Overview

The Present Teacher’s Timetable Overview Per setting controls how a _Teacher_’s (Educator/Instructor) weekly schedule is displayed when office staff look it up from the _Teacher_ list. It determines whether the schedule is shown as a simple grid organized by timetable periods, or as a visual, time-based calendar.

This setting only affects the read-only ‘Timetable Overview’ screen used by staff (Owners, Administrators, and Secretaries) to review a _Teacher_’s schedule. It does not affect the _Teacher_’s own personal timetable view, the main institute timetable editor, or the Dashboard timetable widget.

What This Setting Does

When staff open a _Teacher_’s profile or list and choose the ‘Timetable Overview’ option, the system opens a window showing that _Teacher_’s weekly schedule. This setting chooses the layout used to present that schedule, with two available options:

• Timetable Period (default) – Displays the schedule as a table. Days of the week are listed as rows and the institute’s timetable periods (e.g. Period 1, Period 2, Period 3…) are listed as columns. Each cell that contains a scheduled class shows a small icon; clicking it reveals the _Group_ (Class), _Subject_, and classroom for that slot. If a scheduling constraint exists for that slot (for example, a time when the _Teacher_ has declared they are unavailable), a warning icon is shown in that cell as well.
• Calendar View – Displays the same weekly schedule as a visual calendar/timeline. Each day of the week is shown as its own column, and each class session is drawn as a block positioned and sized according to its actual start and end time (for example, 09:00-09:45), rather than an abstract period number. Hovering over a session shows its details in a pop-up.

In both layouts, staff can still filter the schedule shown by Timetable Category and by a specific week before viewing it; this setting only changes how the resulting schedule is drawn on screen, not which sessions are included.

Where It Is Used

This setting is applied in exactly one place in the application:

• _Teacher_ list / _Teacher_ profile actions menu – the ‘Timetable Overview’ action. When a staff member selects a _Teacher_ and chooses this action, a window opens showing that _Teacher_’s weekly schedule, laid out according to the option chosen in this setting.

This action is only available to staff roles – Owner, Administrator, and Secretary. It is not available to _Teachers_ viewing their own schedule (their personal timetable view is a separate feature and is not affected by this setting) and it is not available to _Students_ or _Parents_.

The setting takes effect the moment a staff member opens the Timetable Overview window; it is read at that time, so any change to this setting applies immediately to the next time the window is opened (no need to log out, re-open the browser, or wait for a scheduled refresh).

Business Logic / Behavior

The following behavior can be confirmed directly from the setting’s design:

• Default behavior: if the setting has never been changed, the system uses the Timetable Period layout (the traditional grid of days x periods).
• The two layout options are mutually exclusive – an institution sees one layout or the other for all staff and all _Teachers_; it is not possible to mix layouts per _Teacher_ or per staff user.
• The Calendar View re-calculates each session’s position using its real clock time, so sessions of different lengths appear as blocks of different sizes on screen. The Timetable Period view instead gives every period the same width, regardless of how long it actually lasts.
• Scheduling constraints (for example, _Teacher_ unavailability recorded in Availability and Constraints) are visually flagged with a warning icon in the Timetable Period layout. In the Calendar View, constraints are shown as labeled blocks on the calendar using the same time-based logic as regular sessions.
• If no active Timetable Category is configured for the institute or period, the Timetable Overview window cannot display any schedule (staff will see a message indicating there is no active timetable category), regardless of which option is selected in this setting.

Assumption (not directly confirmed in the setting’s own logic, but consistent with its purpose and naming): the Calendar View option is intended to give staff an at-a-glance, real-time sense of a _Teacher_’s day (similar to a personal calendar app), while the Timetable Period option is intended for institutes that plan and communicate schedules strictly in terms of numbered periods.

Example(s)

Example 1 – Timetable Period (default)

Riverside Academy keeps this setting at its default value, Timetable Period. A school secretary needs to confirm whether teacher Maria Lopez is free on Wednesday afternoon. She opens the _Teacher_ list, selects Maria Lopez, and clicks Timetable Overview. A grid appears with the days of the week as rows and Period 1 through Period 8 as columns. The secretary looks at the Wednesday row and Period 6 column and sees a filled cell; clicking it shows ‘Group 7B – Mathematics – Room 12’. Since the cell is filled, she knows Maria Lopez is teaching at that time and cannot be booked for another activity.

Example 2 – Calendar View

Lakeside Institute of Technology changes this setting to Calendar View because their class sessions run for different lengths (some 50 minutes, some 90 minutes) and staff found period numbers confusing to compare at a glance. An administrator opens the Timetable Overview for instructor David Chen and instead of a grid, sees a weekly calendar: Monday to Friday are shown as columns, and colored blocks represent each session positioned by its actual time, for example a block from 10:00 to 11:30 for ‘Group MBA-2 – Corporate Finance’. The administrator can immediately see that David Chen has a free block between 11:30 and 13:00 on Monday, without needing to know which numbered period that corresponds to.

When to Use

When to Enable Calendar View

• The institute’s sessions have varying, non-uniform durations (for example, lectures, labs, and seminars of different lengths) that do not map cleanly to identical fixed periods.
• Staff prefer to think and communicate in terms of actual clock times (e.g. ‘2:00 PM’) rather than period numbers (e.g. ‘Period 5’).
• Staff want a quick, visual way to spot free time blocks in a _Teacher_’s day, similar to a personal calendar application.

When to Keep Timetable Period (default)

• The institute organizes its entire schedule around a fixed, uniform set of numbered periods (for example, Period 1 to Period 8), and staff, _Teachers_, and _Students_ already think and communicate in those terms.
• Staff prefer a compact table that is easy to scan for a specific day-and-period combination (for example, when cross-checking against printed or period-based timetables).
• No strong reason exists to change the display; since this is the default, it requires no configuration effort.

Notes

K-12 versus Higher Education Mode

This setting behaves identically whether the institute is running in K-12 mode or in Higher Education mode (controlled by the Higher Education customization setting). There is no functional difference in how the Timetable Period or Calendar View layouts work between the two modes.

The only difference a user may notice is terminology: depending on how the institute has configured its terminology, the word ‘_Teacher_’ shown in this setting’s label and in the Timetable Overview window may instead read as ‘Instructor’, ‘Faculty’, or ‘Educator’ in Higher Education configurations, and ‘_Group_’ may read as ‘Class’, ‘Section’, or ‘Cohort’. These are display-name preferences only and do not change the setting’s behavior.

Prerequisites

• At least one active Timetable Category must exist for the current academic period; otherwise the Timetable Overview window has no schedule data to display, regardless of this setting’s value.
• The _Teacher_ being reviewed must have at least one scheduled class for a schedule to appear; an empty schedule will simply show an empty grid or an empty calendar, depending on the option chosen.

Related Settings

• Exclude Timetable Plan entries from timetable views and only return timetable implementation entries (Sessions) (Timetable > Timetable Settings > Visibility Settings & Rights – Use_Sessions_As_WeekProgram_Weekly_Implementation): affects whether the week selector inside the same Timetable Overview window offers a general ‘Timetable Plan’ option (the recurring weekly plan) or only specific weeks with actually scheduled sessions. This interacts with the Calendar View option, since the Calendar View is most informative when real, dated sessions with specific times are being reviewed.

Setting location: Configuration > Main Settings > General Settings > Basic Customization (tab) > Controls, Filters & Checks (section) – Present_Teacher_Timetable_Overview_Per.