Generate Schedules

For the upcoming academic year, you must

• Create Academic terms

• Offer courses and create course sections with unique Identifiers. For example, you could have sections called Algebra I - 1 and Algebra I - 2.

  If academic groups are similar to the previous year, roll them over to the next year and then edit them.

• Associate teachers as resources for the course.

  • If a teacher can only teach a course during specific blocks, visit the course record to update their availability.

    • Go to your User Profile page, then select Schedule to add availability information.

    • The Course List and Faculty List are handy tools to review and update courses to ensure they are accurate each and every year.

• Set up schedule sets. If schedule sets are similar to the previous year, copy them from the current year and then edit them.

• Each course has a minimum and maximum number of enrollments. In order for the system to know how many students to enroll in each class, each course must have a minimum and target size specified. A maximum number is only necessary if you plan on the possibility of overriding target size to get better schedules for students.

• Courses are tied and linked as needed.

  • If courses are tied, consider whether the sections must also be tied to the same teacher.

    • If you manually set up the room or block, consider whether the sections should be tied to the same room and block.

    • If courses that are tied have multiple sections, consider whether you need the same number of sections of sections for each course.

  • If courses are linked, are they offered in subsequent terms?

• Restrictions for blocks and rooms are set up as needed.

• Courses are prioritized for schedules, though schedule managers can control what order requests are fulfilled in on the dialog and based on the settings in various locations such as department scheduling priority, request preference, etc.

To generate the master schedule:

1. Select Generate master schedule.

2. Select the school levels to include, if applicable.

3. Under Scheduling snapshots, choose whether to create Scheduling snapshots of the master and student schedules.

   Click here for more information on schedule snapshots.

4. Under Information to schedule:

   • Choose to Clear out existing data and/or ScheduleTeachers, Blocks, and Rooms.

   • Determine how to Schedule meetings if not all faculty and room data are available:

     1. Regardless of what else can be scheduled

     2. Only if rooms and faculty can be scheduled using the times

     3. Only if a room can be scheduled using the times

     4. Only if faculty can be scheduled using the times

5. Under Class scheduling order:
   

Each of the two class scheduling orders uses the same data to determine the order to schedule courses (course priority, department priority, and course classification). The primary difference between the two class scheduling orders is how course classification is emphasized.

Course classification refers to how many sections a course has. For example, a course with one section is a singleton, a course with two sections is a doubleton, and a course with three sections is a tripleton.

There are two Class scheduling order routines. Both routines follow the same procedure when scheduling singletons: All singletons (courses with one section) are scheduled first. Within the singletons, departments with higher priority are scheduled first, and based on the department, Generate Master Schedule will look at courses with higher priorities.

• Course classification is the most important data (default selection):
  Once all singletons are scheduled, Generate Master Schedule will schedule all doubleton (courses with two sections) using the same department-course priority logic. Then, all tripletons (courses with three sections) are scheduled using the same logic. Priority is placed on classes with fewer sections. Therefore, a doubleton has lower scheduling priority than a singleton, because the doubleton is dependent on schedule availability after singletons are scheduled. The system will continue scheduling courses by course classification, in ascending order, until all classes are scheduled.

• Priority is put on all the data of a course (classification, priority, and department scheduling preference):
  Once all singletons are scheduled, Generate Master Schedule will schedule a doubleton using following the same logic. After the doubleton has been scheduled, the system will schedule a tripleton using the same logic. Priority is balanced between classes with more than one section. The system will then alternate between doubletons, tripletons, and so forth, in ascending order, until all classes are scheduled.

6. Under Settings to follow:

   • Keep teachers in homeroom if available on course :

     Enable this if include homerooms for teacher resources is enabled for courses you added via the Departments & courses tab (see the Schedule settings when adding or editing a course).

   • Faculty target classes per course:
     Select Follow to determine if Target # of sections should be followed. If Ignore is selected, then Generate Master Schedule will not schedule more than the Max # of sections.

   • Faculty max classes per day:
     Select Follow if GMS should adhere to scheduling no more than the number of classes under Core > People Finder > Schedule > Settings > Edit > Maximum classes per day for faculty.

