Introduction
The Athletics Module handles all aspects of school athletics. Athletics disciplines, heats and team templates can be set up as the backdrop against which to create teams and record performance. Athletics meetings are also fully catered for.
Features
The Athletics module has three main sections to it:
Setup
Setup for the athletics secretary involves the following:
- Running Lanes
- Disciplines
- Heats
- Templates
Running Lanes
Select the number of lanes available for running. This number is needed in order to intelligently set up team sizes to participate in athletics meetings.
Disciplines
Set up the various athletics disciplines. An example would be ShotP (which stands for Shot Put). Each discipline has the following associated with it:
- Age groups – which age groups can take part in this discipline (e.g. only age groups Under 13 and up can participate in shot put)
- Gender – which sex can participate (e.g. only boys can)
- Record Basis – on what basis is performance measured (highest or lowest result). For example, the longer the distance thrown, the greater the performance. TS School uses this to keep track of performance and records.
Heats
Set up the athletics heats. Heats are combinations of
- Disciplines
- Age groups
- Gender
Templates
Any athletics team needs to have a certain structure. There might, for example, be teams that have 3 members and 2 reserves. There might also be large trial teams that have many places within them to cater for all athletes of a certain age.
The structures of teams are called templates. Templates therefore have to first be set up before any team can be created. Later on, when creating a team, you have to say which template it’s based on.
Templates therefore represent every possible combination of how you would like any team to be structured.
There are two main types of templates:
- Trial Templates (used for trial teams) - Trial templates are usually very large, since many athletes need to be catered for - just about everyone of a certain age group and gender need to undergo trials in order to determine the best athletes for a discipline.
- Meeting Templates (used for meeting teams) - Athletics meeting templates are usually much smaller. There are typically teams that use 1-dimensional templates for single races and those that use 2-dimensional templates for relay races. An example of a team using a 1-dimensional template is the final 100 m sprint for boys under 13, where, say, 2 members from each of the school’s four houses occupy the 8 running lanes of your school track. So the team would consist of a single row of 8 runners (1 X 8). A 4 X 100 m relay team, on the other hand, would simply have a 2-dimensional structure of 4 X 8 runners.
|
Trials
Trials need to be undergone by the athletes of the school in order to filter out only the best athletes, since only these should participate in athletics meetings.
The trials section of the Athletics Module handles all of this. It consists of the following:
Setting up:
- Trial Templates
- Trial Teams
- Trials
Working with:
|
As you can see, there are two main sections. The first allows you to set up everything to do with trial teams, whilst the second allows you to actually work with the trial teams themselves.
Setting up Trial Templates
In order to determine the best athletes, each athlete must undergo a series of trials. To both standardize and eliminate the need to set up trials for each and every team, all you have to do is set up trial templates.
Trial templates consist of the following elements:
- Age groups – Indicate for which age groups the trial template is applicable. E.g. Age groups under 6 through 10 have only 2 trials to determine who the best athletes are, whilst age groups under 11 through 17 have four.
- Trials - The trials themselves
The trials have the following elements:
- Description – E.g. First athletics trial
- Weight – The importance of the trial (weights are whole numbers, with the least important being 1 and the most important being 100). Just like with test and exams, trial weights are typically based relative to the most important trial. If trials indeed have varying weights, then a typical spread is as follows:
- Trial 1: 50
- Trial 2: 50
- Trial 3: 75
- Trial 4: 100
In this example, trial 1 is as important as trial 2 (because they both carry a weight of 50). Trial 3 is 50% more important or 1.5 times as important since it has a weight of 75. (75/50 = 1.5). Trial 4, the final trial, is twice as important as trial 1 or 2 (100/50 = 2).
If your school regards all trials to be equal import then simply give all trials the same weight. |
- Date – the date of the trial
- Time – the time of the trial
- Reminders – When you want the system to send out reminders to remind athletes of the upcoming trial:
- First reminder – when in advance the first reminder is to be sent. This is typically a week or so in advance.
- Subsequent reminders – at what interval, after the first reminder is sent, are subsequent reminders sent. Typically, every week.
- Last reminder – when in advance the last reminder is to be sent. This is typically a couple of hours beforehand.
- Format - What format the message should be sent in (PC, Email, SMS)
Note:
The default values for the reminders are pulled from the Practice / Trials section of the Default Reminders screen of the Messaging Module. |
|
Since trial templates are based on age groups, whenever a team is created, the trials applicable to the age group of that team are created – thereafter trials can be manually added and dropped if needed.
Setting up Trial Teams
Finally, the trial teams need to be set up. These teams are needed in order to determine which athletes are to participate in athletics meetings.
Trial teams consist of the following elements:
- Team name – E.g. 100 Sp 13B.
- Description of team – E.g. 100m sprint for boys under 13.
- Template – It’s important to determine what template is to be used for the structure of the team. Once the template is decided upon and athletes assigned to positions within the team, the structure cannot be re-selected (the assigned athletes must first be unassigned before the template can be changed).
- Heat – Select the team’s heat. The heats come from those set up above.
- Athletes – Based on the age group of the heat selected, all learners of that age group are brought into the athletes list box for selection.
- Schoolhouse – Further filtering can occur by selecting specific schoolhouses.
- Coaches – Coaches can be selected to coach the team and record trial results.
- Level – If the team is on a certain level, for example A, B, C, etc, then this can also be indicated.
- Timetable – A practice timetable can also be established at this stage (or later on when working with the team itself).
