Moving your school from Excel and paper to software

1. Pick your start date

The start of a term is best: you bill the new term in the system, take attendance from the first day, and enter that term's scores there. You don't need to move old report cards; keep last session's on file and start fresh.

2. Clean up your student list

Put every current student in one spreadsheet with one row per student. The columns that matter most:

• Surname, first name and other names
• Admission number
• Class and arm
• Sex and date of birth
• Parent or guardian's name and phone number

Use the same phone number format for everyone. Siblings with the same parent phone number can then be linked to one parent account automatically.

3. Then staff

One row per staff member: name, staff number, role, phone number, and which classes and subjects they teach. Salary details can come later, when you set up payroll.

4. Carry forward fee balances

Don't try to move years of payment history. Agree each family's balance at the end of last term and bring that in as arrears. The new term's fees are then billed on top.

5. Train in short sessions

• Class teachers: attendance and score entry (30 minutes)
• Bursar: invoices, payments and receipts (an hour)
• Principal: approving results and reading the dashboard (30 minutes)
• Parents: a one-page note with the school's link and how to sign in

6. Run the first term, then review

At the end of the first term, ask teachers and the bursar what was slow, and adjust: report card comments, fee items, permissions. The second term is always smoother.

With Qyskul

You paste your student and staff lists straight from Excel. Every row is checked before anything is saved, so mistakes are caught before they reach a report card, and siblings are matched to the same parent. Staff get logins without email, with a printed slip.

Questions