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School Sessions

Learn how to enable seamless data segmentation, historical tracking, and efficient data management.

School sessions are used to segment data from different school years. The following is contained in a school session:

  • Students and Parents
  • Orders
  • Campaigns
  • First Step Flow
  • Volunteer Positions
  • Volunteers
  • Directory Invitations
  • Memberships
  • Translations
  • Attachments
  • Languages
  • Grades

The following is shared between all sessions:

  • Administrative Users
  • Organizations

Accessing School Sessions

Each site can have multiple school sessions. Most will use one school session per school year. Each school session will have their own:

  • First Step
  • Store
  • Directory
  • Member Services

Admin View

Only one school session can be viewed at one time in the Admin. To change the school session being viewed, select the desired school session from the school session selector in the upper right corner of the FutureFund Admin.

FutureFund provides links to the First Step, Store, and Directory sites with the school session appended to the URL. To view these links:

  • In the Admin, navigate to Account Settings > School Sessions
  • Click the View button next to the school session
  • Scroll to the Site Links section

Starting a New School Year

For existing accounts, the best way to start a new school session is to duplicate the existing school session. This shows how to accomplish this task.

  1. In the Admin, navigate to Account Settings > School Sessions.
  2. Click on the Duplicate button next to the current school session.

This will create a copy of the school session with the following items:

  • First Step Pages and Sections
  • Campaigns
  • Volunteer Positions
  • Grades
  • Custom Forms
  • Teachers
  • Translations
  • Directory, Store, and First Step settings

Note: Deleted campaigns and volunteer positions are not copied.

The following information is not copied to the new school session:

  • Students and Parents
  • Orders
  • Members
  • Volunteers
  • Directory Entries

The new school session will not be the default school session however parents will not have access to it until the sites are enabled.

Previewing First Step

Before you go live, use Preview to click through First Step exactly as a parent would, without creating any real records.

  1. In the Admin, confirm the school year you want to review is selected in the school session selector in the upper right corner.
  2. Navigate to First Step > Pages.
  3. Click the Preview First Step button.
  4. Click the Start preview button on the page that opens.

While you are in preview:

  • No parents, students, or orders are saved.
  • No credit card is charged.
  • No confirmation emails are sent.
  • Preview activity does not appear in any admin report or export.

A banner appears at the top of every page during preview. Click Exit preview in the banner when you are finished.

The preview link is unique to each school session and can be shared with anyone helping you review the site. Reviewers do not need a FutureFund login, and each one gets their own separate preview, so several people can click through at the same time without affecting each other. Preview works even while First Step is closed to parents.

What Preview Does Not Cover

Preview is a walk-through, not a test purchase. Reviewers can see every page, campaign, form, and price exactly as a parent would, but they cannot add items to a cart or place an order, and there is no test credit card.

If you need to confirm pricing and checkout end to end, have your reviewers complete a real sign up, then unenroll those students before you go live:

  • In the Admin, navigate to First Step > Students
  • Find each student used for the walk-through
  • Unenroll the student

Going Live

When your school session is ready, there are a few steps you need to take before parents can use the site:

  • [x] Confirm you’ve reviewed the site using Preview
    • Verify First Step pages and campaign descriptions
    • Verify campaign pricing
    • Review volunteer positions
    • Check availability dates
  • [x] Verify First Step is Enabled
  • [x] Decide if the store should be enabled. Some schools leave the store disabled to prevent parents from skipping First Step. See Enabling Store for more information
  • [x] If the target school session is not the active school session:
    • In the Admin, navigate to Account Settings > School Sessions
    • Click the View button next to next year’s school session
    • Click the Make Active button
  • [x] Visit your First Step link and verify the school year is correct

Once these steps are done, you are ready for First Step!

Closing the School Session

When the school year comes to a close, admins can effectively disable access to the school session by:

  • In the Admin, navigate to Account Settings > School Sessions
  • Click the View button next to the school session
  • Click the Close All Sites button

When this is selected, access to First Step, store, and directory will be disabled.

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