3 Good Habits to Develop in Jackrabbit Before Starting a New Session or Group of Classes and Closing Out an Old Session or Group of Classes.

As a new season and new sessions roll around, you may have several things that you need to do in Jackrabbit but you are not quite sure of the best way to get your desired results.

We can help. We’ve included three requests that we often hear from users and hope they help you kick off your Fall 2012.  

“I want to see a re-enrollment list. 

Of course, your re-enrollment list is a list of students currently enrolled in this session who are registered for the upcoming session.

Jackrabbit’s reporting capability is very powerful but can become even more valuable when you consider a few tricks that help you see especially helpful information. Sometimes you will not find a report named specifically for the result you want to achieve. That does NOT mean that you can’t get the results you want. An example of this that is a common need at this time of year is a re-enrollment report. Well, there isn’t one. But there IS a report called the ENROLLMENT DETAIL report. By using this report and running it with two very specific criteria you can see who has not reinrolled in your new session.

Here is an example of HOW to determine the amount of re-enrollment from one session to the next:

From the Reports menu go to the ENROLLMENT DETAIL REPORT and use the following criteria (keep it SIMPLE).

“I need to do something with my classes from the previous session now that they are complete and I am starting a new session.”

Jackrabbit has a procedure known as ARCHIVING which is beneficial once a session of classes is complete.  Archiving Classes can be done individually or in a batch.  Archiving puts the class into an INACTIVE status and moves the enrollment for students from CURRENT ENROLLMENT to PAST ENROLLMENT on their enrollment page.

You can always RESTORE an archived class !  This can also be done individually or as a batch.

To ARCHIVE a single class use the ARCHIVE CLASS button found on the CLASS page:

To ARCHIVE all or most of your classes from a prior session, go to the CLASSES – ARCHIVE CLASSES screen.  You may wish to COPY these classes before archiving and then EDIT them from the EDIT CLASSES screen to save time when creating classes for your new session. There are full instructions on Copying, Editing and Archiving classes in the Jackrabbit User Guide!

“I need to do some marketing to the students in our system that have not been active in a class since last year.”

This is a great time to use the Lead File to separate your inactive students from your active students and to create a marketing database for providing information to those who aren’t enrolled this session to try to get them back in your classes!

By pulling your inactives (we recommend to only pull those who have been inactive for at least a year*) from your active database, you have created a group that can be easily reached using the mass email feature and by printing labels to send snail mail offers, coupons and/or class brochures. If your inactives enroll in a session, you can easily move them back into your active Jackrabbit database.

There are two added bonuses in using the Lead File:

1. It saves you money. Moving inactives to the Lead File reduces your active student count and therefore lowers your recurring system charges.
2. It is FREE! Jackrabbit does not charge additional fees for moving inactives, for storing them in the Lead File or for using Mass Email or Mail Label Printing with those contacts.

Note that the Lead File stores a portion of your contact information from the original database. Please review full feature details on the Jackrabbit website or in the Lead File video.

Read more about the Unlimited Lead File in related blogs: Favorite Feature: Unlimited Lead File, Jackrabbit’s Unlimited Lead File.

If you need assistance in using your software, Customer Support is available to you. Simply click the Support button in your Jackrabbit system to make your request. 

*  Lead Filing Families and Students will affect your reporting.  Run enrollment reports BEFORE moving families to the Lead File.