Carouselling student class memberships

Introduction

This document explains a procedure for rotating the students of a set of classes, using a carousel approach e.g. with students in classes A, B and C, a carousel rotation could move the students thus:

- the students of class A move into class B, student of B move into C, students of C move into A

Procedure

1. Focus | School | Academic Structure | Curriculum Assignment by Scheme

2. Select scheme for rotation

3. If you have already assigned students to their initial classes, choose the date range appropriate for the second phase of the carousel. The end (“To”) date must be the day before the next stage starts. This may well be the last day of a half-term or other holiday. Now go to step 6

4. If you haven’t yet assigned students to their initial classes, choose a date range appropriate for the first phase of the rotation. This date range should extend from the first day of the academic year to the day before the second stage of the rotation (the latter may well be the last day of a half-term or other holiday). Make and save the necessary students assignments

5. Click on the magnifying glass at the end of the Effective Date Range field and select the date range appropriate for the second phase of the rotation, making sure that the end date is the day before the next stage, even if this is during school holidays

6. Click on Allocate… | Student Carousel Rotation Wizard then Next

7. Check that the date range you require is correct. The reference day should be the day before the start date of the date range. Click Next

8. Tick the groups involved in the Carousel and move them into the correct order for rotation using the Move Up and Move Down buttons. Click Next

9. Choose either Rotate Forwards or Rotate Backwards and click Next

10. Check the settings and click Next. You will then get a message saying it has completed. Click Finish. You can see the results by double-clicking a student to access their timeline.

11. Click Save to save the changes.

Repeat for other phases of the rotation as required.

Simon Wood, SIMS Team, May 2009

Splitting a double period between two teachers

Using Year Blanking Codes in the model

Overview

Some schools operate a cycle in which certain year groups do not have access to certain periods. The sixth form may have lessons in twilight periods not used by other year groups, for example. Split lunches can result in similar rules needing to be observed by the scheduling routines. As the concept of an extended school day becomes more common, many schools may need to consider the use of blanks.

In use

1. Change to the relevant year in the Model screen, right-click the appropriate band area and select Add Year Blanking Code from the menu:

T6 creates a dummy block for the band, which can be extended across other bands if required by using the Ctrl-drag technique on the block’s lower edge.

2. Enter the number of periods needing to be blanked (2, in this example):

As can be seen in the preceding graphic, the blanking block counts towards the curriculum total entered for this year group – 16 periods including the 2 blanks.

This block does not require staffing. When eventually the blank is scheduled, it will be automatically locked to the period(s) and cannot be unlocked. That is, it cannot be moved (although it can be deleted and placed somewhere else). If the entire school misses the same period (such as last period on Friday), then one method of tracking this is to create a one period blanking block for each year group, then schedule them all at the same period.

Simon Wood
eLIM, June 2013

Using Derived Years to create vertical blocks

Overview

Derived Years provide a mechanism for defining block(s) which serve more than one year group. These are often referred to as “vertical” blocks.

For example, a Sixth Form block may be required for students in years 12 and 13.

In use

The following example illustrates the process of creating an option block for year 12 band a and the whole of year 13. When this is exported to SIMS .net, the tick grid in Academic Management will automatically list students in 12a and 13 for placement in the C6 band and any associated classes.

1. Firstly, it is necessary to create a year group in T6 that can be used for the common sixth form structure.

	2. Create a new year group called C6 (common sixth form) and associate it with national curriculum Year 12 (it could have been 12 or 13). Do not edit the number of students belonging to this year.
	3. Right-click the Band area of the Model and select Add Derived from the menu displayed. The graphic illustrates the structure that has been created in year C6.

4. Assuming that it is intended for the common structure to serve Year 12 band a, and Year 13, change to each of these Year Groups and repeat step 2.

	5. Return to Year C6, right-click the derived block and select Derive From | 13:a 6. Repeat, this time selecting Derive From | 12:a
	What has been defined is the destination year C6 as being sourced from 13:a (94 students) and 12:a (49 students). Thus, any blocks created in the new band C6 will be expected to serve 143 students.

Suppose that the intention is to provide six groups of Citizenship for these 143 students.

7. Simply drag the subject Ci into the area used for blocks (just to the right of the derived structure). Define one period and create six groups.

The block in the preceding graphic has been given identifier C and title Citizenship.

8. Change to Year 12 and look at the derived structure.

The number of periods for band 12a is now 24 (whereas previously it was 23). In other words, the one period block in year C6 counts towards the entitlement of year 12, band a. The same applies to year 13.

In scheduling the sixth form structure, when the Citizenship block in year C6 is placed at a particular period, T6 will prevent any block serving 12a or 13a from being scheduled at the same time. This prevents double-booking of students. The auto-schedule routines also work to this system.

Simon Wood
eLIM, June 2013

Combing Charts - Introduction

Overview

The Combing Chart is an analysis tool that lets the timetabler carry out a feasibility check on the proposed staff assignments to classes in a single subject, or a number of subjects in the case of an entire department. It is currently normal procedure for Heads of Department to produce a simplistic version of a Combing Chart in the form of a spreadsheet.

Large departments tend to teach in blocks of half or a full year and teams of teachers are assigned to classes within each block. If the same teacher is assigned to two or more blocks, then these blocks cannot be scheduled simultaneously.

Departments that only just comb are considered inflexible, and may need to be scheduled before other departments. In a perfect situation, each large department would comb without exceeding the average loading of the staff. For example, where you have a cycle of 25 teaching periods, it would be ideal if each department combed into no more than 21 periods. If combing reaches 24 or 25 teaching periods this is not ideal and combing that exceeds the 25 teaching periods makes scheduling the timetable an impossible task.