7. Under Scheduling rules to follow:

   • Choose how to handle Scheduling rules found under Scheduling setup:

     • Follow:
       Scheduling rules will be stringently adhered to. If they cannot be followed, then GMS will not schedule the course.

     • Try:
       Scheduling rules will be tentatively adhered to. If only some of the requirements of a rule can be satisfied, then GMS will still schedule the course based on the best possible outcome. For example, say a rule involves a teacher, block, and room, but only the block and room aspects can be satisfied, then GMS will schedule the course with a different teacher while following the other rules.

     • Ignore:
       Scheduling rules will not be followed when scheduling.

8. Under Courses to include:

   • Select to include All courses or Selected courses based on one of the following criteria:

     • Department: Select a department from the dropdown menu that appears when you select this option. You can choose additional departments if needed.

     • Grade level: Select a grade level from the dropdown menu that appears when you select this option. You can choose additional departments if needed.

     • Specific courses: Search for a course in the search bar that appears when you select this option. You can select multiple courses if needed.

     • List: Select Open, then select the course list and select Open again.

9. Select Generate when finished.

   Hitting a snag? Getting error messages? Check the help topic Troubleshoot Student Request Issues.

Once you have generated the master schedule, select View master schedule to see what the newly created class schedule looks like. Additional data can be viewed either from Reports or by selecting one of the five statistics under Master Schedule such as the number of missing rooms, missing blocks, and more. Schedule managers can adjust and fill in these holes from here as well.

For a detailed breakdown of the results from Generate master schedule:

1. Select More actions, then View results.

2. Review the following areas:

   • Successful sections
     
     A percentage showing all of the sections with all meeting times, teachers, and rooms scheduled. An actual number is also given as well.

   • Process statistics
     
     Number of sections included and the amount of time elapsed.

   • Sections still missing information
     
     Sections that still need teachers, meeting times, and/or rooms scheduled.

   • Criteria selected
     
     The options used to generate the master schedule.

   • Diagnostics
     
     When the process started and when it ultimately completed. Schedule and platform managers are also able to select Run again, as well as generate additional data files.

Select View previous runs to see data about previous Generate Master Schedule runs.

Filter results by selecting a view category from the immediate drop-down. Each view will refine the results that appear in the Master Schedule. Select the filter button , after selecting the desired view from the drop-down, to further refine the Master Schedule to display precise results.

After you generate the master schedule, use the Conflict Matrix to view courses with potential scheduling conflicts. For each type of conflict, you can view the course name, grade level, number of students affected by the conflict, and the courses that each course conflicts with. Conflicts are categorized as:

• Singletons - A single course on a student’s schedule conflicts with at least one other course the student has requested.

• Doubletons - Two courses on a student’s schedule conflict with other courses the student has requested.

• Tripletons - More than two courses on student’s schedule conflict with other courses the student has requested.

To resolve or reduce course conflicts, add or edit class sections.

When you edits the information for a class section, the changes save automatically.

Before generating schedules or making changes to scheduling data, schools using Scheduling have the option to create a scheduling snapshot. These snapshots will save scheduling data, and can be restored if changes need to be undone or additional changes need to be made. Scheduling snapshots cannot be restored if attendance or grades have been recorded.

For more information, check out our scheduling snapshots help page.

Schedule managers can drag and drop classes on a Master Schedule in a simple grid format. If you are attempting to make a change that creates a scheduling conflict, the Master Schedule will let you know.

While logged in as a schedule manager, go to Scheduling, then Requests and schedules, Overview, and View master schedule.

When using a desktop or laptop computer, you can click anywhere except the context menu to “grab” a course tile. Let go of the tile after you’ve dragged it into the schedule block you want, and the system will automatically check for conflicts.

• If attendance already exists for any student in a class you are attempting to move, the following error message will appear: “Attendance exists for one or more students in this class. Block cannot be changed.”

• You can view the Master Schedule By teacher, By course, By room, and By student. In each mode, the Master Schedule checks for conflicts every time you move a tile.

• If you move a class onto the row of a teacher who was not previously associated with that class, the teacher’s role will be updated accordingly.

