It’s piano scheduling season, and this likely means your head hurts. It’s a time of year we all dread; a time of year that we try to forget is coming so that we can actually enjoy our summer vacations.
Unfortunately, the time for mindful avoidance has passed. Your phone is ringing and your email is dinging; parents are pushing for those perfect piano lesson time slots.
Making everyone happy during scheduling season is a more challenging job than being an air traffic controller. You have to deal with family schedules, family dynamics, and student personalities. While it’s tempting to take a hardline, “Here’s your time” kind of approach, you’re probably not keen on the risk of losing students.
So, pleasing as many people as possible is your only option.
How do you do this? How do you end all of your scheduling headaches? I wish I had all the answers. But I don’t.
Fortunately, the Teach Piano Today community does! If we put our heads together we can end our scheduling nightmares while creating a resource of strategies we can all rely on.
To accomplish this we need everyone to read today’s post below and then, in the comments section, share one tip for at least one of the problems (headaches) we describe. We’ll choose draw lucky people at random from those who leave comments to receive a free copy of our popular teen improv book “With Celtic Courage”. Winners will contacted by email – check the comments section on Sunday, August 4th to see who won!
If everyone who reads the Teach Piano Today blog chips in with a scheduling skill, the comments section of today’s post will be a resource we can all turn to for years to come!
Scheduling headaches can result from a thousand different scenarios. We’ve whittled the list down to the six most common complaints we hear from teachers this time of year. After reading through the list, choose the headache that you can help solve and share your solution in the comments.
Headache 1: Fighting For Prime Time
Is every single parent asking for “Thursday at 4:30”? Are families insisting that your primetime spots are the ONLY times that will work for their children? How do you handle this scheduling headache? First-come, first-served? Seniority?
In the comments section at the bottom of this post, type the heading, “Fighting For Prime Time” before sharing your solution.
Headache 2: The “Can’t Commit” Kids
Are the dance studios in your area slow to solidify their schedules? Are local hockey teams still confirming ice times? Often families are reluctant to commit to piano lesson time slots until they know the schedules of their children’s other extracurricular activities. Do you wait for other activities before confirming your own schedule? Do you place students into a “hope this works” time and then deal with the changes as they come?
In the comments section at the bottom of this post, type the heading, “The Can’t Commit Kids” before sharing your solution.
Headache 3: Sibling Swap
Do you have a family with three or more children who have requested a new time slot? The chain-reaction caused by moving a large chunk of time can wreak havoc on your scheduling as you attempt to accommodate this request. Do you move heaven and earth to make it work for your large families? Do you inconvenience other families to keep a large time slot of siblings together?
In the comments section at the bottom of this post, type the heading, “Sibling Swap” before sharing your solution.
Headache 4: The MIA (Missing In Action) Family
Are you checking your email and texts every hour, waiting for a family to respond to your scheduling information? Sometimes large pieces of your “scheduling puzzle” can be dependent on the answer from just one family. Do you wait for the family to reply before moving forward? Do you continue scheduling and cross your fingers that the time you offered them will work?
In the comments section at the bottom of this post, type the heading, “The MIA Family” before sharing your solution.
Headache 5: Friday Night Flight
Are you having trouble filling a certain day in your studio? Typically this difficult day is Friday as families prefer to leave weekends open. But with a busy studio, every time slot needs to be filled in order for all of your students to have a lesson. Do you save Fridays for new registrations? Do you only offer Fridays to families that are more flexible than others?
In the comments section at the bottom of this post, type the heading, “Friday Night Flight” before sharing your solution.
Headache 6: Schedule Complete?… Think Again
Has your completed schedule been disrupted by a last-minute change? Did the local school’s bussing suddenly shift by 15 minutes and now some of your early time slots are no longer accessible to your students? Just one change can send you back to the drawing board. Do you attempt to shuffle families? Do you ask for families to come forward who are able to switch times?
In the comments section at the bottom of this post, type the heading, “Schedule Complete?… Think Again” before sharing your solution.
Thank you for taking the time to share your expertise with the Teach Piano Today Community. With your help we can solve our headache hardships 🙂
In my initial email asking for availability, I ask all families to include ALL their available time to ensure they can secure a slot in September and then ask for their patience and flexibility at this time as there are around 35-40 families all expecting a slot.
I find if you lay it all out for them, and help them understand it is not just them, they are super helpful! I also have fantastic and supportive families, which makes things easier.
