Draft and review school automation before activation

Start with a disabled draft rule, choose supported events and actions and review the impact preview before activating an approved version. Staff define an approved event and actions, inspect the current impact and obtain independent approval where required before activating an exact version. Activity and attention records help staff check what actually happened afterwards.

Screenshots show a fictional disabled rule in the school-wide workspace. Its example incident count, window and task demonstrate the controls; they are not recommended thresholds for a child’s support or school policy. Rules must not replace professional judgement or the authorised specialist process.

Before you start

Open Leadership → Operations → Automation. The workspace offers Templates, Rules, Pupil reviews, Pupil metrics, Activity, Needs attention and Settings, according to access. Unlike the behaviour-only Rules & Automations page, it brings the school’s supported rule subjects and pupil-review workflow together. Choose the actual source and response rather than assuming every school process can be automated.

Reading, authoring, enabling, approving, running and changing school policy are separate permissions. Check the required actions with the school administrator. A person who can draft may not be able to activate or approve the same version.

1. Start from a template or a new rule

In Templates, read the name, purpose, sensitivity and Rule summary. Adopt as disabled draft creates a draft for school review; it does not activate the template. Inspect any template/version or migration notes rather than assuming a template is already the school’s agreed policy.

Alternatively choose New rule. Enter Rule name and Purpose, choose the applicable Subject and Approved event. The choices follow supported catalogue entries and your source/action access. Changing subject or event can replace incompatible conditions/actions, so recheck the full summary afterwards.

For the incident-window event, set the required incident count and calendar-day window. Current input bounds are one to 20 incidents and one to 95 days; these are form limits, not evidence-based thresholds for a pupil. Counted committed incidents are not every event that happened in school.

2. Choose conditions, actions and practical limits

Use Add fact under Additional conditions where the rule needs another supported check. Select the fact, operator and required value. There can be up to five additional conditions. Read missingness and freshness in the eventual preview; do not interpret missing information as a negative answer.

Under Ordered actions, choose the actual supported action and fill its required parameters. Add action adds another action; the standard behaviour rule supports up to three, in their displayed order. Read the final summary to check that the combined actions represent the intended authorised workflow.

For Assign pastoral check-in, choose an offered role and due interval. The accepted role list is Year lead, SENCO, DSL, DDSL, SLT, Headteacher, Service lead or Pupil Premium lead. An input accepting a role is not proof that staff can see the resulting work; verify the actual recipient/work queue after any authorised live run.

If a supported action offers Delivery mode, distinguish an Approval draft from Approved auto-send. Choosing a draft prepares work for review; auto-send depends on school opt-in, action permissions and the applicable independent approval. Do not assume it can send when any prerequisite is missing.

Set Cooldown days and Maximum firings per run to bound repeat work. The current form accepts zero to 365 cooldown days and one to 500 firings per run. These limits do not authorise bulk sanctions or sensitive assignments. Use a scope and cap the responsible school team can review and deliver.

3. Save a disabled draft and reopen it

Check the Rule summary, action order, parameters and all inline validation. Choose Save disabled draft. Wait for success and reopen the rule from Rules to verify its purpose, exact draft version and definition.

Edit as new draft starts a new editable version of an existing rule. A current active version and a newer draft can coexist; check both labels. Saving a new draft does not mean that the active rule changed or stopped.

If a colleague saved a newer draft first, the builder closes and reloads the rule on conflict. Inspect that new state before editing again; do not re-enter the same old assumptions merely to force a save.

4. Preview the current impact before any activation

Select Preview current impact on the exact draft. Read:

• Current matches: records matching this preview’s definition/window.
• Action targets: the targets of the defined actions, which need not equal the match count.
• Unknown data: checks with information missing.
• Stale data: checks whose evidence is out of date.

An incomplete preview cannot support activation. Unknown/stale information is not silently converted to false or zero. If the scope is too large or records could not be checked, narrow the definition or resolve the source problem and preview again.

