Periods

The Periods page manages the academic time structure used across classes and reporting.

What you can do

Go to Periods in the admin menu to:

  • View all active academic periods
  • Create and update periods with start/end dates
  • Delete outdated or unused periods
  • Define nested academic period hierarchy (semesters, blocks, units)
  • Manage reusable period templates for courses and programs
  • Work with academic calendar events (holidays, exams, closures)

Academic Calendar Events

Academic Calendar Events are separate from Academic Periods. They capture schedule exceptions and special dates such as:

  • Holiday
  • Exam
  • Closure
  • Event

Events can be scoped to institution, campus, or class. They include flags such as: - Is this a teaching day? - Visible to students? - Visible to teachers?

These events are independent calendar annotations that affect visibility and daily teaching status.

Official Academic Periods vs Course Blueprint Periods

Academic Periods are the institution's official calendar skeleton. They are: - Dated, school-wide declarations - Do not describe weeks, modules, or course-specific delivery details

Example structure: - Academic Year 2025-2026 (Sep 2025 → Jun 2026, institution-wide) - Semester 1 (Sep 2025 → Jan 2026) - Block 1 (Sep → Oct 2025) - Block 2 (Nov → Jan 2026) - Semester 2 (Feb 2026 → Jun 2026) - `Block 3 (Feb → Mar 2026) - Block 4 (Apr → Jun 2026)

Key rule: Academic Periods are institution-level and date-based. They represent the official published school calendar.

Course-specific curriculum structure belongs in Curriculum Composer V2. Those periods are course blueprint structure only: they describe the order and nesting of delivery blocks or weeks, but they do not carry real dates or institution-level scope.

This separation keeps: - Academic Periods = official school calendar dates - Curriculum Composer periods = course blueprint structure without dates

Period Templates Tab

A Period Templates tab is available alongside Academic Periods.

What you can do with templates

  • Build reusable period structures once and save them as named templates
  • Templates capture the nested period tree
  • Edit with drag/indent/rename controls
  • Saved templates are reusable across courses and curriculum workflows
  • Apply a template to a course to populate the course's period tree instantly
  • Applied templates are detached copies: later changes to the template do not sync to an already-applied course

When to use templates

  • When multiple courses share the same period structure
  • To quickly set up new courses with standard semester/block patterns
  • To maintain consistency across programs

How templates work

  • Applying a template preserves any existing periods in the course
  • Full replace mode is available but blocked when the course already has modules assigned to active periods
  • If a course period tree has been customized after apply, edit it directly in Curriculum Composer V2 rather than relying on template re-sync

Period Hierarchy

The academic period model supports unlimited nesting. Any period can become a container by adding sub-periods, and containers can also hold modules directly.

Example: - Semester 1 (parent) - Period 1 (child of Semester 1) — may link to Module "Basics" - Unit 1 (child of Period 1) — may link to Module "Basics Week 1"

Admin workflow

  1. Open /admin/periods.
  2. Add new academic periods for the current term or year.
  3. Adjust start/end dates as needed.
  4. Retire old periods when they are no longer relevant.

Notes

  • Periods provide a time dimension for classes, course sections, and progress reporting.
  • They are commonly used to scope assignments and evaluate student cohorts.

Last updated: 2026-07-08