SchoolSlots

Description

SchoolSlots is a dedicated appointment scheduling and parent-teacher conference management plugin designed specifically for primary schools, high schools, and educational institutions.

It allows school administrators to organize school-wide Central Parent-Teacher Conferences as well as recurring Individual Weekly Teacher Consultation Hours through a single, responsive booking interface.

Key Features in SchoolSlots

• Central Parent-Teacher Conferences: Create and manage unlimited active school-wide conference events with custom start/end times, customizable slot durations (e.g., 5, 10, 15, 20, or 30 minutes), and buffer times between appointments.
• Weekly Individual Teacher Consultations: Configure recurring weekly consultation days, lesson periods, time windows, and lunch/break intervals for each teacher. The frontend date picker automatically aligns parent selections to the teacher’s official consultation day.
• Absent Teacher Handling: Mark specific teachers as absent for a central conference. Instead of generating bookable slots, parents see a polite notice with the teacher’s direct email address to arrange an alternative meeting.
• Strict Double-Booking & Collision Protection:
  • Prevents parents from booking multiple slots with the same teacher within the same conference or consultation day.
  • Prevents parent time collisions (a parent cannot book two different teachers at the exact same time slot on the same day).
  • Real-time race-condition protection ensures two parents cannot reserve the same teacher slot simultaneously.
  • Automatically blocks past dates and expired time slots on the current day.
• Automated Email Confirmations & Calendar Invites (.ics): Sends instant HTML confirmation emails to both parents and teachers, complete with an attached .ics calendar file (compatible with Google Calendar, Apple Calendar, and Outlook). Optional automatic BCC copy to the school secretary.
• Printable PDF / QR Confirmation Tickets & One-Click Cancellation: Every booking includes a downloadable, print-ready confirmation ticket featuring a locally generated ISO/IEC 18004 SVG QR code and a secure one-click cancellation link that immediately frees up the slot and notifies the teacher.
• Automated Morning Reminders: Built-in daily cron job dispatches a chronological schedule summary to teachers and appointment reminders to parents on the morning of the consultation.
• GDPR Compliance & Data Anonymization: Configure a custom data retention period (in days) and run one-click GDPR personal data anonymization for past events while preserving aggregate booking counts, or purge test bookings before going live.

Quick Start & Shortcode

1. Navigate to SchoolSlots -> Settings to enter your school’s official name, address, secretary email, and consultation cutoff deadlines.
2. Add your teaching staff and their room numbers/weekly consultation hours under SchoolSlots -> Teachers & Rooms.
3. Optionally create a school-wide conference under SchoolSlots -> Events.
4. Place the [schoolslots] shortcode on any public WordPress page to display the booking form.

Standalone SchoolSlots Pro Edition

For institutions requiring advanced event types and campus-wide automation, the standalone SchoolSlots Pro plugin (available at schoolslots.com and schoolslots.hu) extends the system with:

• Sibling Route Planner: Branch-and-bound backtracking algorithm that calculates optimal, conflict-free meeting itineraries across multiple children and teachers with a unified family ticket.
• Quota-Based Open Days & Senior Photo Sessions: Dedicated registration workflows with live daily capacity bars and multi-day custom schedules.
• School Ball & Gala Tickets: Guest list CSV import and single-dispatch QR admission tickets.
• Mobile Camera QR Check-in Scanner: PWA camera scanner with REST API validation and audio feedback for entrance staff.
• Bulk CSV Import/Export & Executive Analytics: One-click teacher roster CSV import, filtered booking CSV exports, Chart.js workload visualizations, and automated nightly GDPR/deadline cron reports.