.. _terms:

Creating Terms
==============

Terms are periods of time within school years that correspond to the duration of a section, like semesters and trimesters.  

For example, if you work with the same group of students on the same schedule for a full Year, you will only need one big Term.  If you switch schedules and/or student groupings at the end of semesters or trimesters, define those as your Terms.

Report cards and assessments are not tightly bound to Terms in SchoolTool.  You can produce single or multiple reports and grades, or none at all, in any given Term. 

Because there is no hierarchy of Terms, define your Terms by the *shortest* unit that a class section might meet with the same group of students.  For example, if some sections meet all year, some by semester, and some by quarter, use quarters as your Terms.

In almost every case, you will end up needing Terms in SchoolTool, even if there is only one Term matching the span of the school year.  This is easiest to do through the web interface.

In this example, we will create two semesters.

To create or modify Terms, you will need to be logged on a member of **Site Managers**.  Navigate to the School tab, and click on the **Terms** link:

   .. image:: images/terms-0.png

Click **Add: Term**:

   .. image:: images/terms-1.png

Enter a title for the Term.  When you click in the date fields, a calendar selector will pop up to help you select a date:

   .. image:: images/terms-2.png

You must choose dates within the current SchoolTool Year which *do not* overlap with other Terms.

After selecting both dates and clicking **Next** you will see a calendar view which allows you to toggle specific days and dates on and off by clicking on them.  

If a date is **bold** with a darker background it means classes are in session; dates not in bold with a lighter background mean no classes.  Any day that student attendance will be taken should be in bold.  A teacher training day with no classes would be regular weight.  

Clicking the day buttons at the top of the form changes the value of that day throughout the calendar.  Clicking directly on a date toggles its value.

For example, I've set the standard school week from Monday to Friday and added Thanksgiving vacation the week of November 22nd:

   .. image:: images/terms-3.png

When you are satisfied with this, select **Submit**:

   .. image:: images/terms-4.png

If you need to edit the Term, click on the pencil icon next to the Term's title.

We'll add a second Term for the spring by following the same procedure:

   .. image:: images/terms-5.png

