The next step is to set up your Year Groups and Registration forms for next year. This step is required, but you can return to it once completed to make further edits.
How long will it take?
This step usually takes schools at minimum 1 hour. We recommend booking out an afternoon to complete this step, as it can take a while to assign staff, move students around and manage any missing enrolments for students.
1. Copy year groups and registration forms
Go to School > School Structure > School Year Setup and click on step 3.
Please note that your promotions will apply based on what is chosen here, and will not be updated if you move students between registration forms. For example, if you promote 7A into 8A, then move a student into 7B, they’ll still be promoted into 8A.
Once you complete this step, Primary Guardians of your applicants will be able to log in to Parent Portal (if you have this set up) to see and update details of their child once you send out their welcome email.
First, choose which year groups and registration forms to copy over to next year by clicking in the first field.
Top Tip: Don’t worry if your registration forms will have different names next year. Just copy over the number of forms you will need, then change the names later - you can see how to do this here: Change registration form and register name
Untick any year groups and registration forms you don’t want to copy over, then click Copy Year Groups. If you untick a year group but leave a registration form for the year group ticked, the registration form will still be copied, but it will not be linked to a year group.
You can also choose whether to copy over registration forms not linked to a year group.
Editing registration forms
Click on a registration form to link to a year group.
In this example, I've clicked on the Year 10 registration forms, as they weren't linked to a year group when copying them over.
You can also link multiple year groups to a registration form, for example, if you register all your nursery students together.
Adding more Year Groups or Registration forms
You can add additional Year Groups or Registration forms if needed by clicking +Add. You can also do this from Students > Enrolment.
2. Assign tutors to year groups and registration forms
Click the Assign Tutors field to choose the staff members you would like to assign as heads of year and registration forms. Arbor will pre-fill these fields based on your setup this year.
- You can amend them if you wish by clicking the X button next to a name and adding a new name from the list (if you already have a staff profile set up for them).
- When you have chosen your tutors, click the green Assign Tutors button.
If you know there will be staffing changes but don’t know who will be teaching each class, you can assign the staff you know will be registration tutors and leave the forms with no tutor yet confirmed blank. You’ll need to assign the tutors from the class page when you do know, click here to see how: Change teachers
If you’ve left a registration form with no tutor, you’ll see a message telling you that some year groups and forms do not have tutors assigned.
Make a note that this will need to be entered when you do have the information. Click here to see how: Change teachers
Add or edit form tutors
Click on a registration form to change or add teachers as Form Tutors, or to link to a year group.
Please note: If you want to change teachers after you’ve already completed Step 6 of New School Year Setup, you’ll need to also add the tutor to the registers using these instructions: Change teachers
Add or edit a head of year
Click on a year group to add a Head of Year.
3. Promote year group students
The next step is to Promote Year group Students by clicking this next field.
Choose which year groups to promote students into. For example, below you can see all Year 10 students will be moved into Year 11.
- If only some students are moving up (such as for nursery), promote the whole year. You can then move the students who are remaining in nursery back in the ‘tweak’ step later.
- If you’ll be splitting classes, promote the whole year. You can then move the students who will be in a different class in the ‘tweak’ step later.
You can also see that your highest year group is not automatically promoted. You can leave that field blank, then click Promote.
When promoting your year groups in Arbor, you will always be at least one short.
4. Enrol Applicants
Houses and Applicants
You may want to create your houses for the next academic year before you enrol your applicants, to allow you to assign them to the relevant groups quicker.
- You can complete Step 5 - Houses, then return back to this step to enrol your applicants into year groups, registration forms and their houses.
- Alternatively, you can assign students to houses using the final Review and check.
In this step, you’ll be able to enrol your Applicants into Registration Forms and year groups, as you’ve now set them up.
If you haven’t yet added your applicants to Arbor and finished processing them, you won’t be able to enrol them yet. When you click the 4. Enrol Applicants option, you’ll see the below message.
You can use one of our 3 methods (shown in this article) to add these students to your site, then make and accept offers for the applicants who you expect to start in September - take a look at this article for the process: Applicants and admissions - Adding, enrolling and sending communications
Once you’ve completed steps 2-5 in the article linked above, you’ll be able to enrol your Applicants to be in the correct year groups and registration forms. Click the Manage Applicants button or go to In Students > All Students > Applicants > Select intake season > Applicants and select the intake season.
Make sure all the students you want to enrol have the Status of Offer Accepted.
- Tick the students who have accepted their offers.
- Click the Bulk action button to assign them to a year group.
- Repeat, and assign them to a registration form.
When you assign applicants to a registration form, this will automatically also assign them to a year group, and potentially override a year group already input. If the registration form is linked to multiple year groups, it will choose the one that was set up first.
We recommend checking that students have been assigned to the right year group before enrolling them. If they are not, you can repeat the Assign applicants to year group option to re-add them to the right year group.
Finally click Enrol students. The students will then be enrolled in the Applicants section.
In the New School Year Setup the 4. Enrol Applicants section should also now be marked as complete.
If any remaining applicants have accepted a place but haven’t yet been enrolled, click the 4. Enrol Applicants option within Step 2 of the New School Year Setup to enrol these applicants.
Please note that this will not automatically enrol them into a Year Group and Registration form. If you haven’t done this for these students, you should first follow the instructions shown above.