Fighting for Prime Time — I send out my schedule (just did it yesterday) first to families with multiple kids taking lessons and those who’ve taken summer lessons. The next day, it goes to all the others. I have a piano website with the schedule on it, and I update the schedule as I plug people into spots. Since the parents can see which spots are taken, they don’t ask for a spot that has already been claimed.
What website do you use to view your schedule?
Can’t Commit Kids — I relate to this as a mom of 3 — when my girls were in school, it *was* hard getting everything scheduled! So I’m as flexible as possible, and I think parents really appreciate that. One example is a high school boy I teach who runs cross country. I let his mom choose a slot, with the understanding that he won’t begin those lessons until October. She appreciates this, and the boy has studied with me for 7 years now. I don’t really mind either as it gives me a 30-minute “break” in my schedule during the first busy month.
I do exactly the same thing. It works beautifully for both of us! Fortunately for me, it is only one student. 🙂
Fighting for Prime Time I’m thinking of using an online tool like signup genious.com and offering links in order by summer students and seniority. As a side note, I know a teacher who keeps his schedule the same all year to avoid the time it takes to communicate changes from season to season.
Fighting for Prime Time – I live a block from the elementary school in a small town so everyone wants the after school slot so their child can walk over but I only have three of those! So I added a before school option and that has worked well and also helps with the “can’t commit “ families :).
“The Can’t Commit Kids” I have several students where this happens. What we typically do is pick a time slot with the understanding that if their other activity conflicts with it, I’ll do my best to find them a slot that will fit their needs. I don’t make any promises because they’re aware there’s only one 3:30 slot per day! I try to be flexible and parents really appreciate it when you work with them. Keeping the lines of communication open helps a great deal. There’s one girl I’ve been teaching for years. She’s now in high school and is very dedicated to both piano and basketball. In her case, if my schedule allows, we switch midway through the year from Tuesday to Friday. (We’ve also been doing that all summer, but I don’t have nearly as many students so it’s easy.) When we make the switch during the fall, the time may not be ideal, but they appreciate my efforts, take whatever slot is available and it’s far better than losing her as a student.
“Fighting For Prime Time” – Any students who takes lessons over the summer has first dibs on time slots for the fall. To me, it’s only fair. They made the effort to come in over the summer and my way of saying thank you is by doing this. That being said, whatever slots are left, and there are quite a few, typically match the fall schedule the from the year before. I make a mock schedule based on this and start from there. After contacting everyone and getting students booked, I still find myself arranging the pieces of my schedule like a puzzle until September. If someone has to make a change, (they always seem to come up), I offer whatever I can, make switches with other students (parents) who are able to do so and everything settles into place. I’d rather work with parents and they know I do the best I can. They also know there’s only so much I can do and they are willing to work with me.
Schedule Complete…Think Again……..Once I set my schedule, I have Parents sign a “no make up/lesson change policy”. Instead, I ask parents to join a Lesson Swap Text Thread. That way, if sports or other activities derail the plan, they can temporarily swap with another, more flexible student. They take this responsibility on so I don’t have to get caught up in all the rearranging:)
I like the Lesson Swap idea. Where do you have the thread? Facebook group? Something else?
MIA/Can’t Commit-honestly, the best thing that ever happened was that I moved to teaching through a community center two days a week. They have set policies. Returning students have until X date to register and set a time with me and pay. After that, it opens to people on the waiting list. They contact me and I give them a list of available slots. They pick what they want, and it is held for 72 hours. If they have not paid in that time, it becomes open again. After 1 week, registration opens for everyone, with the same procedure. Payments are by semester, including a book fee.
Folks, this was a major policy change for me, and when I put it out for ALL my students, including my home studio students, no one complained. And suddenly, they renewed and registered really quickly, except for one who I am assuming is not returning. No nagging, no fussing-just set dates and email reminders/iCal entries that automatically come out with the email. I also think that not adding new students mid-semester, but instead adding them to a waiting list helped-I did that because I hated to charge per semester knowing that so many people have camps and travel, but it seems to have made the lessons more desirable to have them on a set registration schedule similar to camps or other after school classes.
Friday Night Flight-I empathize. My daughter does travel cheer, so at least once a month sees us throwing stuff in the car Friday night and driving several hours to a Saturday/Sunday competition, then driving back Sunday night. What I did was to reserve Monday mornings and Friday afternoons for special events and group classes. I have set one group class/club a month (except for December) for my piano students in 3 age groups-preschool/K, grades 1-5, and grades 6-12. We do Orff activities, piano games, and master classes/mini recitals. Parents register/pay for this separately. I do similar things for my homeschoolers on Monday mornings. I can schedule around the weeks that are big travel weeks, and if someone needs to miss, it’s not a big deal when it’s a group of 10.
