Athletic programs deliver a ton of upsides to communities. They teach the importance of teamwork and hard work, they build camaraderie, and they can even bring an entire community together.
Unfortunately, for a variety of reasons—such as selfish and aggressive parents, coaches that show favoritism, and donor and booster club influences—student athletics can have a dark underbelly. In this blog post, we’ll take a quick look at why bureaucracy happens and provide six tips athletic directors can use for dealing with politics in high school athletics.
Athletic directors are responsible for creating and protecting a safe and educational sports experience across their districts.
To do this, they need to make sure that authorized students (i.e., those who have submitted all of their forms) are allowed to participate. And at the same time, they need to ensure unauthorized students (i.e., students who haven’t submitted forms, have medical conditions, or have recently suffered a concussion) are not allowed to participate.
With many moving parts in the average sports program, it can be difficult to stay on top of everything.
Here are some of the more common mistakes districts make with respect to athletic clearance forms—and how you can fix them.
Many districts still rely on legacy school management systems they’ve been using for decades, often combination of spreadsheets and software to organize and distribute student data. While these systems might work well enough, they leave much to be desired. Tracking down information can be difficult and time-consuming, the process lends itself to human error with illegible handwriting and data-entry mishaps, and the parent experience suffers as families have to fill out the same information over and over again, among other things.
The good news is that—in the age of disruption—new digital school management systems have emerged that largely solve all of these problems.
As an IT director for a school district, you have a lot on your plate. You play a critical role in ensuring a strong educational experience for students, and it’s easy to get caught up in the day to day. Refocusing on your professional development can keep you sharp, while helping you deliver more value to taxpayers and prove you’re committed to being the best IT director you can be.
One of the primary responsibilities of an Athletic Director is hiring coaches. But finding qualified coaches can be difficult—especially for sports like bowling, lacrosse, and cheerleading.
Being a coach is an important job that comes with public pressures and very little pay. Finding the right person can be tough, but it’s worth the effort.
As an athletic director, you’re tasked with doing everything you can to ensure an optimal athletics experience for all students, parents, coaches, and members of the community. To do that, you need to keep safety and legal issues in high school athletics top of mind. Mitigating risk, ensuring compliance, and preventing negligence are all important pieces of AD job descriptions today. This is in large part because districts across the country faceincreasing regulations and we live in an increasingly litigious society.
While your staffers may think "forms" when they hear FinalForms, our stats tell us there is an even more popular use for our online registration system: email communication. Staying connected with staff, parents, and students can be an uphill battle. However, in the midst of the current COVID-19 pandemic, email communication is a critical lifeline. Staffers relied on FinalForms' uninterrupted, zero-delay service to send 4.5 million emails last month.
As an administrator, your job is to create an educational environment that helps students and athletes reach their potential. One effective way to do that is by enacting parent engagement strategies that encourage parents to get involved in the educational experience.
But many parents are busy, and there are only so many hours in the day. To make parent engagement more attainable for your district—and create a better learning environment with stronger educational outcomes—use these 12 parent engagement strategies:
Our team is proud to announce that we've completely revamped our new student enrollment features.
Based on first-hand interaction with customers, we've confirmed that managing new student enrollment is one of the most critical, and potentially stressful, jobs in the school district.
While FinalForms streamlines the parent experience, especially for those with many children, there is a lot more work to do for administrators. The central office staff may need to review student information and decide whether to enroll the student, while building staff must ensure specific student information gets to the right reports and the right hands at the right time. Collecting the right information, determining enrollment statuses, and pleasing time-crunched parents can really create nightmares for your most valuable staffers. Don't worry, we're here to help!
The "Why" Behind the Update...
We listened to your feedback and guidance. Thanks to your insight, we added features and options that truly help your administration save time and eliminate hundreds of headaches and phone calls.
For your staff:
Approve enrollments before they are included in your student database
Customize enrollment statuses such as JVS, N, R, O, etc.
Review RCards with critical enrollment information such as IEPs, District of Residence, and more
Track enrollment history throughout a student's time at your district
View enrollment statuses to be relative to specific school years
Configure school choice options
Start services immediately for students requiring attention at kindergarten screening
For your parents:
Reduced workload first-time applicant parents
Upload required documentation
Intro to Enrollment Records
Many administrators use our academic, athletic, and medical screens to use lists, statuses, and email options. Now, we've added an additional 'enrollment' screen allowing your registrars to view lists, review forms, email parents, and enroll students. Beyond that, administrators may modify enrollment statuses when it's necessary to withdraw, transfer, or archive a student.
