Beginning-of-Year Procedures

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Beginning-of-Year Procedures

Here are some answers to common questions and tips for beginning your school year with Alexandria. Please note that several of the procedures described here, such as updating calendars, advancing patron grades, removing graduated students, and updating patron policies, overlap with our End-of-Year Procedures. If you took these steps at the end of the previous school year, you don't need to do them again! Also note that procedures involving calendars and patrons overlap with Textbook Tracker, meaning you only have to do those procedures once to count for both Alexandria and Textbook Tracker.

Update Calendars
Advance Patrons
1. Advance Patron Grades
2. Update Patron Policies
Import Patron Records
Remove Graduated Students
Update Expired Cards
Backups

Calendars

^{Set your Closed and Period Due dates.}

Advance patrons

^{Advance patrons to the next grade.}

Import records

^{Update and add new patron information.}

Graduated patrons

^{Remove graduated patrons from your database.}

Update cards

^{Renew patron library cards.}

Backups

^{Be prepared. Back up your self-hosted data.}

Additional resources:

Check out the Back-to-School Workshop video if you would like to be walked through the procedures mentioned here.
Need a quick refresher on how to operate Alexandria? Read the Alexandria Refresher.
If you're still using Alexandria v6, go through the Beginning-of-Year Procedures for v6 instead.
Print out this handy Beginning-of-Year Procedures infographic to keep at your desk. It's a great reminder of what needs to be done!

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Note
Before running any of the data-changing utilities described in the steps above, create an archive so you have a restore point if something unexpected happens.

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Calendars

Calendars are used in conjunction with Patron Policies to accurately perform circulation-based calculations, like due dates, fines, holds and reservations, etc. Alexandria will not adjust the due date after an item has been checked out, so it's important to establish your Closed and Period Due dates at the beginning of the year, before any items or resources are checked out. Read Calendar Preferences to learn more.

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Go to Preferences > Calendars.
Select a calendar from the list on the left.
Choose a date and click once for Closed, twice for Period Due.
1. To close the same day of the week for the entire month, click on one or more day of the week headings at the top of the calendar.
2. Click + to add a note to a particular date.
Click Save and move on to the next month, or the next calendar.
Repeat step 2-4 for each calendar.

Patrons are assigned to a calendar according to their Patron Policy. Go to Preferences > Policies and check that each patron policy is assigned to the correct calendar and that Apply Period Due Dates is checked.

Tip

Period Due is a date by which all items should be returned to the library. The circulation period just before this date will be shortened so items are returned in time. For example, if you set a Period Due date of May 13, all items checked out before May 13th—that would have been due after the 13th—will be assigned a new due date of May 13th. Set a Period Due date to remind patrons to return their borrowed items before the end of the year or another specified period.

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When patron data is synced with Alexandria via SIF or Clever, patrons who have an active record in Alexandria but are no longer included in the synced data will be marked as Transferred. Those patron records will need to be removed manually. Run this utility to remove patrons with a status of Transferred.

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Remove graduated patrons

Beginning or End of Year

^{Skip this step if you keep records for graduated patrons.}

Run the Remove Patrons utility to remove graduated students from the database. You may need to run it multiple times with different selections, depending on your needs.

Go to Tools > Utilities.
Select the Patrons > General category.
Choose the Remove Patrons utility on the right.
On the Selections tab, enter the criteria needed to select the individual patrons or groups of patrons you intend to remove. Make sure the correct status is selected (like Active or Transferred, or choose Any to include them all). Then depending on your method for tracking graduated patrons, you can use two different selections:
1. If you keep track of graduation dates in patron records, enter the appropriate date range or relative date in the Graduation Date field.
2. If you use Last Grade in the Grade Table Preferences, enter the user-defined value for Last Grade in the Patrons in Grade field (most commonly "Graduated").
On the Options tab, choose if you want patrons to be removed even if they have items checked out or outstanding charges.
Click Run.

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title	Do you manage patrons with SIF or Clever?

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Update Expired Cards

_{Skip if card expiration dates are disabled.}

Do you use expiration dates for patron library cards? Run the Renew Patron Cards utility to update the expiration dates for the new year. It will reset and update the Card Exp. Date for all matching patrons to a date X number of days from when the utility is run, as specified in their Patron Policy.

For example, if the patron's policy has Days Patron's Card is Active set to 365 and the utility is run on May 30, 2019, the patron's new expiration date would be May 29, 2020.

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Go to Tools > Utilities.
Select the Patrons > General category on the left.
Choose the Renew Patron Cards utility on the right.
On the Selections tab, enter the criteria for the patrons whose cards you want to renew. To renew ALL expired patron cards, leave the default settings.
Run the utility.

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Backups

_{Self Hosted, only. Skip if your library is Cloud Hosted.}

Finally, create a complete backup of your Alexandria Data folder. Unlike an archive, backups are considered a "last resort" in case everything else fails.

Don't store your backups on the same device as your library data station. We recommend storing your backups with a file hosting or cloud storage service, like Dropbox or CrashPlan, which are specifically designed to backup to other machines or off-site servers. If you use an external hard drive, we suggest storing it in a fire-resistant safe in an off-site location. It may seem extreme, but you never know what will happen, and we want you to be prepared for the worst.

This is also a great time to review and possibly revise your backup strategy. Read Back Up Your Data to learn more.

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Key

Beginning-of-Year Procedures

Calendars

Advance patrons

Import records

Graduated patrons

Update cards

Backups

Calendars

Remove graduated patrons

Update Expired Cards

Backups

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