Fighting for Prime Time- at the end of last semester I sent a google form to families requesting their first, second, and third choices for lesson days and times. I put the results on a spreadsheet for the whole week. I color coded the choices, green, yellow, and red. This is my current tentative schedule. I try to give everyone their first choice, but I can also clearly see if a family could move to their second or third choice, if needed. The only problem is the stragglers. Despite sending the form out again in a reminder email, there are a few families I haven’t heard from all summer. There is no perfect solution. We just have to be polite and professional, and if necessary withdraw from our bank of goodwill that we built up from last year to smooth over any disappointments!
This year I used SignUp Genius. All but one family has signed up for their lesson time and I only had to handle ONE snag! It was pretty swift.
PRIME TIMEI teach all year allowing for family vacations, etc, in the summer. Students keep their time in the Fall with the understanding we might have to adjust.
SIBLING SWAPWith sibling groups, the parents might have to take a less desirable time (later in the evening) or have the option of splitting up.
MIA Parents agree on a “let’s get started” time with my promise to adjust if needed.
LESSON SWAP I give, with permission, phone numbers to all parents who can work out a swap if needed and I keep Friday evenings or Saturdays available for any student if needed. I schedule students with a 15-minute break in between…if they miss a lesson, I can use that extra time to give a couple extended lessons to make up the time.
PRIME TIME: Existing students get first choice!
CAN’T COMMIT: I ask for best guess and allow changes the first month (August). After that they have to take what’s left.
FRIDAY NIGHT: If I have a day that is mostly empty, I channel new students there, OR use it for make-up lessons. Mine has varied across the week over the years. It’s not always Friday.
I teach all year long and have recently switched to MONTHLY billing practice. They get a slight discount by paying monthly, rather per lesson and in months with 5 wks, they get a bonus lesson for free. 2 Months into this, my student enrollment income has actually gone up!
“Fighting for Prime Time” – I give students the same time slot that they had in the spring unless they specifically request a change, and then it is first come, first served. I have an “early priority” date, and continuing students are expected to confirm their time slot by that date, or else I will open it back up and offer it to incoming students. All of my students can access my studio calendar on my website, so they can already see if a time they want is taken. I understand that there are sports and other activities, but I can’t read their minds or see into the future, so that’s why I allow open access to my calendar (the software I use doesn’t show which students have which times, it just shows up as either “busy” or “open”). That way if they want a time, there is no negotiating – either it’s open and they request it, or it’s not and they figure something out. I had a mom last year who had to change times temporarily during softball season, and she was willing to pay a holding fee for two months in order for me to continue to hold her daughter’s preferred time slot while she was attending during a different day/time.
Fighting for prime time. like many piano teachers my studio drops of by about 2/3 in the summer months. To encourage families to continue in the summer I offer priority scheduling in the fall. By committing to 3 or more summer lessons they have first pick of my fall schedule slots. Its a win-win for all!
Fighting for Prime Time – I give first priority to those who take summer session, then second priority to those who have been with me the longest. I like the idea of the parent swap text group but do not have a website so I don’t know how the parents would have access to the master schedule. I would like to have more ideas on how to make that work without a website.
I just make an excel or word document with all the information and email it out, updating when necessary if I have to add or drop anyone. I do have a website, but I don’t run my calendar or swaps through it.
The MIA Family – My registration paperwork reads: “To guarantee your space in the 2019-2020 studio year this paper must be placed in Registration Basket by 5 pm May 25th. I will look over your schedule requests (they mark NO for all times they at NOT Available), and together we will come to an agreement by June 1st. If no mutual agreement can be reached by June 1st, I will refund your registration fee and give you a list of other piano teachers in the area. Wait list clients will be booked into open lesson slots June 2nd.”
By mistake one year, I did not give a family a follow-up check in when their paperwork was not in the registration basket; which lead to bad feelings on both sides. So I now follow-up one time with a text or phone call double checking: 1. Do you want to continue or no? Mutual respect between teacher/business needs and clients is paramount to a piano studio’s reputation, future and relationship with students and their families not only just for registration, but throughout the studio year. A quick “Just checking in; didn’t see your paperwork in the registration basket by the deadline” text or call makes your mind/heart clear.
