How School Periods Work for Super Users in Vocab Loco

School periods define the academic calendar for your entire organization in Vocab Loco. As a Super User, you set the start and end dates for each school year, and all linked teachers follow the calendar you configure. Vocab Loco uses these periods to organize activity data, segment reports by year, and control what resets when a new year begins. All historical data is preserved — past school years remain available in reports at any time.

Where to Configure School Periods

School period settings are located in Customize Program, under the School Year tab. This is the default tab when you open Customize Program. Click Customize Program in the left sidebar to get there.

Choosing a Calendar Format

At the bottom of the School Year tab, you can select how your academic calendar is structured:

With summer break — a gap separates one school year from the next. Use this for standard US academic calendars where students are off during the summer.

Year-Round Schedule — school years run continuously with no summer gap between them. Use this if your program operates year-round without a long break.

Switching formats opens a setup dialog where you confirm the new dates. Previous school years are preserved and realigned to the new time frame.

Your School Years

The School Year tab displays a table listing all your configured school years. Each row shows the school year name, its start and end dates, and a status badge:

Current — the active school year. Data generated today is attached to this period.

Upcoming — the next school year, already configured and waiting to activate on its start date.

Past — previous school years. Their data is preserved and accessible in reports.

Editing School Year Dates

Click the edit button (pencil icon) on any school year row to open the edit dialog. You can adjust the start and end dates for that year. The end date must be after the start date, and dates cannot overlap another school year already configured.

Student progress is always attached to its original school year and remains available for review at any time, regardless of date edits.

Starting a New Year with an Empty Class

When editing an upcoming school year, you will see the option Start this school year with an empty class. If enabled, student enrollments will not carry over when the new year begins — teachers will start the year with no students in their roster and will need to re-add or re-import their class. Student history from the previous year remains intact and attached to that period.

If left unchecked, all current enrollments carry over automatically when the new school year starts.

What Resets Automatically

When a new school year begins, activity points reset automatically for all students. This happens every year rollover and cannot be disabled.

Banked Words and list progress are never reset and carry over across school years.

Game coins can optionally reset at the start of a new year if that option was selected during initial setup. They can also be reset manually at any time (see below).

Manually Resetting Game Coins

The Reset school year data section of the School Year tab lets you reset game coin balances for the current school year at any time. Click Reset game coins and confirm the action. Student coin balances are set to zero immediately. Activity history and reports are not affected.

This section requires a two-step confirmation before any action is applied. No data is changed until you complete both confirmation steps.

How School Periods Appear in Reports

Every report in your Super User account includes a school period selector at the top of the page. The list shows all your configured school years — current, upcoming, and past. Selecting a period filters all report data to that academic year, making it easy to compare performance across years.

Impact on Linked Teachers

All teachers linked to your Super User account follow your school calendar automatically. They cannot modify the school year dates. On their own Customize Program page, teachers will see the name and dates of the current active period along with a note that the school calendar is managed by the school account.