Academic years

An academic year is the group of your academy's new course editions, with its own dates and closures. Courses stay the same (links, reviews, chat): the year adds to each one a new edition (a cycle), with its lessons, registers and recordings, and a new course version, in draft, that you publish when the year is ready. How versions work is explained in Versions and the academic year.

They are managed by the academy's Owner and Admins from Settings › Academic years.

What carries over to the new year

Lessons are generated from the timetable rules on the new dates, at the right local time even after the clock change, and skip the new year's holidays and closures.

The course's introduction lessons (the recorded ones without a date, such as the course presentation) apply to every year: the new year's students and teachers see them together with their year's lessons.

Recurring lessons

Every lesson that repeats in a course is a recurring lesson: weekdays, time, duration and the lesson's content. For courses that already existed it is worked out from the calendar: the last third of the year counts (so a mid-year timetable change applies to the next year), make-ups don't. If the timetable isn't clear (many lessons out of place) the recurring lesson has low confidence and appears in To fix as "Timetable rebuilt with low confidence".

In the wizard's Recurrences step you can correct a recurring lesson's days, time, duration and interval (not add or remove one). The correction applies to the new year and the following ones; the current year doesn't change, and the corrected lesson is no longer "low confidence". If the lesson is a convergence you're asked whether to correct every class: if you correct only yours, the convergence will have different times and appear in To fix.

Applies to: this year only or also in the baseline

When you edit a course lesson with This and following or All occurrences (from the calendar or the builder), the Applies to row appears:

• This year only (default): the change stays in this year. On an academic-year edition it stays in the edition only: it does not create a new course version;
• Also in the baseline (following years): the change also goes into the plan the next year is built from and, like any course change, into a draft version.

A change to a single lesson, suspensions, make-ups and substitutions always apply to this year only.

Convergences

A convergence is the same lesson in several courses (for example year-1 Maths for classes 1A and 1B). In the new year it stays one lesson shared by the chosen courses:

Example: year-1 Maths is shared by Liceo 1A, Liceo 1B and Serale 1. If you leave Serale 1 out of the new year, the lesson stays shared between 1A and 1B; the preview's Convergences changed box says so and Also include Serale 1 puts it back.

Prepare the new year

In Settings › Academic years press Prepare the new year. A step-by-step window opens:

1. Dates and closures: start and end of the year, the country's holidays (already in, you can remove some), closures and breaks, and the Open enrollment on live editions switch (on: see below).
2. Courses: the courses by space and folder, all ticked. A course left out doesn't enter the new year and its current year is untouched. Under each chosen course you see Starts from: the version the course starts from in the new year (the latest published one, or the latest draft if the course was never published); you can pick another one from the history. If a teacher has an open draft you see Draft by … of … not included with the Include the draft switch.
3. Recurrences: for each course its recurring lessons with days, time, duration, interval, teacher and confidence (low-confidence ones are highlighted). Correct opens the inline edit; the teacher is the subject and level teacher, and changing it applies to every lesson of that subject and level.
4. Convergences: the convergences among the chosen courses and each course's recurring lessons. Untick a convergence to turn it into one lesson per course, or a recurring lesson not to recreate it.
5. Changes to carry: the year's changes per course, with see difference. Those marked "Also in the baseline" are ticked.
6. Teachers: for each subject and level today's teachers (including the year's permanent changes). A change here applies from publishing.
7. Preview: how many lessons are generated, how many are skipped for closures, the conflicts (a teacher in two lessons at the same time, a one-off lesson on a closed day) and the Convergences changed.

With Create the year is born In preparation: editions are created in the background (you can close the page; if it stops, it resumes where it left off) and only staff can see them. Each course gets a new "Anno …" draft version: nothing is published at creation.

Open enrollment on live editions

The year's setting, in the Dates and closures step (also in Set up your school year), on by default. It applies to every live edition the year creates: they start with open enrollment, so people can enroll after the edition has started until the end of the year, with unlimited seats, and late joiners pay the initial fee and the rest over the instalments left. When it's off, the year's editions can only be bought before they start, as before.

