← Back to blog

Let your students sign themselves out from your houses or dorms

Paul Organ

March 28, 2017

You Decide: Allow your students to sign out from their own devices with Boardingware.As ex-boarders ourselves, we've been dying to make something that the students will really love and today we think we've finally done one...When 3.30pm comes, it’s madness on boarding school campuses all over the world. Most will require students to sign in and out on a paper logbook, or they’ll use Boardingware’s Kiosk Mode. However, both of these methods require students to (reluctantly) make their way back from class and sign out from the dorms.To avoid this problem, some schools allow their students to just text a staff member to tell them they’re off. This is normally for well-known local destinations or school commitments and even though a text does the job, it requires tedious data entry or re-entry for the staff member.So today, we’re excited to expand on our leave workflow capabilities and allow schools to let their students sign themselves out from their own devices.As a Boardingware Administrator, you can simply visit the ‘Manage Leave’ page within the school management section of the web application.First, I recommend that your school is clear on what destinations students are allowed to go to using this method. Once you have decided, you can set your default destinations in the Form Builder section of the Leave Type setup page.

Screen Shot 2017-03-27 at 6.12.13 AM.png

This will allow you to add to your default destinations and select which ones can be used. You can see here that I have left mostly school commitments and local destinations.After you have confirmed this, then visit the ‘Workflow’ page and simply ‘allow’ students to sign out as seen below.

Screen Shot 2017-03-27 at 6.02.24 AM.png

After you have saved your workflow, students will be able to immediately begin using this leave type! Check out the workflow from student sign out to what you see as a staff member below.

ezgif.com-video-to-gif.gif

From a staff’s perspective you will simply see that student is signed out. And this will be instantaneous as long as you’re connected to the internet so there will be no confusion as to where that student has gone.For those of you that haven’t used this kind of workflow before, I would recommend giving it a go on a small test group of students and test the results. It should help to reduce congestion during the ‘after school rush’ and reduce the demand for your staff’s attention, allowing them to focus on discussions with students that are going to places that aren’t common or require more information.If you have any questions or feedback, please comment below!Happy Boarding,PaulPS - It’s important to note that this will not allow students to sign themselves IN from their own device as we believe that could open schools up to risk, so for now, that’s still in R&D.[marketo-fat form="1107"]

Get Orah Passes, Attendance Insights & Alerts free for 30 days, plus an incredibly useful newsletter

Join thousands of school leaders exceeding their school's duty of care—subscribers receive free access to our attendance management tools, Orah Passes, Attendance Insights & Alerts for 30 days. When you sign up, we'll send you a guide detailing the setup process.

Paul Organ

I live in Auckland, New Zealand. I enjoy exercise, sauna's and cold plunges, video games and design. Prior to Orah (10 years ago now!) I was a University Student studying my Masters of Architecture. There are two important things that keep me enthused at work - Using creativity to solve complex problems and working with good people.

Featured articles

Attendance Alerts Just Got a Helpful Upgrade

Previously, you could only select one recipient type for an attendance alert. Now, you can include all three recipient types in a single alert.

Product Update
Orah CEO, Matt Varley

Introducing Orah’s new CEO

It’s our great pleasure to introduce our new CEO, Matt Varley. Matt will be starting officially as Orah’s CEO from November this year.

Article
Free Attendance Sheet Template for Easy Record Keeping

Attendance Sheet Examples: Free Template for Easy Record Keeping

Maintaining accurate attendance records is crucial for educational institutions. A well-organized attendance sheet can help streamline the process of tracking student presence, tardiness, and absences.

Article