September-November:
- Finalize school initiatives affecting next year’s staffing and scheduling. Examples might include, changing number of periods in a day, moving to a block schedule, changes of course offerings in your Career and Tech Education (CATE) department or advanced academic offerings.
- Update course catalogs to reflect changes for next year.
- Obtain Board approval for new initiatives, if necessary.
- If you are at a high school, meet with parents of eighth grade students regarding Personal Graduation Plans.
- Update secondary students’ Four-Year Plans.
December-January:
- Meet with all students to discuss course offerings for the following year. English or social studies classes are an excellent choice, as these classrooms are often grade-level homogeneous.
- Offer informational sessions for parents to ensure they are an active part of their student’s educational journey.
- Obtain master lists of special population students, including your feeder schools. Special education, 504, English language learners, dyslexia, gifted and talented, and over-aged students are some of the subpopulations you should identify.
- Set expectations with a hard deadline for counseling staff to enter course requests into your SIS. As a guideline, if your goal is to have your master schedule built by May, it will be advantageous to have all course requests finalized by the first of February. If you plan on building your schedule during the summer, have your course requests completed by Spring Break.
February:
- Finalize all students’ course requests in the SIS.
- Review enrollment lists to determine what courses will be dropped or will need to be stacked.
- For example, if a course has fewer than ten requests, a decision will need to be made to determine if you will still offer the course next year.
- You also have the option of stacking appropriate classes, which occurs when an instructor teaches two or more courses during the same period. This is commonly found in your CATE department. For example, an accounting class might have eight Accounting I students and five Accounting II students enrolled. These thirteen students will sit in the same classroom for the period.
- Run a report to locate students who might have too few, too many or potentially missing course requests for next year. When these students are identified, counselors should meet with each student individually to allow for other courses to be selected.
March:
- By this time, you have probably received your allotted FTEs (Full Time Equivalent, or teachers) for the next school year. Work with your school administrative team to decipher how to best utilize the total number of FTEs.
- Be prepared for teacher turnover. It is essential for your administrative team to know who is leaving at the end of the year, who is retiring over the summer, and who is threatening to leave because they are still angry at you for moving their conference time. Having an idea of who will be returning plays a huge role in your staffing plan!
- As they say in Shark Tank, KNOW YOUR NUMBERS! How many of your existing staff are returning, who do you need, and will you get to replace them this year?
- Have a good grasp on your projected student enrollment. Are you a fast-growing school, is your enrollment declining or will you stay constant next year?
- Hold onto these numbers. You will revisit them and put them into action once you start your build in the next few months.
April:
- Review courses with selective rosters. These courses have pre-identified students, such as athletics, marching band, Destination Imagination, AVID, etc. Have each coach or sponsor review and verify each roster with a hard deadline for making changes. These lists are extremely important to the master schedule and should be complete prior to beginning your build.
- Double check your SIS information. Like you did in February, run a report to locate students who might have too few, too many or potentially missing course requests for next year. This information must be as accurate as possible prior to beginning your master schedule.
- Now is a good time to provide students with their updated course requests. Communicate with parents to inform them that this a prime opportunity to finalize their child’s schedule. If you want to minimize summer schedule changes, complete this step!
- After communicating with parents, have counselors finalize any last-minute changes to course requests, ensuring requests are as clean as possible prior to scheduling.
May:
- This is where the puzzle starts! Now it’s time to start putting your collected pieces together. Before you get started, ensure the number of sections generated from course requests matches the number of sections that teachers are available. Refer to the staffing projections you prepared in March.
>>> 3 Secondary Planning Considerations for the New School Year
Building your school master schedule is not as overwhelming when you begin early in the school year. Mix in some Marzano flare and utilize backwards design. Develop your own Master Scheduling and Staffing YAG (year-at-a-glance) to meet your district and school parameters and goals. Start planning now – your current fall self will thank your future spring self!
September-November:
- Finalize school initiatives affecting next year’s staffing and scheduling. Examples might include, changing number of periods in a day, moving to a block schedule, changes of course offerings in your Career and Tech Education (CATE) department or advanced academic offerings.
- Update course catalogs to reflect changes for next year.
- Obtain Board approval for new initiatives, if necessary.
- If you are at a high school, meet with parents of eighth grade students regarding Personal Graduation Plans.
- Update secondary students’ Four-Year Plans.
December-January:
- Meet with all students to discuss course offerings for the following year. English or social studies classes are an excellent choice, as these classrooms are often grade-level homogeneous.
- Offer informational sessions for parents to ensure they are an active part of their student’s educational journey.
- Obtain master lists of special population students, including your feeder schools. Special education, 504, English language learners, dyslexia, gifted and talented, and over-aged students are some of the subpopulations you should identify.
- Set expectations with a hard deadline for counseling staff to enter course requests into your SIS. As a guideline, if your goal is to have your master schedule built by May, it will be advantageous to have all course requests finalized by the first of February. If you plan on building your schedule during the summer, have your course requests completed by Spring Break.
February:
- Finalize all students’ course requests in the SIS.
- Review enrollment lists to determine what courses will be dropped or will need to be stacked.
- For example, if a course has fewer than ten requests, a decision will need to be made to determine if you will still offer the course next year.
- You also have the option of stacking appropriate classes, which occurs when an instructor teaches two or more courses during the same period. This is commonly found in your CATE department. For example, an accounting class might have eight Accounting I students and five Accounting II students enrolled. These thirteen students will sit in the same classroom for the period.
- Run a report to locate students who might have too few, too many or potentially missing course requests for next year. When these students are identified, counselors should meet with each student individually to allow for other courses to be selected.
March:
- By this time, you have probably received your allotted FTEs (Full Time Equivalent, or teachers) for the next school year. Work with your school administrative team to decipher how to best utilize the total number of FTEs.
- Be prepared for teacher turnover. It is essential for your administrative team to know who is leaving at the end of the year, who is retiring over the summer, and who is threatening to leave because they are still angry at you for moving their conference time. Having an idea of who will be returning plays a huge role in your staffing plan!
- As they say in Shark Tank, KNOW YOUR NUMBERS! How many of your existing staff are returning, who do you need, and will you get to replace them this year?
- Have a good grasp on your projected student enrollment. Are you a fast-growing school, is your enrollment declining or will you stay constant next year?
- Hold onto these numbers. You will revisit them and put them into action once you start your build in the next few months.
April:
- Review courses with selective rosters. These courses have pre-identified students, such as athletics, marching band, Destination Imagination, AVID, etc. Have each coach or sponsor review and verify each roster with a hard deadline for making changes. These lists are extremely important to the master schedule and should be complete prior to beginning your build.
- Double check your SIS information. Like you did in February, run a report to locate students who might have too few, too many or potentially missing course requests for next year. This information must be as accurate as possible prior to beginning your master schedule.
- Now is a good time to provide students with their updated course requests. Communicate with parents to inform them that this a prime opportunity to finalize their child’s schedule. If you want to minimize summer schedule changes, complete this step!
- After communicating with parents, have counselors finalize any last-minute changes to course requests, ensuring requests are as clean as possible prior to scheduling.
May:
- This is where the puzzle starts! Now it’s time to start putting your collected pieces together. Before you get started, ensure the number of sections generated from course requests matches the number of sections that teachers are available. Refer to the staffing projections you prepared in March.
>>> 3 Secondary Planning Considerations for the New School Year
Building your school master schedule is not as overwhelming when you begin early in the school year. Mix in some Marzano flare and utilize backwards design. Develop your own Master Scheduling and Staffing YAG (year-at-a-glance) to meet your district and school parameters and goals. Start planning now – your current fall self will thank your future spring self!