- Calendar – Team calendar events can be planned for at this stage (or later on when working with the team itself).
|
Setting up Trials
When a trial team is created, the trials associated with the age group of the team are automatically created as well. (The trials were associated with age groups in the first place when the various trial templates were created).
If you need to add, change or drop any of these team trials, you can do this by using the Trials screen.
Working with Trial Teams
If you are a coach or power user, you can go through to your team or teams. If you have more than one team, you must first select which team you want to work with, otherwise your one and only team will automatically be shown.
You can do the following with your team:
- Team Positions – You can change the position of the members within the team. Moving one athlete onto another will simply swap the athletes. If you wish to add or drop team members, you need to go back to the Setup Teams screen.
- Trial Results – You can enter the individual trial results of each of the members of the team.
- Attendance – You can take attendance for practice sessions and other team events.
- Timetable – A practice timetable can also be setup (this could also have been done when the team itself was first created under the Setup Teams screen).
- Calendar – Team calendar events can be scheduled from time to time (initial scheduling could also have been done when the team itself was first created under the Setup Teams screen).
Entering Trial Results
The trial results of the individual members of the teams taken by you can be recorded.
Since TS School allows you to make remarks and comments on individual trials, the athletes can be strictly monitored and developed. Again, if you take more than one team, you must first select which team you want to work with, otherwise your one and only team will automatically be shown.
Athletics Meetings
TS School allows you to set up, organize and execute athletics meetings. Typically, this entails the following:
Athletics Meeting Teams:
Athletics Meetings:
|
Setting up Athletics Meeting Teams
The cream of the crop need be placed in athletics meeting teams, available to participate in the next athletics meeting. Athletics meeting teams are set up in much the same way that trial teams were. The only exceptions are that athletics meeting teams do not have:
- Trials
- An attendance register
- A calendar
- A timetable
Like regular trial teams, athletics meeting teams have the following:
- Team name – E.g. 100 Sp 13B.
- Description of team – E.g. 100m sprint for boys under 13.
- Template – It’s important to determine what template is to be used for the structure of the team. Once the template is decided upon and athletes assigned to positions within the team, the structure cannot be re-selected (the assigned athletes must first be unassigned before the template can be changed).
- Heat – Select the team’s heat. The heats come from those set up above.
- Athletes – Based on the age group of the heat selected, all learners of that age group are brought into the athletes list box for selection.
- Schoolhouse – Further filtering can occur by selecting specific schoolhouses.
- Coaches – Coaches, in this context, are really staff members in charge of the team during athletics meetings.
- Level – Finally, if the team is on a certain level, for example A, B, C, etc, then this can also be indicated.
|
Working with Athletics Meeting Teams
If you are a coach or power user, you can go through to your team or teams. If you have more than one team, you must first select which team you want to work with, otherwise your one and only team will automatically be shown.
You can do the following with your team:
- Team Positions – You can change the position of the members within the team. Moving one athlete onto another will simply swap the athletes. If you wish to add or drop team members, you need to go back to the Setup Teams screen.
- Athletics Meeting Results – You can enter the individual athletics meeting results of each of the members of the team.
Setting up Athletics Meetings
TS School allows you to set up individual athletics meetings. There can be as many meetings per year as you wish, although schools usually have only one. Some of the larger schools, though, might have two – one for juniors and one for seniors.
The following is required:
- Name – The name of the athletics meeting (such as Athletics 2005). This exact phrase will go onto invitations.
- Description – The description of the athletics meeting (such as 2005 athletics meeting for all athletes).
- Date and Time – the date and time of the athletics meeting. This, too, will go on invitations.
Each athletics meeting comprises the following sections:
- The Schedule - This is a schedule of events that represents the entire athletics meeting from start to end.
When setting up any event you need to indicate the following:
- Team or Event – Whether the event is a team competition or a regular event such as an opening speech for example. In the former case, the team needs to be selected. In the latter case, the actual event and description need to be typed out (e.g. Opening Speech would be the event, and By the School Principal, Dr. William Mathews would be the description).
- Times – The starting and ending times of the event also need to be given. The events of the schedule will be ordered in accordance with their starting and ending times.
Printing
- To assist you in setting up the athletics meeting’s schedule, you can print out both general and detailed versions. The detailed version will show each team along with their members. This is of course a quick way of determining that all is fine.
- Alternatively, you can simply print out the programme that will finally be given to those attending the athletics meeting, to make sure that everything is in order.
(See the Programmes section below).
|
- Documentation -
This section contains the various documents pertaining to the athletics meeting, namely:
- Invites - Default athletics meeting invite, Athletics – Invite^. This document needs to be sent off to all those invited to the athletics meeting.
- Programmes - Default athletics meeting programme, Athletics – Programme^. This is handed out to those attending the athletics meeting. The programme contains the full schedule of events of the entire athletics meeting from start to end. Shown are:
- Name - of the event or heat (eg Opening Speech, 100 Sp G13)
- Description – of the event or heat (eg Opening speech given by the School Principal, Dr. Patrick John Williams, 100m Sprint – Girls under 13)
- Athletes – The athletes participating (first name and surname)
|
- Other Documentation - There is a link to the Batch Run screen of the Documentations Module where you can print out all those user-defined athletics documents to which you have been given access.
Note:
All documents are done in MS Word to give you the opportunity to customize them in the way you would like them to be sent out. |
Cloning
To save yourself a lot of work, you can simply clone from a previous athletics meeting. This will copy over the entire schedule of that meeting. You can then add, change and drop events. Ensure, though, that all heats do indeed have participants.
Athletics Meeting Results
Athletics meeting results can be recorded, along with any pertinent comments. Athletics records and performances are based on these results. |
