I have seen some posts on social media asking what should be done when as people take up the role as a timetabler. There are no hard and fast rules but here is the timescale I worked to when I put the timetable together.
September/ October;
In this period of the school year there were two things going on. First, it was the bedding in period for the current timetable and was when I reviewed how it was going. Was there anything I could have done better ? Is there anything I need to make sure I do in the timetable I have to write this year? Answering these questions allowed me to try and get better each year. The second thing I did was to consider exam results, staff changes and how this might impact on next years timetable. For example if a subject had done badly in exams, had falling option numbers or staffing issues then it needed to be discussed as to whether the subject gets the same weighting going forward. For me this was done through line management meetings with the DHT/ HT and then bringing these items to SLT for agreement.
November/ December;
This is the time that I would be discussing with SLT and HoDs the thoughts on what the timetable model should look like next year. This would be influenced by a number of factors including accountability measures, School improvement priorities and what would be right for the students. Once this ‘consultation’ is done I would then put a draft model into NOVA in the model screen. This would then be taken to SLT for agreement and will then be the basis for the construction. I would also get agreement on the structure of the day. If there is no change, and no desire to change anything, then that is fine. But if there are going to be changes then this needs to be reflected in the cycle (maybe changing from 1 week to 2 weeks, or adding in periods during the day, or timings are changing). These are examples of changes that need to made to the cycle.
January/ February;
By now you should have some idea about how your curriculum will look for the new academic year. With this in mind you now need to get the options process underway. This is a whole other blog post on its own, but i suppose it is fair to say that the traditional way of running this is for year 9 students moving into year 10 for GCSEs, and setting up options for those joining year 12. Most of the MIS providers have some form of option module. Timetabler also has an options module that you can use. I would say that if you can move as much of this online as possible then you should. This means having the information online, getting students to make choices online and then putting the grouping together within the system. Again, most MIS systems then allow for importing this information back in to reduce the admin burden associated with options.
Another thing that could be done now is to tidy up the timetable software by making sure the right staff, subjects, rooms and levels are there.
March/ April;
During this period i would get the timetable modelling moving forward by putting information out to HoDs to check over, or add to, so that i can put staff to classes. I generally put staff into classes that i felt were appropriate. I was SLT and had a good view of staff performance and how the timetable could enhance our improvement priorities, but i know some timetablers are not in that position.
I would print off the classes screen (showing the classes in each year group) and this would have the staff i think should go with each class. HoDs would then either agree or suggest changes.
May/ June;
This is where the majority of the scheduling work is done. I would now have the staffing requests (remember these are only requests) and i would have added all these in. Once this is in and ready i would then schedule the classes in the ‘bands’ screen in NOVA.
This would require a number of attempts with many builds and rebuilds. I would eventually get to a point where i would be relatively happy with the timetable. This will probably mean a few compromises, but as they say- perfect is the enemy of the good!
These timetables would then go back out to HoDs to check over again just to make sure i hadn’t made any glaring mistakes like missing an option subject, or whole year group.
July;
Now i am in a position where i am happy with the timetable i would room the classes at the beginning of July, then once complete, get a first draft out to staff. I would take feedback and tweak as required (there would not be any big changes like a new subject added etc at this time) to then send out a second draft.
The final stage would be the timetable being sent out to staff within a minimum of 2 weeks before the end of the summer term (I know that things come up, and this might not be possible in all situations, but this should be the aim). Then it would be the process of transferring the timetable into the MIS.
Hope this gives some guidance to new timetablers, but if you have any additions/ suggestion then please add to the comments below.