3.8 Activities and excursions

The school's teams, ensembles and clubs, who is on each one, the rounds in which families choose, and the trips that take children away from school.

Written forFront officeTeacherChild safety officerPrincipal and executiveHead of house or year

What it is for

Activities and excursions is where the school keeps its co-curricular life. It records each season, the teams, ensembles and clubs inside it, the students and adults on each roster, the trainings and fixtures, and each trip the school runs.

The module keeps two records you can rely on later. The first is the roster as it stood on any day, so a student's co-curricular history survives a change of team. The second is the list of who went on a trip, written when the bus left, with the consent and the working with children check read for each person at that moment.

Who uses it

The front office runs the module day to day. A teacher who coaches sees the activities they supervise. The child safety officer and the principal can also put adults on an activity. Other roles read.

In plain words, the capabilities are: reading rosters (activities.roster.read), running rosters (activities.roster.write), staffing an activity (activities.staffing.write), reading and running excursions (activities.excursion.read and activities.excursion.write), writing season comments (activities.comment.write), and reading and running selection rounds (activities.selection.read and activities.selection.write).

Key ideas

Season

A stretch of the year, with a first and last day, in which activities run, such as Term 1 sport.

Activity

A team, ensemble or club in a season. It has a name, a kind, a code, a venue and a number of places.

Roster

The students on an activity, each with a role such as Participant, Captain, Vice-captain or Cox. Removing a student ends their place from that day and leaves the earlier rosters as they were.

Staffing

The adults on an activity, each as Coach, Manager, Supervisor or Accompanying. An adult is a member of staff or an external adult, and Kestrel reads their working with children check when you add them.

Event

A training, fixture, rehearsal, performance or meeting on an activity. A fixture has an opponent and is home, away or neutral.

Selection round

A window in which families or students rank their choices of activity. It runs through four stages: Not yet open, Taking choices, Closed and Confirmed.

Excursion

A trip away from school, or a visit that comes in. A trip is an Excursion, Incursion, Camp or Tour, and moves through the phases Proposed, Approved, Declined, Departed, Returned and Cancelled.

Who went

The list written when a trip is marked as departed. It shows each child's consent and each adult's working with children check as they were at that moment.

• 3.9 Messages and consents

Screens

The Activities area in the console has three tabs: Seasons, Selection rounds and Excursions. You see a tab only when you hold its read capability.

• Seasons

  /app/activities

  The seasons and each team, ensemble and club in them, with the number of students and adults on each. Search by name, code or venue. From here you open a season and create an activity.

  Needs activities.roster.read

• An activity

  /app/activities/[id]

  One activity, with its Roster, Staffing and Events. You add a student, add an adult, schedule an event, cancel an event with a reason, remove a student or adult, and hand an adult's place to someone else. Season comments are written here as well.

  Needs activities.roster.read

• Selection rounds

  /app/activities/selections

  Each round, newest first, with its window, the number of choices each child ranks and how many have responded.

  Needs activities.selection.read

• A selection round

  /app/activities/selections/[id]

  One round: who can choose, the places Kestrel proposes, the children without a place, the waiting lists and the confirmation.

  Needs activities.selection.read

• Excursions

  /app/activities/excursions

  All excursions, camps, incursions and tours with the decision on each, how many are going and how many are without consent.

  Needs activities.excursion.read

• A trip

  /app/activities/excursions/[id]

  One trip: its facts, the decision, the families' consent, medical confirmation, who is invited, the list of who went and what has happened to it.

  Needs activities.excursion.read

• Print the bus list

  /app/activities/excursions/[id]/bus-list

  A printable list of each child on the bus and the consent read for them. It is offered once the trip has left.

  Needs activities.excursion.read

• Print the missing-consent list

  /app/activities/excursions/[id]/missing-consent

  A printable list of each child with no consent in force, with who may give one.

