Flat File Rostering

Overview

Flat File Rostering is one method for onboarding your staff, teachers, students, and section data into Wayfinder. This tutorial is designed for technically minded folks who want to speed up rostering for students, teachers, and courses by uploading a set of spreadsheet files to Wayfinder.

To utilize flat file rostering, you'll need to have System Admin access in Wayfinder. Switch to your System Admin role, or reach out to us at support@withwayfinder.com to request System Admin access. 

How to Roster with Flat Files

Watch the video below for a visual walkthrough, or scroll down for written instructions:

How to Start

This tutorial will walk you through how to create five .csv files and upload them to Wayfinder's platform. 

  • students.csv - lists all students and their optional demographic information
  • teachers.csv - lists all classroom teachers
  • sections.csv - lists all classes in which students may be assigned lessons
  • roster.csv - rosters students into those sections
  • staff.csv (optional) - list all administrator users
    **Please email support@withwayfinder.com to turn on staff rostering.**

To begin, open the Wayfinder Data File Specification file. You will see two sheets associated with each required file listed above. 

  • A layout sheet lists the column headings in each file and indicates which fields are required or optional.
  • A sample sheet, which serves as an example of what a completed file might look like.

For example, you will see a "students.csv layout" sheet and a "students.csv sample" sheet. You will use both to create your final "students.csv" file.

Files should be complete for the term, and are not additive. Users, sections, or rosters that are no longer listed in the file will be removed from the term.

Populate the Four Required Files

Using Google Sheets

  1. Create a copy of the Wayfinder Data File Specification file (File > Make a copy).
  2. Replace the sample data in the students.csv sample, teachers.csv sample, sections.csv sample, and roster.csv sample sheets with information for your own school or district. 
  3. Once you are finished, click on File > Download > Comma Separated Values (.csv). Repeat this for each sheet and name them exactly:
    • students.csv
    • teachers.csv
    • sections.csv
    • roster.csv
    • staff.csv (optional)
      **Please email support@withwayfinder.com to turn on staff rostering.**
  4. Then, skip to Zip the Files

Using Excel, Mac Numbers, or other software

  1. Instead of editing a Google sheet, you may download the entire Wayfinder Data File Specification file by clicking on File > Download > choosing whatever format you would like to work with (.xlsx, .csv, etc.). 
  2. Use Excel Sheets, Mac Numbers, or your preferred spreadsheet software to replace the sample data in teachers.csv sample, students.csv sample, sections.csv sample, staff.csv sample and roster.csv sample with information for your own school or district. 
  3. Export each required sheet as a .csv file
    • In Mac Numbers, click on File > Export to > .csv
    • In Excel, click on File > Save As > Browse > Select "CSV" from the drop down > Save
  4. Make sure your files are named exactly:
    • students.csv
    • teachers.csv
    • sections.csv
    • roster.csv
    • staff.csv (optional)
      **Please email support@withwayfinder.com to turn on staff rostering.**
  5. Then, Zip the Files

Zip the Files

Once you have the four .csv files, you'll need to zip/compress them together before uploading to Wayfinder. The name of the zip file does not matter.

Uploading the Files

Once you've created the four data files, login to your System Administrator account and navigate to the Flat Files section of the Import Settings page by:

  1. Clicking on "System Admin" tab on the left
  2. Clicking on the "Import Settings" tab in the page
  3. Choosing "Flat Files" as the Rostering Type
  4. Fill out the information on the page as follows:
    • Term: Roster data will be added to a particular term in Wayfinder.  Here, you can select either Auto Detect, or specify a specific term.
      • Auto-Detect: Selecting the Auto Detect option will attempt to match your data with what Wayfinder has in the Term Manager. Wayfinder attempts to make the match using term name and academic year listed in your flat files. 
      • Specifying a Term:  If you specify a term, all incoming data from your import will be pushed into the specified term in Wayfinder, regardless of the term names and dates in your flat files. 
    • Upload Type: Manual Upload or SFTP (see SFTP Data Sync for more information)
    • Select zip file: Drag and drop or browse for the zip file.
    • Invite New Users: When selected, newly imported students and teachers with email addresses will automatically be sent an invitation to Wayfinder via email. 
    • Allowed % change: We suggest you leave this at 10%. This is the percent of changes or deletions allowed by the upload, as is intended to avoid mass loss of data in case of an error in your files. 
    • Allow Custom Classes: This setting will allow staff members to create standalone classes that will not be affected by automated rostering. Please note that custom classes must be managed independently, and will not be updated with each roster sync. See our How to Enable Custom Classes after Auto-Rostering for details. 
    • Configure Class Names: By default, the class name that appears in Wayfinder is mapped directly from the Section Name column in your sections.csv. The Configure Class Names setting allows you to customize how class names appear in Wayfinder. These settings apply to all classes, across all schools, and changes will take effect on the next import run.
      • You can select the following tags to appear in the primary Class Name or secondary Subtitle Tag:
        • Class Name
        • Section ID
        • Term
      • Follow these steps to adjust how class names appear: 
        1. Use the "Class Name" dropdown to select the fields that will make up the class name
        2. Use the "Subtitle Tags" dropdown to select optional fields to display as subtitle tags beneath the class name

        3. Finally, review the Preview section to see how your selected settings will appear throughout Wayfinder. on class tiles

  5. Click on "Save Import Settings" to ensure you don't lose this information.
  6. Lastly, click on "Run Import Now" to process your zip file.
  7. After your import is processed, please Review Your Import Logs to see how your import progressed. Note that you will not be able to run another import until the previous one has finished.

Reviewing Import Logs

Once you have uploaded your zip file, you'll want to check that the import went through successfully. 

  1. On the System Administration page, click on the "Import Logs" tab to review your import. 
  2. Check the Status column to review the status of your import. Once the status will change from "Processing" to "Finished" or "Invalid". 
    • A "Finished" status means that your files were successfully imported; however, the import may still have errors that you'll want to review. 
    • An "Invalid" status means that the import was not processed, and your rosters have not been uploaded.

  3. Check the Notices column to see how many errors or notices occurred in the import. 

  4. Click on the import to review any errors or notices. 
  5. If needed, resolve any issues in your flat files and then re-upload your zip file on the Import Settings page. 

For more information on troubleshooting and resolving import errors, see our Import Logs and Roster Troubleshooting guide. 

 

Conclusion

For considerations on how to continue to manage rostering after flat file rostering is complete, please check out our article: How to allow staff to manage rosters manually after uploading Flat Files.

Send Out Login Instructions

Choose the login method that best works for your users here!