Cycle setup for administrators

Build an admission cycle before intake opens: the prerequisites outside the module, seat capacity versus intake target, and what publishing actually does.

Admissions guide for day and boarding schools.

Last updated August 29, 2026

A cycle is the container for one intake round: an academic year, an application window, a form configuration, an optional application fee, and switches for the entrance test and interview stages. Setting one up is mostly work outside the admissions module, because the two things that stop offers going out later — an academic year and classes with seat capacity — both live elsewhere. Configuration is limited to Platform Admin, Principal, Vice Principal, and the chair of the Admissions committee.

Before you open a cycle

Create the academic year the intake is for at /academic-year. A cycle is bound to one year and cannot be moved afterwards.
Create the class sections for every intake grade at /classes, and set a seat capacity on each. An offer is refused outright when no active section exists for the grade and stream, or when none of them has a positive cap.
Assign the Admissions committee at /committees and give it a chair, because committee membership is what grants staff access and the chair acts as admissions in-charge.
Create the cycle at /admissions/cycles with its name, cycle number, application window, and the dates for the test, interview, results and enrolment phases.
Configure the form: which built-in fields appear, which are required, any custom questions, and any extra required documents on top of the birth certificate, Aadhaar document and photograph.
Set the application fee if the school charges one, and the intake target per section at /admissions/intake-plan.
Move the cycle status to OPEN, and point the school website at /admissions/apply.

During intake, watch the funnel and the remaining seats on the admissions dashboard rather than the raw application count, because outstanding offers already reserve seats. Expiry is the piece people forget: an offer past its acceptance deadline is only marked expired when the daily cron job runs with the admissions cron secret set, and the waitlist is only promoted automatically when the auto-promotion flag is switched on as well. Without them, declined seats free up and lapsed ones do not.

Common questions

Quick answers in plain language.

What does publishing a cycle do?+

It moves the cycle status to OPEN, which is what makes it appear in the dropdown on the public /admissions/apply page. A cycle also has to be active and its closing date has to be in the future. Nothing is generated and no new address is created — the apply page is a single public URL that lists whatever is currently open.

What is the difference between class capacity and seats to fill?+

Class capacity is the physical seat cap on a section, set at /classes, and it is what the offer and enrolment checks read. Seats to fill is a per-cycle intake target set on the intake plan, capped at the available seats in that section. Both are enforced: an offer is refused when the cycle intake target is exhausted even if physical seats remain.

Why is the system refusing to issue any offer for a grade?+

Most often no active class exists for that grade and stream, or no section has a positive seat cap. The message distinguishes the two. Otherwise the grade is genuinely full — the check counts enrolled students plus outstanding pending and accepted offers, so unexpired offers reserve seats until they are accepted, declined, or expired.

Can two cycles be open for the same academic year?+

Yes. Cycles carry a cycle number, so a school can run a first and second intake round in one year, and a cycle can be duplicated to save rebuilding the form. Applicants choose the cycle themselves, so name them in a way a parent will understand.

Before you open a cycle

Common questions

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