Fighting for Prime Time – Thinking about using an online booking/sign-up tool. I create a schedule of available time slots, send it out, first come, first served. If a family cannot make any of the remaining available time slots, they can try to swap with someone else in the studio.
I give everyone the available times and then I ask each parent to give me their first, second and third choices for times. If there are times that will absolutely not work for them, I want to know that as well!
Fighting For Prime Time: I send out a doodle poll on August 1, so families know my availability. Each family is to pick their top 3 choices (they can leave a comment or email me if they have a 1st, 2nd, 3rd choice) and they have until August 14 to participate. I have a small studio, so this method has worked out every year since I started using it 3 years ago. (watch now, this will be the first year it doesn’t!) The deadline is about a week before school starts.
Can’t Commit: We only have one dance studio in my small town (and that includes my own daughter’s tumbling class) and they are NOTORIOUS for NEVER getting their schedule out early. They don’t start classes until after Labor Day, even though school starts two weeks before. I can’t wait that long to set my schedule, so most people base their lesson choices on when classes were held the year before and it *usually* is pretty close.
MIA: Since I have a deadline for participating, I do not feel guilty when I set my schedule before hearing from someone. If my remaining openings are not available, I invite them to check with already scheduled families for a switch.
Schedule Complete?: I purposely take the first week of the school year off from teaching as one of my “vacation” weeks specifically for this purpose. From the get go, I tell families: “I’ve used this system several years in a row and so far it has a 100% success rate at everyone getting a lesson time that works for them! Sometimes it requires a little shuffling around and extra communication, but nothing too painful, and seems to work better than a “first come, first served” approach which can sometimes leave some up a creek without a paddle.” And thank them for their patience as we get things worked out, acknowledging that scheduling can be a moving target at this time of year. That way everyone knows up front that we are doing our best to make sure everyone gets what they need. I have asked for any families that might be available at other spots in order to accommodate everyone. I also have several older students who participate in seasonal sports at school, and because volleyball (Aug/Sept) has games on T/Th, but then Basketball Games (Oct/Nov) are M/W, I do allow schedule changes where I have holes (I purposefully have more availability than lessons to teach) as long as it’s ahead of time and for no fewer than one month of lessons at a time.
Friday Night Flight: I haven’t taught on Friday’s at all for this reason. I will occasionally allow an exception if I have a commitment from the family to be there regularly and they come to my earliest spot. My family doesn’t go out of town very often either, but if I have a student right after school, then it’s easier to still leave at a decent time if we do need to leave.
Sibling Swap: I currently don’t have families with more than 2 students. I do try to give them priority to have lessons back to back as much as possible.
One more thing: In the past, I’ve had a lesson swap list be optional to join. This year, I am just going to go ahead and put everyone on it and request that it be the FIRST place they go when something comes up, such as a rescheduled game or track meet because of weather. I have a bunch of alternatives to missing a lesson, since I am upfront about not making up missed lessons and rarely being able to accommodate rescheduling. There have been some times when I’ve had to ask a family to reschedule, so I’ve been a bit more lenient with them if they’ve asked well in advance and I can make it work. I think it helps that we have refreshments after recitals, so all the parents at least have faces to connect with names so they will be more comfortable asking for a favor every now and again.
Fighting for prime time……In early August I email my parents with the schedule for teaching days and times available, asking them to pick their 1st, 2nd and 3rd choices. I dont find providing this at the end of the previous year helps because they dont know their schedule for next year at that point. This has worked really well for me for over 25 years.
Schedule complete……….Because I adhere to a no makeup policy, one of the options I give for changes is providing a student swap list. This is a list of phone nos and email addresses gotten with permission from everyone at the beginning of each new year. In the case of last minute schedule changes; conflicts from sports, band, ballet, etc. they are asked to refer to the list and swap times with another students. This has work really well also. This solved many needs for changes and left the responsibility to the parents.
Headache 1,2, 5
I send out an email 2 weeks before I begin with all of my time slots listed. I create motivation! I tell the parents they get first dibs if they respond first- and I give a small discount for early payment. I also ask them to list what times they absolutely CAN’T come, and what their preferred times are, as well as what times they COULD come if they had to. This creates a little wiggle room for me if I need to squeeze things around.
Regarding Friday and makeups- I stopped teaching on weekends and I never do makeups. If it is an EXCUSED lesson (24 hour notice or emergency) I simply give them a lesson credit and pay it forward. This makes my life way easier. I teach early mornings rather than on weekends. It’s just not worth it for me.