The displayed sample is limited to the first 20 matches. The total can be larger; a small sample is not the complete affected list. Read the evidence explanation, such as committed incidents in the stated calendar-day window, alongside the count. A match is a prompt under the defined rule, not a diagnosis or a finding that a sanction is appropriate.

Read the expiry time. Preview, approval and activation bind to the exact version and preview. If an open preview expires, the page withdraws activation/approval and asks for the next valid step. A new preview clears an old apply-current confirmation. Check the actual date/window, especially around a school-day boundary, before relying on the results.

5. Obtain independent approval where required

The preview’s recorded approval requirement controls this step. If the requirement is unknown, approval is required rather than guessed as unnecessary.

1. Read the definition, current preview, risk and proposed recipients/actions.
2. Use Request independent approval where offered.
3. A different authorised user opens that exact version and preview, checks them and chooses Approve exact version or Reject. Authors cannot approve their own high-risk version.
4. Refresh/check the resulting status before attempting activation.

A pending draft can wait for someone with approval access. A rejected draft needs Edit as new draft, correction, a fresh preview and approval request. An approved version whose preview expired needs re-drafting as explained by the page. Do not treat an old approval as permission for changed matches or a new version.

6. Activate deliberately, with a separate decision about current matches

Activation can create downstream work or communication when live policy allows it. Only authorised staff should perform it after reviewing the impact and the school’s actual ability to deliver the response.

Leave Apply to current matches unticked to avoid applying the initial baseline to current matches. If the school has explicitly decided to apply to those current targets, tick it and type APPLY CURRENT MATCHES for this version and preview. Recheck the count and audience before Activate exact version.

Activation does not override Automation platform, Shadow mode, action permissions, independent approval or school caps. In shadow mode the platform evaluates/records without committing the actions. Enabled status alone is not proof that tasks/messages were created.

A fresh preview, another rule or another version needs its own confirmation. Never copy a previous confirmation as though it authorised a different set of pupils.

7. Check Activity and Needs attention after a run

Activity shows recorded firings and each action outcome. Inspect executed, skipped, failed or other reported states rather than treating the firing count as successful delivery. Open rule returns to the original definition/version context.

Needs attention identifies approval and operational problems, such as missing recipients, stale source or failed actions. Use Open rule and the action-specific message to find the next step. The page does not offer a universal resolve/dismiss action for every attention item; some open items can persist after staff investigate them.

Activity and attention show at most the latest 100 entries. A full list is labelled and counts can read 100+. Do not report those lists as complete school history. A task creation outcome is not proof that the assigned role can find, claim or complete it; check the work destination through the appropriate authorised route.

8. Switch off, revise or compare a legacy source carefully

Disable rule switches off a live rule directly. Re-enabling is not a casual toggle: use the current preview/activation process. Disabling does not automatically undo work or messages already committed, nor reactivate a legacy source.

For a rule with source-cutover controls, Run bounded source comparison compares the supported source before a deliberate migration. Read matched/mismatch and completeness first. The typed cutover confirmation and any switch of evaluator can change which source acts; this is an administrator operation requiring the exact displayed prerequisites. Do not run legacy and replacement paths in parallel merely to compare their visible outcomes.

9. Review school automation policy

In Settings, check Automation platform, Shadow mode, Family auto-send opt-in and the displayed action/message caps. Those settings affect more than this one rule. A viewer can inspect policy while being unable to change it.

An authorised manager changes only the intended fields, checks allowed whole-number cap ranges and chooses Save automation policy. If settings changed elsewhere, reload and reconcile them rather than overwriting another administrator’s policy. Switching off shadow mode or enabling family auto-send is a consequential live-action decision, not a routine preview step.

10. Build a pupil-review pattern from supported evidence

Use New pupil review rule where offered, or choose the supported recorded-pattern event in New rule. In the expression editor, use Add metric and choose its approved source/metric, operator, value and required observation/freshness parameters. Use Add group when the meaning needs nested conditions.

