Managing secondary scheduling involves a comprehensive series of steps, each integral to the overall process. Sequential completion of these steps, coupled with the assignment of due dates to each, is crucial for effective scheduling.
Below are the recommended steps and timeline for you to use for the scheduling process at your school.
1. Data Rollover (January) : This step is completed by MIS staff and will roll over all of your students from the current year to the upcoming year. During this process the students will have an enrollment line for the upcoming school year added to their enrollment record. Your district may also opt to roll your schools courses and sections from the current year into the upcoming year. This can be helpful as doing so will provide a starting point for building your master schedule.
2. Course Review/ Cleanup (February): Once the data rollover is complete, it's crucial to evaluate the courses scheduled for the upcoming school year. Identifying any courses that are not intended to be offered is essential, and they should be removed from the schedule accordingly. Furthermore, any new courses planned for inclusion should be added during this review process.
3. System Preference Review (February) : Your MIS staff will manage the system preferences in Focus. Work with them to make sure the scheduling preferences are configured as expected for the upcoming year.
4. Request Set Up (March) : Courses that will be requested should be reviewed to ensure all courses have a graduation subject assigned. If you will be allowing students to request courses, the course flag to allow student to request should be set.
5. Open Request Entry for Students/ Staff (March) : Open request entry for students/ staff. Make sure to identify and communicate the date request entry will close.
6. Close requests and Review Requests For Completion (April) : Once requests are entered guidance staff should review them to make sure all students have enough requests for a full schedule. FOCUS has tools like the Request Report that help make this easy.
7. Begin Building Teacher Master Schedule (April) : Whether you use the master schedule builder or roll and tweak, build your master schedule based on student demand.
8. Finalize Teacher Master Scheduler and Seat Students (May) : Use the tools in FOCUS, such as the builder reports, to determine when your master schedule is complete. Run the scheduler to seat the students in the master schedule you have just created
9. Finalize Student Schedules/Hand Schedule Remaining Students (June/July) : Once the bulk of your students have been fully scheduled, you can begin hand-scheduling some of the tougher to seat classes. Be on the lookout for newly enrolled students who were not included in the original schedule building.