Overview

The School Houses module allows administrators to create and manage the school's house sport teams. These houses are used across annual sport allocations and learner grouping. The setup consists of three sequential components: defining the school houses, configuring annual house teams and team managers, and setting up learner allocation rules.

School houses must be created before annual teams can be configured, and annual teams must be active before learner allocation rules can be applied. These dependencies are enforced by the system to ensure data consistency across sport reporting.

Navigation Path

My School > Sport > Sport Teams > School Houses

Purpose of Feature

This feature enables the school to:

• Define permanent school house names in both Afrikaans and English.
• Assign colour identifiers to each house for reporting and display purposes.
• Link houses to annual sport team configurations per academic year.
• Allocate learners to houses using configurable rule-based methods.

Step-by-Step Instructions

1. Create and Edit School Houses

School houses represent the permanent house records for the school. These are reused across academic years and are not year-specific.

To add a new school house:

1. Navigate to My School > Sport > Sport Teams > School Houses.
2. Click Add Team.
3. Enter the house name in Afrikaans in the Afrikaans name field.
4. Enter the house name in English in the English name field.
5. Select the house colour from the available options.
6. Click Save to create the record.

To edit an existing school house:

1. Double-click on any field in the house record to activate it for editing.
2. Update the Afrikaans name, English name, or colour as required.
3. Click Save to confirm changes.

To edit colour definitions:

1. Click Colour Definitions.
2. Double-click on the colour code field for the entry to edit.
3. Adjust the colour value to match the school's house colours accurately.
4. Click Accept Changes once all colour edits are complete.

2. Set Up Annual House Sport Teams

Annual house sport teams link the permanent school houses to a specific academic year. This configuration must be completed each year before learner allocations can be processed.

Step 1 — Select teams for the year:

1. Click the tab labelled Step 1: Select teams for 20XX.
2. Select the required houses from the left-hand panel.
3. Click the right arrow to move them into the active allocation for that year.

Step 2 — Assign team managers:

1. Click the tab labelled Step 2: Select team managers for 20XX.
2. Select a team from the Teams list.
3. Select the team manager from the left-hand panel.
4. Click the right arrow to allocate the manager to that team.
5. Repeat for each team.
6. Click Save when all managers have been assigned.

3. Set Up Rules and Learner Allocations

This section defines how learners are assigned to houses. The system supports four allocation methods: Learner Surname, Register Class, Round Robin, and Demographics. Exceptions can be created to override automatic allocations for individual learners.

The process is completed in three steps and must be followed in sequence. Applying rules before completing Step 1 setup will result in incorrect or incomplete allocations.

Step 1 — Configure the allocation rule:

Learner Surname:

1. Click Learner Surnames.
2. Select the alphabet letters to assign to each house.
3. Click the right arrow to allocate the selected letters.
4. To subdivide a letter (e.g., for letters with diacritical marks), select the checkbox under Subdivide a letter of the alphabet.
5. Select the letter to subdivide and click Subdivide. The system will split the letter into subsets (e.g., Q?, QA, QB). Question marks indicate characters with diacritical marks.
6. Click Save.

Register Class:

1. Click the Register Class icon.
2. Select the register class to allocate.
3. Click the > button to assign it to a house.
4. Click Save.

Round Robin:

1. Click Round Robin.
2. Select the checkbox under Change method of allocation.
3. Select the sorting method: Per School, Per Grade, or Per Register Class.
4. Click Save.

The Round Robin method assigns learners sequentially across houses (1 > 2 > 3 > 1 > 2 > 3) based on the selected sort order. This ensures an even distribution of learners across houses.

Demographics:

1. Click Demographics.
2. Select any combination of age, gender, or ethnic group criteria.
3. Click Save.

Step 2 — Apply the rule type:

1. Click Step 2: Apply rule type.
2. Click the allocation method configured in Step 1 (Demographics, Learner Surname, Register Class, or Round Robin).
3. The system applies the rule to all qualifying learners immediately upon selection.

Step 3 — Create exceptions:

1. Click Step 3: Create exceptions.
2. Select the target team from the Teams list.
3. Select the grade from the Grade list.
4. Select the learner from the left-hand panel.
5. Click the right arrow to manually allocate the learner to the selected team.
6. Click Save.

System Behaviour

• School house records are permanent and shared across academic years. Editing a house name updates it globally, including in historical annual team records.
• Annual team configurations are year-specific. A new annual setup is required for each academic year.
• Learner allocation rules are applied at the point of execution in Step 2. Changes to Step 1 rules after applying will require re-application.
• The Round Robin method re-sorts learners each time it is applied. The sort order is determined by the method selected in Step 1.
• Exceptions created in Step 3 override any rule-based allocation for the selected learner.
• Colour definitions are shared across all houses. Changes to a colour code will update all houses using that colour.

Restrictions and Reasons

• Annual teams cannot be configured without existing school houses. The system requires at least one saved school house before the annual team tabs become available. This prevents orphaned annual records with no house reference.
• Learner allocation rules cannot be applied without active annual teams. Step 2 is dependent on Step 1 annual team setup being complete for the relevant year. Applying rules to an unconfigured year will produce no allocations.
• Step 2 must follow Step 1 in sequence. The rule type can only be applied after the allocation method has been fully configured. Partial configurations in Step 1 will result in incomplete or incorrect allocations when Step 2 is executed.
• Editing a house name after learner allocations have been processed will update the display name but will not alter existing allocation records. Historical sport reports will reflect the updated name.