By using the Combing Chart to simulate a number of different scheduling scenarios, you can clearly see where potential problems will occur before you spend a great deal of time actually trying to schedule the timetable.

In use

Select Tools | Combing Chart to display the Select Subjects dialogue.

All the subjects that have been used in the current Model are available for selection. Click the Clear All button to make an individual subject selection. If you want to try to analyse the proposed timetable structure using all available subjects, click the Select All button.

Alternatively, click the Department button to display the Select Department dialogue, then highlight the Description of the Department that you want to work with in the Combing Chart.

Click the OK button to continue, and the Combing Chart is displayed.

A Tour around the Combing Chart Page

The items to be fitted into the Combing Chart are shown in the list on the right-hand side of the page. Each item relates to a block within the block's build matrix. The bands, the block name and its attributes, i.e. the Staff and Rooms, for each item are also displayed in this list. The items are grouped by block and each block is colour coded so that it can be easily distinguished from others.

Every item is allocated a unique short code that is made up of the Year, the band or block identifier and a number, e.g. 10A:1, 7xy:13.

There are a number of ways that the items can be placed into the Combing Chart:

· Click and drag and individual item onto the Combing Chart.

· Hold down the Ctrl key and then click and drag multiple items from a block onto the Combing Chart.

· Click the Insert button to place all the items in the list onto the Combing Chart automatically.

When dragging items onto the Combing Chart, there are a number of things to be aware of:

· The possible destination cells in the Combing Chart ate shown with a black border.

· Items that would be displaced if the dragged items were dropped into their cells are shown with a black background.

· While the drag action is in process, the text inside the cells of any potentially displaced items displays the reason for the displacement, e.g. Band or a list of the conflicting attributes.

· If the drag cursor moves close to the edge of the chart area, the chart scrolls automatically.

Refer to the Nova-T6 handbook, or the eLIM Helpline, for detailed information relating to the functions available in the Combing Chart page.

If you click the Insert button to begin trying to fit the items into the grid, various items may be moved or 'shuffled' around the grid to enable the 'best fit'. Whilst this process is underway, a yellow progress bar is displayed at the bottom of the Combing Chart page detailing the item that is currently being 'fitted'.

Click the Abort button to stop the process at any time before it is complete.

When the shuffling is complete, the items in the grid are coloured in accordance with the block colours in the Model screen. Move the cursor over an item in the grid to view a tool tip displaying the names of the classes and the full list of attributes for the item.

If you want to keep the results of your Combing Chart analysis, click the Copy Chart button to display the Copy to Clipboard/Disk File dialog.

Simon Wood
eLIM, June 2013

Class appearing in SIMS .net as group

Symptoms

A linear group is reduced to a non-linear group and the group label is changed or deleted, but the original group name remains as the column heading in SIMS .net.

The correct class name does not appear in SIMS .net in the column heading in Academic Management, and the teacher’s initials are not shown.

When transferring the timetable to SIMS .net, the Curriculum Matching Wizard gives a message “The following groups have been inserted…”:

Cause

A group name change or the removal of a group name in Nova will not transfer to SIMS .net if it is done at the same time as the group is reduced to one class, nor will the change transfer to SIMS .net on any subsequent send.

Advice

IMPORTANT: If implementing this advice, note that careful checks must be made in the Curriculum Matching Wizard to ensure that all groups have retained the correct links. Some re-linking may be necessary where groups are being renamed.

Once a linear structure is created, then it is not removed even if the group is reduced to one cluster. This means that the teacher's name will not re-appear in brackets under the class name in block assignment.

The best that can be done, once the situation exists, is to rename the group to something appropriate, typically to reflect the subject name. This can be accomplished as follows:

1. In the Nova-T6 model, temporarily add another class to the group, with 0 periods, choosing any subject that starts with a letter alphabetically after the subject of the class which is to become the group label. This makes the cluster linear once more:

 

2. Send the timetable to SIMS .net. This will rename the group in SIMS .net as per the first (and required) subject in the cluster: Ma

3. Remove the temporary class from the model, making it once again a non-linear cluster of one class

4. Re-send the timetable to SIMS .net

Example

In this academic management screen, the column heading 7x/Hu1 is in fact the name of a linear group. The other columns show class names and teacher initials:

 

Here is the associated section of the Nova-T6 model which caused the situation. Note that the first row of the Maths block is a linear group because it contains a ‘cluster’ of more than one class. Nova-T6 automatically names this group 7x/Hu1 after the first class subject alphabetically:

Amending the model as below, and then resending, does not alter the situation in academic management; we still have a column headed 7x/Hu1. This is because the linear group structure cannot be removed from SIMS .net, once created:

Technically speaking, this does not cause a problem. The column 7x/Hu1 is a group containing the underlying class 7x/Ma1, which still exists. Ticking the 7x/Hu1 column automatically ticks the underlying class 7x/Ma1. This can be seen in academic management by:

1. Highlighting 7x/Maths in the list of schemes

2. Clicking the Down Level button

 

3. Open the revealed cluster, and note that we now see the class name and teacher (these were there all the time, but not visible because we were looking at group level):

 

So, not a problem from a technical point of view – if the group column is ticked, so will the underlying classes. Furthermore, it is the class names that will appear on student/teacher timetables, not group names.

However, the situation can be highly confusing for the operator doing academic management, especially if the group name bears no relation to the underlying subjects. To mitigate this, the linear group cannot be removed, but it can be renamed to something sensible, as explained previously.

Simon Wood, eLIM (SCC), July 2013