Auto-staffing

Auto-staffed Lessons

What is Auto-staffing ?
"Auto-Staffing" is when you leave an Activity (or a group within an Activity) with no Teacher (unstaffed).  When you schedule this Activity (or group), TimeTabler will choose a possible / suitable (as explained below) Teacher for you.

How is the Teacher chosen ?
The teacher chosen by TimeTabler will be one who is available and:
-- has the same main subject as the lesson,
-- or if no teacher meets this criterion: can offer the lesson's subject as a possible second subject (as described by you at : "Teachers -> Advanced -> Second Subjects")
-- or if no teacher meets this criterion either: is simply any other free teacher (you will want to change this yourself, later - see later in this article, for how).

Notes:
-- Where 2 or more teachers meet the same criterion, the one who is currently furthest from fulfilling his/her "max. periods" / "expected offering" (as chosen by you, eg: on the Staff Availability screen), is chosen.
-- If no teacher is free, the lesson cannot be scheduled.

How do I specify it ?
When entering the Activity (in the Activity Batch), just leave its Teacher as "(no teacher yet)".

When would I want to use this feature ?
There are 2 possible reasons for using this feature:

  1    You wish to run a "What if..?" or "Feasibility study": if you just want to check if a timetable is possible, or how easily your lessons might fit on your Schedule, then you can leave some or all of your lessons Unstaffed, and see if TimeTabler can find free Teachers who can teach these subjects ... without worrying (at this stage) about who those Teachers are, or about split-teaching.

  2    Or: You are unsure of (all) your Staffing, and wish to finalise it later, when you see who is free on the Schedule.   In this case, you will later want to review your Auto-staffed lessons, and move them to different Teachers.  To do this: in Scheduling, go to the "Staff Timetable view", click on "Views" (top-left) and choose "Highlight Auto-staffed lessons".  This will highlight each auto-staffed lesson; you can then drag-&-drop a lesson vertically, to give it to a different Teacher.   When you do this, the lesson will no longer be marked as "Auto-staffed".

Note: see also:
- Scheduling with Auto-staffed activities

Any questions, let us know.