News & Updates

It’s once again time for Facilitron’s now traditional (and super-helpful) Back-to-School Checklist for School District Administrators. Reviewing this checklist of important tasks can set you up for a smooth start to your school year and helps school district admins take their facility use and rental program to the next level. Go through each point and consider what actions you need to take, and remember, your account manager and account support team are here to help!

• Review Your Policies & Processes - Have your school board’s policies regarding rentals changed? The start of a new school year is a good time to review policies to make sure they’re up-to-date in the system. That may include your policies for payment, cancellations, your terms & conditions, insurance requirements, who is authorized to waive fees, and more. It’s also a good time to review and make adjustments to your facility use processes. Processes include things like workflows and expectations for handling requests and perhaps how you communicate to support services. Generally, process improvements aren’t things that require school board approval, but can save time and help set expectations with your team. Examples might include setting a precedent as to how many days it should take to pre-approve a request, or what’s the process for requesting HVAC for a facility.
• Open or Extend Your Availability - Now is the time to extend your facility availability for the 2023-24 school year so requests can come in for future dates. Contact your account manager to open availability so that renters can begin to plan their events. Facilitron can send out a marketing email to your renters notifying them that your availability has been opened. (Pro Tip! You can see how far out your district’s availability is currently open by looking at the date listed on the top right corner of your Calendar page in Facilitron).
• Update Your Facilitron Users - The new year brings many personnel changes at school sites (APs, ADs, etc) so making sure your school site pre-approvers are up-to-date is essential to starting the year smoothly. Adding a new user or editing an existing one is easy to do in the system. Use this support article for step-by-step instructions. If you have a large list of users, you can download this spreadsheet template, and list all your user changes, including name, email, phone number, and role assignment. Then, send that to your account manager who will make the changes.
• Add New Sites or Locations - Did your district just open a new school or close an old one? Or maybe a new gym or football stadium just opened or a grass field was converted to turf. It’s a good time to make sure all your openings, closings, and updates to facilities are reflected on your storefront. If you need to update photos, use this support article to show you how to take pro shots with your mobile device. Send your updates to your account manager or email support@facilitron.com and you’re ready to go!
• Get Your Admins Trained - New admins need training and even experienced admins can benefit from a refresher course. Luckily, Facilitron is intuitive and easy to use, but with our live interactive training, spending just a few minutes with our team and you can become a confident Facilitron pro user! Training sessions are held online every other week. Click here to sign up for the next one. Also, our support site has videos, and support articles for just about every topic.
• Add Internal Schedules - Getting internal schedules entered is key for tracking utilization, scheduling support services like HVAC, custodial and security, and preventing double bookings. It takes everyone working together to enter their schedules to keep frustrated community members from requesting dates that were never available — the #1 complaint we receive from renters. Review and share this support article and help your district keep their calendars up-to-date. And if you have any problems, ask Facilitron for help.
• Approve Requests - If you’re involved in the approval process at your campus or district, check your “Pending Reservations” queue to review all upcoming requests that need your pre-approval (campus administrators) or approval (district administrators). It's best practice to review reservations and make decisions within 72 hours. Remember, even an approved reservation for a future date can be declined and rescheduled if a school event comes up later. Leaving renters in limbo wondering if their request will be approved doesn’t foster good relationships with your community. Check out this user guide for more information on how to approve/ decline pending requests.
• Publicize Your Rentals - Is it easy for your community to find your facility rentals storefront? Take pride in showcasing your facilities by updating your district’s facility page to include or make more prominent the link to your rental site and including this how-to video for renters. This will make things easier for your community and reduce phone calls and walk-ins looking for information. It’s a great practice to share your Facilitron rental site link on your district’s social media sites and posts (and if you tag us, we’ll share too), in fact, Facilitron can help your communications team create content that features your facilities to your community. (Super pro tip: Update your email signature to include a link to your rental site!)
• Sign Up for Our Webinar - To get even more tips and suggestions on how to optimize your facility use program, join our own Cheryl Galloway (who used to be in your shoes as a facility use administrator!) for our Back-to-School Roadmap: Seven Checkpoints to Set You Up for Success. We’ll discuss seven key checkpoints that can save you time and improve your processes. Sign up here. Tuesday, August 15th at 12:00 pm Pacific Time, 3:00 pm Eastern Time
