Editor’s Note: The info in this blog post is outdated! For the latest information on the Discord Moderation and Safety, please visit https://discord-webhook-relay-6q9nx.thz.cool/safety-library.
Moderators play one of the most important roles on Discord: helping keep servers and the communities they hold safe. They’re often the unsung heroes who go above and beyond and make communities on Discord what they are.
Moderating a community on Discord means much more than wielding your mighty ban hammer and smiting those who mean to do harm: it means being responsible for fostering a space where you, your friends, and potentially hundreds of others can find belonging.
Many times, moderators are one of the first people to greet you when you join a community, making you feel at home as soon as you enter. The list of multi-faceted responsibilities that a good Discord moderator takes on, including running events and making sure the community runs smoothly, can be endless, and sometimes, thankless.
In our continued efforts to recognize and celebrate Discord’s most accomplished and capable community moderators, we are introducing the Certified Discord Moderator Badge!
Did You Say… a New Badge?
Yes, a new profile badge! As the uncle of a certain web-slinging hero once said, with great power comes great responsibility. As both community leaders and protectors of the realm, mods hold a lot of power within their respective Discords.
The Certified Discord Moderator badge is just a small portion of our grand plan to recognize and support those who have a direct hand in making communities on Discord the unique and amazing places we all know they are.
We want to recognize the expertise and efforts that some of our best moderators have made to help tell the world they’re one of the most experienced admins and mods on the platform with the brand new Certified Discord Moderator badge, seen below:
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This badge is awarded to moderators who can prove they’re the real deal. A Certified Discord Moderator is familiar with Discord’s rules and guidelines inside and out, an expert at throwing the best server events, and above all, an exemplary image of a community leader and moderator on Discord.
You may be thinking at this point “well, I’m doin’ a pretty good job moderating my server. I do all the things that a good moderator does, my members are pretty happy and my community could not be healthier. How do I get qualified for one of these shiny new badges?” Glad you asked.
Becoming a Certified Discord Moderator
There’s a lot that goes into being a great moderator — it’s a complicated position where you have to sometimes wear a lot of different hats and wear them equally well.
In some communities, the moderation team spreads out their mods into individual roles based upon their skillset. There may be a moderator that manages the team’s auto-mod bots, or a moderator that’s better at organizing hype game nights for the community to rally around.
Just because you don’t do it all, all at once, doesn’t mean that you aren’t eligible or qualified to be a Certified Discord Moderator. Being a great moderator is not a one-size-fits-all kind of job, so the application to be recognized for your expertise isn’t one either.
The journey to being a Certified Discord Moderator involves a few different steps, including some steps where we’ll be able to evaluate your skills on a more holistic basis to truly let you demonstrate your moderation prowess.
The requirements for the Certified Discord Moderator badge are as follows:
- Study the Discord Moderator Academy: The Discord Moderator Academy (DMA) is a resource chock-full of moderation and community building wisdom compiled by mods, for mods. Content in the DMA makes for a solid foundation of moderation knowledge that any Certified Discord Moderator should be familiar with.
- Take the Discord Moderator Academy Exam: Have you read the Discord Moderator Academy articles back to front? Left to right? Side to side? Cross-cross? Think you have a solid grasp on the ins and outs of the topics covered by the extensive catalog of moderation mentorship?
Take the Discord Moderator Academy Exam and see how your moderation know-how stacks up, which you can find within any Discord Moderator Academy article. This exam pulls directly from the materials presented in the Moderator Academy and is meant to challenge your decision-making skills and understanding of important moderation practices. Pass this test and you’ll get an invite to…
- Join the Discord Moderator Community: We’ve mentioned this server in our previous moderation-centric blog post and we’re finally opening it up to moderators who pass the Discord Moderator Academy exam. In short, it’s a server where some of Discord’s best moderators can exchange knowledge, provide peer support, and discuss the finer points of what it really takes to run a safe and successful server.
Within the Discord Moderator Discord, you’ll have opportunities to interact with both the Trust & Safety Team and Engineers who are interested in receiving direct feedback on projects and upcoming features. You may even have the chance to write an article for a future update to the Discord Moderator Academy and share your own expertise in our lexicon of mod wisdom.
- Become an Active, Engaged, and Contributing Member of the Discord Moderator Discord: The Discord Moderator Discord (on Discord) is an incredible hub and resource for anyone who’s passionate about furthering their skills and becoming an even stronger moderator.
It’s also a community — it’s not enough to just join the server, mute it, and forget about it forever. By joining the Discord Moderator Discord, you’re joining in on a collaborative effort with your moderation peers to not only level up yourself, but to advance the state of moderation on Discord as a whole.
Discord’s Community Moderation Team takes note of who’s actively engaging with their fellow members, and who’s participating in conversations around the server that demonstrate an eagerness to share their moderation experience and a desire for sharpening their moderation toolkit.
Active and engaged community members of the Discord Moderator Discord who demonstrate these traits for at least three months are eligible (but not guaranteed) to receive the Certified Discord Moderator badge.
This contribution doesn’t have a strict set of requirements. It’s not a list of things to mark off a checkbox to automatically get a badge. Just do what people do best on Discord: be a part of a community centered around a specific topic that you all are passionate about. In this case, moderation.
What comes next
Even if you don’t pass the exam the first go around, the process of reading through the Mod Academy and learning from your mistakes can be a catalyst for growth as a moderator. Being a part of the Discord Moderator Discord opens a whole network of not only invaluable educational resources, but moderator camaraderie and the opportunity to learn from first-hand experiences of the best moderators on the platform.
Along with the badge, the Discord Moderator Academy will receive its first batch of new content later this year, so keep an eye out there and on the Changelog for updates — we’re working on new resource formats and new ways to stay in-the-know about all things moderation on Discord.
We can’t wait to see you demonstrate your moderation chops on the exam, chat with you about how to properly get a server event started, and watch you earn your Certified Discord Moderator Badge.
Perhaps we’ll catch you on the Discord Moderator Discord soon, future Certified Moderator!