  Needs activities.excursion.read

Run a season and its rosters

1. Open Activities. On the Seasons tab, choose "Open a season", give it a name, a first day and a last day, and save.
2. Choose "Create an activity". Pick the season, name the activity, choose its kind, and add a code, a venue and the number of places.
3. Open the activity. Under Roster, choose "Add a student", pick the student and their role, and save.
4. Under Staffing, choose "Add an adult". An adult can be a member of staff or an external adult. Kestrel reads whether their working with children check is current.
5. Under Events, choose "Schedule an event" for a training, fixture, rehearsal, performance or meeting.

To take a student or adult off an activity, choose "Remove" beside them. They are off the roster from now on and still appear on earlier rosters. To cancel an event, choose "Cancel" and give the reason, which stays with the event.

When a coach leaves mid-season, choose "Hand over" beside them and name who is taking over and the day. The first adult stays on the record up to that day, and the new adult is on it from the start of that day in the same role. The new adult needs a current working with children check.

Selection rounds

A selection round lets families, or students, rank the activities they want. Kestrel then proposes who gets each place, and the rosters are filled when you confirm.

1. Open the Selection rounds tab and choose "Open a round". The school needs at least one season first.
2. Name the round, choose the season, and choose whether the family or the student ranks the choices.
3. Set the number of choices (from one to ten), when the round opens and closes, and the tie-break: the older year level first, returning members first, or a ballot.
4. Under "Who can choose", limit the round by year level, campus, house, or boarders and day students. Leave these empty and all students can choose.
5. Save. The round is Not yet open until its opening time, then Taking choices.
6. When the round has closed, open it and read the proposed places. If an activity has more children than places, Kestrel tells you how many to move. Change a child's place with the control beside their name, and choose "Undo my moves" to start again.
7. Read Without a place and Waiting lists, then choose "Add them to the rosters" and approve. Confirming writes a roster place for each child and tells each family where their child stands.

Excursions from proposal to return

Teachers propose trips on the excursion request form. The office can also choose "Propose a trip" on the Excursions tab. A proposed trip waits for a decision.

1. Open the trip and choose "Record a decision". Approve it, or decline it with a reason. The decision is recorded in the trip's history.
2. Check "Who it is for". Each line names a group, such as year-level:7 or activity:ROW-1ST-VIII. Under "Who's invited" you can add or remove a single student.
3. Choose "Ask families" to ask for consent by a deadline. Add an optional document, such as an itinerary, which the family opens before answering. You can set a date from which the ask shows in the portal.
4. Choose "Ask the families to confirm medical details" if the trip needs it. The page shows how many families have confirmed since you asked.
5. Watch the table of children still waiting on a yes. Choose "Ask again" to ask only the families who have not been asked yet. Where a child's consent is in question, use the "Consent in question" table and "Record decision" to say whether the child goes.
6. Before the bus leaves, print the missing-consent list. Choose "Mark as departed and save the list" when it leaves. That writes the list of who went.
7. Print the bus list. If a child must come off, choose "Remove from the list" and give the reason.
8. When the trip is back, choose "Mark as returned".

Kestrel warns you when a trip's record contradicts itself, for example a trip marked as returned that was never marked as departed.

• 2.8 An excursion
• 4.3 Answering the school
• 3.6 Medical

Tasks

• Open a season and create an activity.
• Put students and adults on an activity and schedule its events.
• Hand an adult's place to someone else on a given day.
• Write a student's season comment for their report.
• Open a selection round, check the places and confirm it.
• Propose a trip and record the decision.
• Ask families for consent and for confirmation of medical details.
• Print the missing-consent list, depart the trip and print the bus list.
• Mark a trip as returned.

Journeys

This module takes part in one journey: an excursion, from the proposal to the printed lists. Selection rounds and a student's trips also show on the family's page for each child.

• 2.8 An excursion
• 4.2 A child's page

Settings

Two areas in Settings change how the module behaves.

• 5.5 Module settings

Training notes

• Who needs it: the front office and each teacher who coaches. The child safety officer and the principal need the staffing and excursion sections.
• Suggested length: forty-five minutes, with the selection round shown on a baseline season.
• Practise on the test school: run a season, confirm a round, then take a trip through to the bus list.