• Review Your Policies & Processes - Have your school board’s policies regarding rentals changed? The start of a new school year is a good time to review policies to make sure they’re up-to-date in the system. That may include your policies for payment, cancellations, your terms & conditions, insurance requirements, who is authorized to waive fees, and more. It’s also a good time to review and make adjustments to your facility use processes. Processes include things like workflows and expectations for handling requests and perhaps how you communicate to support services. Generally, process improvements aren’t things that require school board approval, but can save time and help set expectations with your team. Examples might include setting a precedent as to how many days it should take to pre-approve a request, or what’s the process for requesting HVAC for a facility.
• Open or Extend Your Availability - Now is the time to extend your facility availability for the 2023-24 school year so requests can come in for future dates. Contact your account manager to open availability so that renters can begin to plan their events. Facilitron can send out a marketing email to your renters notifying them that your availability has been opened. (Pro Tip! You can see how far out your district’s availability is currently open by looking at the date listed on the top right corner of your Calendar page in Facilitron).
• Update Your Facilitron Users - The new year brings many personnel changes at school sites (APs, ADs, etc) so making sure your school site pre-approvers are up-to-date is essential to starting the year smoothly. Adding a new user or editing an existing one is easy to do in the system. Use this support article for step-by-step instructions. If you have a large list of users, you can download this spreadsheet template, and list all your user changes, including name, email, phone number, and role assignment. Then, send that to your account manager who will make the changes.
• Add New Sites or Locations - Did your district just open a new school or close an old one? Or maybe a new gym or football stadium just opened or a grass field was converted to turf. It’s a good time to make sure all your openings, closings, and updates to facilities are reflected on your storefront. If you need to update photos, use this support article to show you how to take pro shots with your mobile device. Send your updates to your account manager or email support@facilitron.com and you’re ready to go!
• Get Your Admins Trained - New admins need training and even experienced admins can benefit from a refresher course. Luckily, Facilitron is intuitive and easy to use, but with our live interactive training, spending just a few minutes with our team and you can become a confident Facilitron pro user! Training sessions are held online every other week. Click here to sign up for the next one. Also, our support site has videos, and support articles for just about every topic.
• Add Internal Schedules - Getting internal schedules entered is key for tracking utilization, scheduling support services like HVAC, custodial and security, and preventing double bookings. It takes everyone working together to enter their schedules to keep frustrated community members from requesting dates that were never available — the #1 complaint we receive from renters. Review and share this support article and help your district keep their calendars up-to-date. And if you have any problems, ask Facilitron for help.
• Approve Requests - If you’re involved in the approval process at your campus or district, check your “Pending Reservations” queue to review all upcoming requests that need your pre-approval (campus administrators) or approval (district administrators). It's best practice to review reservations and make decisions within 72 hours. Remember, even an approved reservation for a future date can be declined and rescheduled if a school event comes up later. Leaving renters in limbo wondering if their request will be approved doesn’t foster good relationships with your community. Check out this user guide for more information on how to approve/ decline pending requests.
• Publicize Your Rentals - Is it easy for your community to find your facility rentals storefront? Take pride in showcasing your facilities by updating your district’s facility page to include or make more prominent the link to your rental site and including this how-to video for renters. This will make things easier for your community and reduce phone calls and walk-ins looking for information. It’s a great practice to share your Facilitron rental site link on your district’s social media sites and posts (and if you tag us, we’ll share too), in fact, Facilitron can help your communications team create content that features your facilities to your community. (Super pro tip: Update your email signature to include a link to your rental site!)
• Sign Up for Our Webinar - To get even more tips and suggestions on how to optimize your facility use program, join our own Cheryl Galloway (who used to be in your shoes as a facility use administrator!) for our Back-to-School Roadmap: Seven Checkpoints to Set You Up for Success. We’ll discuss seven key checkpoints that can save you time and improve your processes. Sign up here. Tuesday, August 15th at 12:00 pm Pacific Time, 3:00 pm Eastern Time

You can download a PDF version of this checklist here.

For more help, contact your account manager or visit our support site.