5. Review and tweak year group enrolments
The next step is to make any changes to the year group a student has been automatically promoted to if necessary. It is an optional step.
Click a student’s name to edit the enrolment, or select multiple rows and use the Bulk action button to change the student's year group. Click the Back button to return to the New School Year Setup.
Top Tip: You can only edit a student’s future enrolment from this page. If you need to change their current enrolment, use the Enrolment section on the Student Profile.
6. Promote registration form students
The next step is to promote Registration Form students from this year’s registration forms into their forms for next year. Don't worry if you at this point are not sure which students belong in which new registration forms - you move students around later.
In the slide over, select which registration form students should be promoted to for next year.
- If you have any registration forms without a year group assigned, you'll need to add them before you complete this: Change the year group linked to a registration form
- We recommend you promote each Registration Form to the form that the majority of students will be in next year. You can move individual students to different classes if required in the next step.
7. Review and tweak registration form enrolments
The last step is to make any changes to the registration forms a student has been automatically promoted to if necessary. It is an optional step.
Click on the cell and a page will load for the first year group in your school. Select the year group you wish to make changes to by clicking on the top right-hand corner and selecting the year group from the drop-down. You can either:
- Click on the cell containing the class information. A drop-down will appear offering the choices of classes for their year group. Select the class you wish to move them to.
- Select multiple rows and use the Bulk action button to change the student's registration form.
Please note: You can only move students to registration forms in the same year from here. To move a student to a reg form in a different year, they’ll need to be added to the year group.
Resolving students without an enrolment
If you have any students who were not assigned a year group this academic year, they will not have been promoted to the next year group during Step 2. Instead, these students will appear in the Review section.
Enrolling attending students
If they will be attending your school next year, you will need to add them to a year group and registration form. Click the student’s name to visit their profile and assign them to a year group and registration form.
First, change the academic year to next year. In the Enrolments section for this year, click +Add to add their enrolment into the required year group etc.
Removing students who will not be attending
To off-roll leavers if they will not be attending your school next academic year, you will need to delete or end their enrolment. Click the student’s name to visit their profile.
Click their enrolment in your school. In the slide over, click the orange Edit button.
You can then:
- Un-enrol the student if they no longer attend by clicking Unenrol Student.
- Delete their enrolment completely by clicking Delete if the student never attended your school. Top Tip: If you want to then delete the student from your system before the data retention period expires, take a look at this article.
Whichever method you choose to resolve your missed enrolments, the student should no longer appear in the Review section of your New School Year Setup Step 3 page. You should aim to remove all the students listed in this section.
If you choose to delete the student’s enrolment, if you added the student as an applicant, they will still be marked as Enrolled in the Applicants section.
Make sure your students will be in the right year
To check that all your students have the correct year group for next year, go to Students > Enrolment. You will be taken to the Year Groups page. Change the academic year using the drop-down menu.
If you have not yet properly completed the setup for the next academic year, you will not see any year groups here. Complete the section above to promote your students into their year groups for next year.
If you completed this step, you can check your enrolments are correct. You can click on the Enrolments tab to directly edit student enrolments.
Mark as complete
When you are happy that this section is now complete, click the green Mark as Complete button.
If you wish to return to this step and make any changes, click the red Return to incomplete button.
You must click the Mark as Complete button again to save your changes and enable you to continue editing the all the next sections.
FAQ
If this step is locked, you'll need to go back to the Academic Calendar step and click Mark Calendar as Complete.
Can I reset this step?
Please see our guidance here: Can I reset a step in the New Year Setup?
When should we enrol applicants?
You can see more information here: Do we have to enrol our applicants now?
Can we split or merge student groups?
Please see our guidance here for splitting existing groups: Split students into two registration forms for next year
Please see our guidance here for having more than one year group in a Registration Form: Mixed year group registration forms
Can we change the names of the student groups?
You can see how to change Year Group names here: Change Year Group name
And Registration Form names here: Change registration form name
We don't want to promote Year 6s, Year 11s or Year 13s?
Please see our guidance here: How should we promote the Year 6s, Year 11s or Year 13s?
Can we keep students in their current year group?
You can see how to do this for Nursery students here: Keep students in Nursery when promoting year groups
And for other years here: Hold a student back a year
Can students or guardians see the new registration forms and teachers?
We enrolled applicants before adding a year group or reg form?
If you have accidentally enrolled students before you have added them to a year group or registration form, you can undo the enrolment then add them to a Year group, Registration form or House. You can see how to do this here: What do I do if I enrolled our applicants before adding a year group or registration form?
What happens when we add more students after completing this step?
If you’ve already promoted year groups and reg forms, any new students you add on to Arbor won’t show up in the ‘Tweaks’ or Review sections.
Instead, you’ll need to go to their Student Profile and add them to the year group and registration form from the Enrolments section. You can see how to do this in this article: Enrolling a single student
I can’t add students to a year group/registration form?
If you have registration forms with students in more than one year group, you might not be able to select students because you need to link the registration form to both year groups. You can see how to resolve this here: Mixed year group registration forms
Students are in the wrong year group or reg form?
If you have accidentally enrolled students in the wrong groups or need to move them around, you can see how to do this here: Students are in the wrong year group or registration form for next year
Please see our guidance on this here.
What's next?
The next step in the New School Year Setup Process is to copy over your Custom Groups.
Comments
Article is closed for comments.