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
  • Registration Flow
  • Volunteer Positions
  • Volunteers
  • Directory Invitations
  • Memberships
  • Translations
  • Attachments
  • Languages
  • Grades

The following is shared between all sessions:

  • Administrative Users
  • Funds

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:

  • Registration
  • 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 Registration, Store, and Directory sites with the school session appended to the URL. To view these links:

  • In the Admin, navigate to 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 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:

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

Note: Campaigns are copied when at least one person added the campaign to a cart in either live or test mode or the campaigns was created within 30 days. Volunteer positions are copied when at least one person has signed up in either live or test mode.

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.

Testing Credit Card Processing

When the school session is in test mode, use the following test credit cards to test your checkout process. Use a valid expiration date in the future, and any random CVC number, to create a successful payment.

Card Number Type
4242424242424242 Visa
5555555555554444 Mastercard
378282246310005 American Express
6011111111111117 Discover
30569309025904 Diners Club

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 tested the site in test mode and everything is working properly
    • Verify registration pages and campaign descriptions
    • Verify campaign pricing
    • Review volunteer positions
  • [x] Verify Registration is Enabled
  • [x] Decide if the store should be enabled. Some schools leave the store disabled to prevent parents from skipping registration. See Enabling Store for more information
  • [x] If the school session is not the active school session:
    • In the Admin, navigate to Settings > School Sessions
    • Click the View button next to next year’s school session
    • Click the Make Active button
  • [x] Visit your registration link and verify the school year is correct

Once these steps are done, you are ready for registration!

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 Settings > School Sessions
  • Click the View button next to the school session
  • Click the Close All Sites button

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