios in place. The review flow applies to everyone else.

The four states

Every scenario is in one of four states. Only Live scenarios reach learners.

Draft - being written. Nobody else is expected to act on it
Waiting for reviewer - the author has submitted it and a reviewer needs to publish it or send it back
Waiting for author - a reviewer sent it back with feedback and the author needs to make changes and resubmit
Live - published and available to learners, subject to the scenario's access settings

You can filter the Scenarios page by state using the Status filter.

Who reviews

Administrators and assistant administrators review anything in the organisation
Cohort leads review scenarios aimed at the cohorts they staff

A cohort lead cannot approve content set to All users in this organisation; that goes to an administrator. Authors cannot publish at all. See Understanding roles in SimChat.

For authors: submitting a scenario

Build your scenario and select Save draft as you go. Use Preview to try it as a learner would
In the Key details step, choose who can access the scenario. Your organisation's author policies may limit you to Specific cohorts
When it is ready, select Submit in the editor header. You can add a note for the reviewer

The scenario moves to Waiting for reviewer. You can still open it, and any real edit to its content returns it to Draft so that reviewers never publish something you are mid-way through changing - just submit again when you are done.

Posting a note does not reset your submission; only edits to the scenario's fields do.

For reviewers: publishing or sending back

Everything waiting on you is listed on Scenarios → Review queue, oldest first, with who submitted it and the latest note. The sidebar shows a count next to Review queue, and the dashboard shows the same numbers.

Open a scenario from the queue and either:

Publish - the scenario goes Live. The author is emailed
Send back - the scenario returns to the author as Waiting for author. A note explaining what to change is required, and the author is emailed

You can also read a submitted scenario without acting: use Preview, or leave a note asking a question.

Notes: feedback as a conversation

Every scenario has a notes thread that authors and reviewers can both see. Open it from the notes strip in the editor to read the thread and reply. Notes can be posted in any state, so a reviewer can ask a question before deciding, and an author can explain a choice when resubmitting. The thread is kept for the life of the scenario.

For authors: responding to feedback

A scenario that has been sent back shows as Waiting for author on the Scenarios page and on your Review queue. Open it, read the reviewer's note, make your changes and select Submit again.

Changing a scenario that is already live

Live scenarios are locked below the administrator tier so learners are never disrupted mid-edit.

Administrators and assistant administrators open the scenario and select Update to edit it in place
Cohort leads and authors select Propose an update - on the Scenarios page, or from the editor when they open a live scenario

Propose an update opens a draft copy of the live scenario. The live version stays available to learners while you work on the copy, which goes through the normal Draft → Waiting for reviewer → Live loop. When a reviewer approves it they select Publish update: the copy's content replaces the live scenario's, and the copy is removed. The live scenario keeps its link, audience, cohort assignments, collections, past conversations and analytics.

Some rules to know:

Only one proposed update can be open per scenario at a time
A proposed update keeps the live scenario's audience and collections. Change those on the live scenario itself
Proposed updates don't count towards your plan's scenario limit
The editor names the author and, for a proposed update, links to the scenario it will replace

To retire a scenario rather than change it, a reviewer selects Unpublish. It returns to Draft and disappears from learners.

Emails and history

Authors are emailed when their scenario is sent back and when it goes live (or when their proposed update replaces the live version). Assistant administrators see review counts in SimChat but don't receive emails.

Every state change and edit is recorded in the scenario's edit history - open it from the clock icon on the Scenarios page.

Updated on: 06/09/2026

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