Jan 23, 2018

We use the terminology of “a round” to refer to the process of requesting a selection from students.  This can be a selection of sports or co-cirriculars, or a selection of academic subjects or electives.  It can apply to the entire student body or a particular year level.  The rest of this article explains the process and options for creating a round.

Pre-requisites

Before you start this process you should have your subject lists and student data loaded.  If you haven’t completed those two steps then read the previous articles, the creation of the round requires that this information is already loaded and ready.

You will need a security level of Sobs administrator in order to create new subject selection rounds.

Creating the round

Click on the ‘Rounds’ link in the Main menu – this will display a list of any existing rounds for your school.

On the top right of the page you will find a button “Add round” – click this button.

1. Add a description of the round – this might identify the purpose for the round and the year levels it applies to.  For example: ‘Subject selections for 2014 Yr10’,  ‘2014 Co-cirricular selections’, etc
2. A list of year levels taught at your school should appear next – check the year levels that this round will apply to.  Note, the year levels selected would be the students current year level.  For example, if you were scheduling a round for next year’s ‘Yr10 subject selection’ this would typically apply to current Yr9 students, so you would check the Yr9 box.
3. Date and times for student access:
   1. The ‘open’ date and time indicate when students will be able to select this round on the student interface.  Prior to this date and time the student may be able to access the system but they will not be able to select this round (there may for example be other rounds that are valid for them to access).
   2. The ‘stop’ date and time indicate when the students will no longer be able to register their selections – they will still be able to login and access their selections but they will not be able to make any changes.
   3. The ‘close’ date and time indicate when the students will no longer have access to this round.
4. Click the ‘Save’ button to continue
5. You should now see the round you created in a list with other current rounds.
6. In the ‘Managers’ column you will find a “+” icon – click this icon to add managers to this round.  Staff will generally not need access to this round, however in general all staff with Sobs logins will be able to access the round and assist students with making selections.  Only ‘managers’ however will be able to edit the round or make modifications to the subjects or rules.  Add appropriate people as managers.  At this point typically the round managers will take over completing the configuration, you can provide them login details and a link to this article.
7. Click on the ‘Actions’ button at the far right of the page (if there are multiple rounds listed select the ‘Action’ button for the appropriate round you are configuring)
8. If no further configuration has been completed you should see an option “Continue setup” – click this option
9. The number of semesters or number of terms depends very much on what the students are being required to select.  If the selection is in regard to full-year subjects then you should enter “1” and we can later modify the term ‘Semester’ to ‘Year’.  If the selection allows students to select different subjects for the first half and second half of the year then enter “2” and we will keep the terminology of ‘Semester’.  If the selection allows for different options in each term then you might choose “3” or “4” depending on the number of terms your school has.
10. The number of subject lines can vary depending on the number of options you have available.  It is not necessary to include compulsory subjects, however you may choose to include these if you desire.  The number you enter will typically reflect the number of optional subjects the student should select for the first semester or first term.  Later you will discover options that allow you to group multiple selections into a single line, however for now let’s assume one subject per line.
11. You should now see a table display with the number of semesters being the number of rows, and the number of lines being the number of columns (with an additional column indicating the semester value).
12. Modify the ‘semester’ name as required.  Mouse over the text ‘Semester1’ and you will see a ‘Pencil’ icon appear – click this icon to edit the name for this row.
13. If you find you have created more rows than are required you can at this point delete a row by click the ‘Cross’ icon that appears when you mouse over the ‘Semester1’ title.
14. Each cell of the table contains the text “Req=1 Opt=0” – this indicates the number of selections required in this particular cell.  By default the student will be Required to select 1 subject from this cell, and there are no Optional selections.  Generally when selecting subjects for the following year you will require the student to select just one from each line, however if selecting co-cirriculars there will be a varying number of Required and Optional selections.  Adjust the values appropriately by mousing over the text – a ‘Pencil’ icon will appear. Click the ‘Pencil’ icon to edit the values for Required selections and Optional selections.
15. In each cell you will also see a “+” icon – clicking this icon will allow you to begin adding subjects to this cell.
    1. The first select box will show a list of categories – click on a category to show the subjects
    2. The subjects list includes an option “* Select all subjects” which actually means “select all subjects in this category”.  Each subject listed will then be included as an option in the current cell.  Otherwise selecting an individual subject will add this subject to the current cell.   Below the list of subjects is a ‘Back to category’ button allowing you to return to the list of categories.
    3. When you select a subject you will be prompted for minimum and maximum numbers.  For many subjects these will not be required and you can simply click ‘Save’ to ignore these values.  For elective subjects where you may have a minimum required and a maximum allowed then enter the appropriate values.  This can also apply to sport, in particular the minimum required to form a team.
    4. The subject will then be listed in the cell.
    5. Mousing over the subject will display a ‘Cross’ icon – clicking the icon will remove the subject from the cell.
    6. Continue adding subjects to each cell in the first row.
    7. Often the subjects available in the first semester are repeated in the second semester, or they may be very similar and only require minor modifications.  We have added a shortcut to enable the subjects to be copied from the first semester to the second semester cell – by clicking the ‘Circular arrow’ icon in the second semester cells.
16. The final row (below the table) is for adding additional rules to the processing.  Our aim here is to identify when the student has completed all of the selections necessary while also following the selection rules.  There are many examples of rules such as, students must select at least one subject from a particular category, or, students must select different subjects between the first and second semester.  For further information on the rules please see the help article titled “Selection rules”
    1. Click the “+” icon to add a rule to the current line.
    2. Some of the rules are straight forward, for example “No repeats” means that you cannot repeat a subject in the second semester, the system will force the student to select a different subject.  Other rules require additional information, for example “Require subject” or “Require category” will prompt with a list of subjects or categories that you will need to select from.
    3. Mousing over a rule while display a ‘Pencil’ and ‘Cross’ icon allowing you to edit or delete the rule.

Testing the round

To test your round it is helpful to have a ‘Test’ student in the system.

Click on the ‘Students’ link in the Main menu, search for your ‘Test’ student.  If necessary adjust their year level so that the round button appears for this student and click the round button.  This will take you to the subject selection screen as it will appear to the students.  You can now try making various selections and check that the rules are working correctly.