Combine conditions can require all, any or a minimum number of matching conditions/child groups. Read the grouping in the final summary: “all of A and B” is different from “any of A or B”. Minimum matching conditions or child groups must fit the group’s actual contents. Remove an unwanted condition/group using its offered Remove control; do not leave an accidental empty group.

Choose explicit missing/stale tests only when that is the intended question. Missing, stale and unavailable evidence is not a negative result or a zero. The editor’s Observation window (calendar days) does not mean school days, and a recorded pattern does not establish harm or diagnosis.

Under Year groups and Forms, select the intended available groups. Leaving them unselected means all permitted pupils; a group selection is not just a label for the rule. Review this carefully before previewing. The input permits up to 20 year groups and 20 forms, which is a technical bound rather than a recommended review workload.

Pattern rules use their supported review/notification/follow-up actions, up to six ordered actions rather than the standard event rule’s three. They still require the exact-version preview and any independent approval. A review suggestion is not permission to change a pupil’s specialist plan or assign sensitive work without the appropriate human decision.

11. Check the Pupil metrics source contract

In Pupil metrics, read Approved pupil metrics and Sources requiring a supported integration. An unavailable integration’s explanation matters: it does not mean every pupil has a zero or that the source holds no records.

This list describes supported source availability. Only the actual preview tests the current permitted evidence, observation window, coverage and freshness. Do not substitute a source’s catalogue entry for a successful school-data check.

Staff alerts use in-app notifications. Email, SMS and push choices produce governed communication drafts; the appropriate approved recipient/channel workflow still controls delivery. A draft is not a sent message or evidence that a family read it.

12. Review a pupil suggestion before accepting work

In Pupil reviews, open the relevant suggestion. Read the rule, pupil, status and creation time. Evidence at suggestion creation preserves the original window/value; Source and freshness explains provenance, while Current permitted evidence can differ after records change. Use Open pupil record to review the wider relevant context.

With review access, Acknowledge records that staff are considering it. To monitor, choose Review date for monitoring and Monitor until review; the accepted date is today through a year ahead. Dismiss suggestion and Record reviewed resolution are deliberate final decisions, not list-cleaning buttons.

In Proposed follow-up work, Accept follow-up creates work assigned to you; it is not merely acknowledgement. Check the proposed action, linked active staff record and resulting task/due date. Dismiss proposed work decides that proposal separately. Recording a suggestion decision does not silently accept every proposal, and completing work does not prove an improved pupil outcome.

If another person decided first or evidence/source changed, inspect the refreshed current state. If a panel refuses a refresh, its old rows/links are withdrawn rather than presented as current evidence. A failed read is different from “nothing to review”. For the focused sequence, see Act on a pupil review suggestion.

Phone use and troubleshooting

Scroll the rule details and builder to inspect the full definition and footer. A saved draft, preview, approval and active version are four different states.

Situation	Next step
Automation access required	Ask the school administrator for the exact action permission.
Save disabled	Correct the named fields, event/action parameters and run limits.
Rule changed elsewhere	Reload its new draft before editing.
Preview incomplete/expired	Resolve coverage or narrow scope, then use the offered fresh-preview/re-draft step.
Self-approval refused	Ask a different authorised approver.
Approval pending/rejected	Follow the displayed pending/re-draft path; do not bypass it with a duplicate rule.
Platform off or shadow mode on	Check policy with the authorised manager; enabled is not proof of live actions.
Action failed or recipient missing	Inspect the original rule and downstream work; do not infer delivery from a match.
Cap reached	Review scope/caps with the responsible manager rather than repeatedly running the same work.

Common questions

Why is a new automation rule disabled?

Rules start as disabled drafts so staff can review the supported event, actions, impact preview and any required independent approval before activation.

Where do I check an activated rule’s result?

Read its activity and attention records. Activation is not proof that every downstream action completed.

About this feature

Read about Automation on the Student Radar website.