• The Master Schedule will continue to respect any filter settings you apply. For example, if the filter is set to only display courses that have a faculty member scheduling conflict, and you make a change that removes the conflict, the course will disappear from the filter view. Turn off the filter to see that course again.

The drag-and-drop feature can override the settings your school chose for a course, but the interface will double-check to make sure you want to do it. If you are trying to move a class into a schedule block that was not initially checked for that course, you will get the following message: “The course you have selected was not set up to take place during this block. Are you sure you want to continue?” Choosing to continue here will not produce an error.

Once a Master Schedule has been generated, you are able to view the results at a later date. Each output can also be compared against other outputs to observe differences in each run's # of Sections and Success Rate.

To view Previous Master Schedule Runs:

1. Navigate to Academics > Scheduling > Requests and schedules. This will open the Overview tab.

2. Select Master Schedule > More actions > View results.

3. Select View previous runs, located below the title of the page.

4. Configure the filters as necessary.

5. Select the blue hyperlink within the Status column of the desired run.

   The same principle can be applied for viewing previous runs of Student Schedules by returning to the Overview tab, going to the Student schedule tile, selecting More actions, then View results.

After generating the master schedule, you can review the total number of open seats available in each section of a course. Use this information to verify whether there are enough available seats or whether additional sections need to be moved or added to meet the needs of students who requested the course.

We recommend taking a look at the block totals first to ensure a nice balance across all of the blocks or to make sure those blocks that need more seats have them. For added detail regarding what makes up those numbers, expand each section to determine if the number of sections can be changed based on the resources available.

From Overview, under Master schedules, select More actions, then View total seats. A grid appears and shows the number of students who need to be scheduled for each department or grade level.

To view details about course sections, expand the department or grade level row. In the course row, the grid shows the numbers of existing sections for each block.

• To edit the available sections for each block, select the corresponding number in the grid.

• To quickly review the course name and section ID, hover your cursor over the number in the grid for a course by block.

Once you have generated a master schedule and student course requests have been entered, you can use Generate student schedule to assign students to courses according to a customizable list of priorities.

1. Select Generate student schedule.

2. Select the Terms and school levels to include.

3. Under Scheduling snapshots:

   • Choose whether to create scheduling snapshots of the master and student schedules

     Click here for more information on schedule snapshots.

4. Under Information to schedule:

   • Choose to Clear student enrollments to remove existing student enrollments before the schedule is created.

   • Choose to Include alternate requests when necessary if you would like the system to schedule alternate requests when a student's first choice is unavailable.

5. Under Settings to follow:

   • Click and drag the listed criteria into the order of priority you would like to follow when generating the student schedule. To ignore one of the criteria, select the checkmark to remove it.

   • For the enrollment targets and room capacity restrictions, select Follow or Ignore.

6. Under Scheduling rules to follow, determine whether pre-established scheduling rules should affect student schedules. You have three options for each rule:

   • Follow: Generate Student Schedule will only schedule a student if all conditions of a rule can be met.

   • Try: GSS will schedule a student as long as some of the conditions of a rule can be met.

   • Ignore: The scheduling rule will no be followed when scheduling.

   For example, if you require students who take Algebra to take a complementary course in the following term (Geometry), then setting Follow for Linked courses would enforce the corresponding rule.

   Likewise, if you require certain courses to occur at the same time, you would set Follow for Tied courses. An example of a Tied courses might be an English course and a History course. Both, together, might make up an American Studies course, but are taught by individual teachers at the same time in the same room, block, and section. This solution would allow for this scenario to be automated, and for students to be enrolled in both courses accordingly.

7. Under Courses to include:

   • Select to include All courses or Selected courses based on specific criteria.

8. Under Students to include:

   • Select to include All students or Selected students based on specific criteria.

9. Select Generate when finished.

Running into errors? Check for solutions using the troubleshooting guide, Troubleshoot Student Request Issues.

With student enrollments, schedule managers can edit students’ schedules to help fulfill any requests the process couldn’t or potentially find any alternates to get complete schedules.

For more information on how to work with student enrollments, make sure to visit our help page.

From a student's record, Parents and students can select View Full Scheduleto run two schedule reports:

• Student Schedule By Day Name

• Student Day Name (Grid)