SchoolRota vs the school cover spreadsheet
When a school cover spreadsheet is enough, and when versions, sick cover and the one person who owns the file start to take the morning.
Most schools do not need a new system. They need the morning to stop depending on one file and one person. This page is the comparison: what a spreadsheet does well, where the same file fails, and what changes if you move the rota to SchoolRota. If your sheet is calm, keep it.
What a spreadsheet does well
A cover spreadsheet is the right tool when the week is stable:
- The rota is a simple pattern that rarely changes
- One person owns it and is in school
- Cover is mostly arranged the day before, not rebuilt at 07:40
- Staff will check a wall or an email, and they trust that copy
- Nobody is asking for a fairness count, a missed-session log, or an audit trail
A nursery or a small primary with the same midday team most weeks can live like that. A blank template downloaded in September is not the same thing. It rarely survives to October, because the school is not generic. More on that shape of file is on school cover spreadsheets.
Where the same file breaks
It usually breaks because of a person. These are the mornings that show up in almost every school that later switches.
The owner is off
The person who built the colour code is the only one who can find the right tab. When they are on a course, or sick, someone else opens the file and rebuilds the day from memory. The gate post and the 1:1 are the first things to go wrong.
Versions multiply
By 08:15 there are three copies in three inboxes. The staffroom printout is yesterday's. Nobody is sure which attachment is live, so people stand where last week's sheet put them.
Cover is still a manual search
You scroll the staff list, check who is free, who has already covered twice, and who cannot leave the gate. That is 20 to 40 minutes on a bad morning, and it is easy to miss that the 'free' person is teaching. How to plan school cover is that search written out as steps.
Interventions get dropped
A TA is pulled to a class. The ELSA group or the reading group does not run. The spreadsheet does not record that unless someone keeps a second log. Six weeks later the SENCO cannot say how many sessions happened. SchoolRota records staff time only. It does not name the pupils.
There is no record when someone asks
A head or a trust lead asks who has covered most, or what happened on a given Tuesday. The answer is a recollection. There is no revision history beyond whatever the drive kept, and that history is not the same as a published rota.
What changes with SchoolRota
| What you do now | What the board does |
|---|---|
| Open the spreadsheet at 07:40 | Open the day. Cover is already proposed, with a reason |
| Scroll staff to find someone free | See who is free, and who is blocked by a lesson, a duty or a skill |
| Check who has covered twice this week | The fairness count updates as you publish |
| Rewrite, print, and hope the pin is current | Publish once. Staff get a PDF they can open without a login |
| Forward another copy when it changes | The published version is the version. Older revisions stay on record |
| Try to remember if interventions ran | Missed sessions are logged when you record that they did not happen |
| Rebuild the sheet for a report | Export a coverage view, a fairness view, or the audit log |
You still confirm the name. A suggestion is not a published rota. Staff do not see the draft. That is the same rule on cover management.
The cost of staying on the sheet
The 15-staff primary model is at least 5 hours a week. The 88-staff secondary is about 8. The five-school trust model is about 35, including time at the centre. At STPCD 2025/26 leadership pay for England outside London, those hours are the expensive part. SchoolRota's smallest plan is £79 a month. The models, including what is left out of the cash figure, are on savings. They are not named schools.
When it is worth switching
Switch when any of these are already true. You do not need the full set.
- The rota person has been off and nobody else could run the morning
- You have rebuilt the spreadsheet more than twice this term
- Leaders have asked for coverage data you could not produce without rebuilding the file
- Intervention sessions are dropped because the TA is on cover, and you cannot count them
- More than one site, and the sheets do not agree
- Staff have turned up to the wrong post because they had yesterday's copy
Five signs the cover spreadsheet is done is the same list with the mornings written out.
What you would be changing
SchoolRota does not replace your MIS, your teaching timetable, or payroll. It replaces the spreadsheet that runs the rota.
What stays
- Your MIS stays the record for staff and for pupils
- The teaching timetable stays in whatever you use to build it. You import slots so cover can see them
- Contracts and pay stay in HR
What moves
- The rota moves from a file to a board with a weekly pattern and a daily copy
- Cover is proposed from rules you set, then confirmed by a person
- Staff get a PDF and, if you connect them, a calendar update
- Each publish is kept, so a later question does not mean retyping the week
- Reports are an export, not a Sunday rebuild
A trust does this per school, not as one giant sheet. MAT rota is that shape. Integrations covers Outlook, Google, school login and what is still on the way for MIS.
A morning, side by side
Take a primary at 07:40. A TA is sick and a midday supervisor is at the hospital. On the spreadsheet you open yesterday's file, look for someone who is free, first-aid trained and not already with a pupil, then print. At 08:05 a third change arrives. The pin on the wall is the old print. Two people have the email from 07:50. The ELSA group that the sick TA was running is simply gone, because the cell you overwrote was the only note of it.
On the board the day already exists, copied from the week. The two absences show as empty posts. The suggestions skip anyone teaching, anyone on a protected session, and anyone without first aid if the post requires it. You reject one name because you know the yard, accept another, and publish. The PDF replaces the earlier one. The missed ELSA session can be marked as not run, so the half-term count is not a guess. You have not booked supply. You have not changed the MIS. You have changed the list people are standing to.
What people worry about, and what is true
The usual worries are fair. Will midday supervisors have to log in? No. They get the PDF. Will it replace SIMS, Arbor or the timetable? No. Those stay in charge of their own records, and lesson times are only imported so cover can see a clash. Will it publish while you are still deciding? No. A draft stays a draft. Will the AI move people on its own? No. If you use it, it drafts and waits. You can leave it off and still run the board.
The worry that is sometimes right: a small stable team does not need this. If the owner is rarely off, the file has one name, and nobody is asking for a report, switching is a project you can skip. The trial is how you find out which of those schools you are, using your own week rather than a slide.
Try it with your own week
The useful test is your staff, your posts and a real absence, not a demo school. Start a 30-day trial. No card. If the PDF matches what you would have printed, the sheet can come down. If it does not, you still have the file.
Common questions
- Is the spreadsheet wrong?
- No. It is the normal tool until the morning it breaks. Plenty of schools run on one for years. The problem is an outdated copy in the staffroom, not the fact of using Excel.
- Do we have to import everything on day one?
- No. Staff can come from a CSV or from SCIM if you use Microsoft Entra or Google Workspace. A teaching timetable can come from a CSV export. MIS connections for products such as SIMS and Arbor are listed on the integrations page, including what is still coming. You can also paste the current rota in setup and check the draft.
- Can we keep using the spreadsheet as well?
- Yes. SchoolRota exports to Excel, PDF and print packs. Some schools publish the board and still pin a copy on the staffroom wall while people get used to the PDF.
- How long does setup take?
- A small primary with the current rota to hand can be live in a sitting. You still check the draft. The trial is 30 days and does not need a card.
Start a 30-day trial with your own staff and posts. No card.