Events

Overview

This article explains how to create, manage and publish a parents' evening within the Events module.

A parents' evening doesn't have to be constrained to one date. A single parents' evening event can run over multiple days.

Create a parents' evening

Follow these steps to

1. Open Events.
2. Select Parents' Evening.
3. Select Create:
4. Complete each of the Create Parents' Evening steps:

   • Complete the Overview details for the parents' evening, before moving on to the next step:

     

     1. Enter a Title for the parents' evening.
     2. Enter a Location.

     3. To include provision for parents to book appointments with the appropriate SENCO, toggle SENCO appointments on:

        

        Where a SENCO has not been configured, an advisory message is displayed. To configure a SENCO, see Assigning a staff member as SENCO.

     4. Select the length of each parental consultation appointment, using the Duration of Time Slot (from five minutes to an hour per slot, at five-minute intervals).

     5. Select the Date, Start Time and End Time for the parents' evening:

        

        Where a parents' evening runs over several days:

        1. Select Add for each extra day.
        2. Select the Start Time and End Time for each of the days.

        If you make an error / add an extra day, select the delete icon to remove it.

     6. Add in any breaks for staff during the parents' evening. Repeat for each date where the parents' evening runs over multiple days,or where there are multiple breaks in an evening:

        

        1. Select one or more Dates as appropriate.
        2. Select one or more Time Slots as a break for staff.
        3. Select Add, as required to add an additional date.

        If you make an error select the delete icon to remove the break, or select X to remove individual times / days.

     7. Select Next.

   • Select the class / groups and associated staff involved in the parents' evening:

     

     1. Check / uncheck one or more classes / groups that you want to include / exclude in the parents' evening. To select / deselect all classes / groups, check / uncheck the box next to Group Selected:

        

     2. Where multiple staff members are assigned to a class group, select the member of staff who will be present for the parent's evening:

        

        Where a class is shared, only one of the staff members is assigned. Parents book appointments with one staff member per class. For multi-day events, the same staff member is assigned for all days -you cannot assign a different staff member for the class on different days. 

     3. Select Next.

   • For each staff member (teachers and the SENCO as applicable) involved with parental consultations, modify their schedule as needed:

     

     1. Select the member of staff:

        

     2. Where a staff member's location is different to the default value entered in Step 1 - Overview, enter their location in Teacher Location:

        

     3. Where a staff member is not be available for an appointment slot, change it from Available to Break or Unavailable as appropriate:

        

     4. After reviewing the schedules of all staff members and making any necessary changes, select Next. 

   • Select the contacts for each of the pupils that you want to send booking invitations to:

     

     • Either select each pupil and check the contacts that you want to send the parents' evening booking invitation to, or check the appropriate Quick Selection options (All Contacts, Parental Contacts and Emergency Contacts) to select the related contacts for all pupils.
     • If you select Quick Selection options, change any exceptions manually by checking / unchecking contacts for individual pupils, 
5. After completing Create Parents' Evening: Step 4 - Pupils & Contacts, save the parents' evening as either a draft or publish it. Select either:
   1. Save, to save your parents' evening as a draft without publishing. This lets you return to the parents' evening and make changes to all sections, including the Overview and Staff Schedule in the future. For further information, see Working with a draft parents' evening.

   2. Publish to publish the parents' evening, and send out messages to the selected contacts asking them to book parent consultations. Select Confirm to publish the parents' evening when prompted:

      

6. You are returned to All Parents' Evenings. If you chose to save a draft version of your parents' evening, its Status is set to Draft. If chose to publish the parents' evening, its Status is set to Published:

   

Tips and best practices

1. When organising a parents evening, if you plan to make changes to the SENCO and Schedule (including breaks) in the Overview tab at a future date or remove invitations from parents, save the parents' evening as a draft. You cannot update these when the parents' evening has been published, and the invitations sent out.
2. At any time during the parents' evening creation process after Step 1, select Previous to return to the last step. 
3. Where the majority of staff / pupils are being selected, check the corresponding select all box, then uncheck those individual pupils / staff members that are the exceptions. 
4. Enter the name of a member of staff / pupil / contact into the search bar to quickly locate them, ready to assign to / unassign from a parents' evening.
5. Use filters to reduce the number of groups displayed. This will speed up pupil / group selection. Filter by either Group Category or Group Type.
6. When you check child related contacts to send an invitation, to speed up the process, select from either All Contacts, Parental Contacts and Emergency Contacts.  Uncheck any exceptions as needed.
7. Where a parent is flagged as having a Court Order preventing contact, they are listed, but cannot be selected when sending an invitation. 

Next steps

After the parents' evening is published, it is time to wait for parents to book appointments to meet with class teachers. 

To manage the appointments and invite the additional parents after the parents' evening has been published, see the following articles:

• Manage parents' bookings (add / make, change and decline bookings).
• Add pupils to a parents' evening.

To manage staff involved with the parents' evening and add groups, see:

• Managing staff schedules.
• Add groups to a parents' evening (the teacher associated with the group will be added to the parents' evening when this is done).

If you need to cancel the parents' evening, see:

• Cancel a parents' evening.

Related information

• Assigning a staff member as SENCO.

Updated 21 May 2026 16:03