It is saved on the year; each edition can still be changed one by one from the course builder (Cycles › Open enrollment). For lessons already held when a student joins, see the attendance registry.

The year's control room

Opening the year from the list you find:

• the preparation's progress;
• To fix: each item links to where it is fixed; a conflict that's fine as it is can be Ignored;
• the list of courses with the lessons created, the year version ("draft version", "teacher's draft not included") and, after publishing, the outcome: published, in review or error with the reason;
• PDF summary: what carried over and what didn't, course by course;
• Publish the year: enabled when nothing is left to fix (see below);
• Retry unpublished courses: after publishing, if some course failed;
• Cancel preparation (until the year is published): deletes the editions, lessons, calendars and versions created for the year, without touching earlier years or teachers' drafts;
• Close year (after publishing): the year becomes Archived.

Publish the year

Publish the year publishes in bulk the year versions of all courses. Before you confirm, the window tells you which courses go online now and which to review, and why:

The Publish without review the public courses where only dates change switch is on by default. The check is made course by course by comparing the year version with the published version: if anything changes besides cycles and dates the course goes to review even with the switch on.

A paid course needs the academy's Stripe Connect completed, as with any publishing; free courses don't. The previously published version becomes unpublished and stays in the history. Teachers get a notice, one each, and the chosen teacher changes apply from now.

If some course doesn't publish, the year still becomes active for the others: the course appears in To fix with the reason; fix it and press Retry unpublished courses. Courses already published or in review are not published again.

An edition for a single course

Adding a start date from a course page uses the same timetable rules: the edition is generated with its period's closures and its own lessons. If its dates fall in an academic year, the edition joins that year; otherwise it's an out-of-year edition (summer or intensive courses). This edition follows the course's normal publishing, without a year version.

Inside a course

Inside a course the edition is chosen as always, with the cycle (the start date). The Content and Attendance sections have the same cycle selector: lessons with their dates, the attendance register and recordings follow the chosen cycle, and the new edition's content can be edited without touching the archived year's. The chosen cycle stays in the page address, so a link opens the same edition.

The new edition's lessons are copies of last year's in the same position (first with first, second with second…). If the new year has more lessons, the extra ones come from the recurring lesson's template; if it has fewer, the last ones aren't copied.

The year selector

If your academy has at least one academic year, staff find the year selector in the sidebar, under the workspace: years In preparation, Current and Archived, plus All years. Courses, Home, Calendar and Assignments show only the chosen year's courses and lessons. The current year is chosen at first; the choice stays on this device. The selector doesn't change the cycle chosen inside a course.

Archived year

With Close year the year's editions become read-only: lessons, calendar events and attendance can no longer be changed (whoever tries gets a notice). They stay available from the year selector; for a printable copy use the control room's PDF summary.

Set up your school year

An academy with no courses yet finds the Set up your school year button in Home and in Settings › Academic years. In six steps:

1. Dates and closures of the year, as in the preparation;
2. Classes: how many grades and sections (1A, 1B…); names can be changed;
3. Subjects and teachers: subjects, their teachers and whether they have a level per grade;
4. Timetable: for each class the week's lessons (day, time, duration, subject);
5. Convergences: identical lessons in several classes (same subject and level, same time) proposed as a shared lesson; untick those that stay separate;
6. Summary: how many classes, subjects and lessons are created.

With Create you get the school's space with one folder per grade, one course per class, subjects and levels with teachers, and the academic year, prepared with the same engine as "Prepare the new year". You land in the control room: once the preparation is done, Publish the year also publishes the classes in bulk, right away (they are the academy's private courses).

Not there yet

• Students don't carry over to the new year: they enrol again. Promoting students to the next year may come later.
• Assignments are not copied into the new year.
• The new year can't add or merge convergences: they are kept, reduced or split.
• The Recurrences step doesn't add or remove recurring lessons: it corrects the existing ones.
• An edition created from a single course page doesn't reconnect by itself to convergences with the year's other courses.
• The student's My path page, with past years.