The role required to display search box in /user/index.php is currently set to 'moodle/course:bulkmessaging' $bulkoperations = has_capability('moodle/course:bulkmessaging', $context); ... if ($bulkoperations && $totalcount > ($perpage*3)) { echo '<form action="index.php"><div><input type="hidden" name="id" value="'.$course->id.'" />'.get_string('search').': '."\n"; echo '<input type="text" name="search" value="'.s($search).'" /> <input type="submit" value="'.get_string('search').'" /></div></form>'."\n"; } Displaying this search box should instead be restricted by something like '/moodle/site:viewparticipants' The simple fix is to change the above if statement to: if (has_capability('moodle/site:viewparticipants', $context) && $totalcount > ($perpage*3)) { echo '<form action="index.php"><div><input type="hidden" name="id" value="'.$course->id.'" />'.get_string('search').': '."\n"; echo '<input type="text" name="search" value="'.s($search).'" /> <input type="submit" value="'.get_string('search').'" /></div></form>'."\n"; }