I teach all year, and keep the same schedule all year. I only make changes if something comes up (new student, someone quits, time/day change request), then I juggle the schedule as best I can. I am flexible with them, and they are flexible with me. I have a great relationship with my families.
Fighting For Prime Time. I’m a very visual person. I have students sign up for 2-hour blocks of time that are ideal, possible, and impossible (ie. Wednesdays 4-6; Wednesdays 6-8…). I put everyone’s choices for each time slot on individual post-it-notes (green for ideal, yellow for possible & pink for impossible). I make a big grid of the days & the 2-hour blocks and sticky-tack it to the wall. I place everyone’s individual post-it notes inside the corresponding blocks on the grid. From there, I can remove post-it-notes when they’re “firmly-placed” in a 2-hour block. Once everyone’s narrowed down to 1 block, it’s just a matter of fine-tuning who goes when inside that 2-hour block.
It gives me enough wiggle-room for making my schedule to keep almost everyone happy when they get a lesson inside their preferred block. It prevents people from asking for a specific half-hour time.
Fighting For Prime Time –
I would suggest what Nicola Cantan suggested. On your enrollment form, include a grid of checkboxes consisting of all your teaching hours. Ask for parents to check off any UNSUITABLE lesson times.
As parents are checking boxes off, they will start to feel like they are being a little unreasonable if they prefer just one or two specific times.
Plus, this also gives you many more options when scheduling everyone, vs. the “3 most preferred times” that most teachers use.
In August, I email my availability for families to consider. I’m eliminating a weekday this year and adding a Sunday late afternoon/early evening time slot as an option for those who find the weekdays too full with multiple sibling activities. I offer a few 1 hour slots every other week for busy teens to consider. I schedule middle and high school students 2:45-4:15 or 7-8:30pm; elementary students 4:15-6:45.
I give a late August deadline for parents to pick 3 time slots and don’t start fall lessons until students have been in school for a week. They have adjusted to early wake-ups by then.
I have found being firm about my schedule as offered gets a stronger commitment from families to make it work!
I use Accuity Scheduling. It puts the responsibility back to the parents/students to book their lesson. Yes there are those who forget- but if they have to pay for missed lessons then they soon remember to schedule.
It takes the pressure of me having to try to accomodate- I still accomodate where I can and where it is just cause, but being firm about the schedule and the contract is working out fine – everything is upfront and by putting some responsibility back to the student/ parent then it soon sorts out those who really want to learn and those who see swimming as more important than their music lesson.
Headache 4: MIA. I have managed this in two ways. First, I put a deadline on my scheduling communications. The Subject Line for this year’s email said “Fall Scheduling (form due by July 15th)”, and it’s repeated again in the email along with thanking the parents for helping me have a smooth scheduling process. Second, I make it very easy for my students to leave in case that is uncomfortable to them. Sometimes those delays can be because they don’t know how to say they need to stop lessons. But I love teaching, and I want to only teach those who WANT to take lessons. So in the fall scheduling email, I tell them that my Google form for scheduling includes a place to mark if they have had a change in lesson needs. The very first question of my Google form reads, “While I love to see my students return year after year, I also understand that lesson needs and schedules can change over time. Will your student be returning to lessons?” I have only had one student per year say no. But they always have the chance to do upfront in a comfortable way that doesn’t delay the scheduling process.
“Schedule Complete?… Think Again”
Headache 4: MIA. I have managed this in two ways. First, I put a deadline on my scheduling communications. The Subject Line for this year’s email said “Fall Scheduling (form due by July 15th)”, and it’s repeated again in the email along with thanking the parents for helping me have a smooth scheduling process. Second, I make it very easy for my students to leave in case that is uncomfortable to them. Sometimes those delays can be because they don’t know how to say they need to stop lessons. But I love teaching, and I want to only teach those who WANT to take lessons. So in the fall scheduling email, I tell them that my Google form for scheduling includes a place to mark if they have had a change in lesson needs. The very first question of my Google form reads, “While I love to see my students return year after year, I also understand that lesson needs and schedules can change over time. Will your student be returning to lessons?” I have only had one student per year say no. But they always have the chance to do upfront in a comfortable way that doesn’t delay the scheduling process.
FIGHTING FOR PRIME TIME
We start scheduling for the fall in April. If current students submit their registration form and fee before the end of the month they get a discount on their registration fee and have first choice of keeping their current spot. If they don’t want to keep their current time we look to see what else is open or if another current student wants to switch. They are all aware that after the end of April all spots not paid for are open to the general public. Seems to work well and we have very few problems.