How to: Set Up Your Office Hours in Starfish
- Jennifer Easthope
NOTE: If you don't use Starfish to schedule appointments, that's okay! Please note in your Starfish Profile how a student should schedule an appointment to meet with you. Example below:
In Starfish, you can add Office Hours in one of three ways:
If you have no office hours set yet: Use the Office Hours Setup Wizard that may be presented when you log in to Starfish.
At any time by clicking the Add Office Hours button from the menu on the Home or Appointments pages. (Most common and flexible method to setting up your Office Hours.)
At any time by clicking the Scheduling Wizard button from the menu on the Home or Appointments pages. (Great option for adding multiple blocks of the same Appointment Type at the same time.)
Each option is described in detail below.
1. Setup Your First Office Hours Block Using the Setup Wizard
On your first visit, Starfish may present the Office Hours Setup Wizard screen to walk you through setting up your Office Hours.
If you do not wish to set up your online scheduling yet, click the Close button.
At the bottom of the Setup Wizard is a checkbox to indicate that you would like for Starfish to Show me this Office Hours Setup Page again next time I login if I don't have any Office Hours. Leave this option checked if you want the Setup Wizard to be displayed on your next visit if you still haven't set up any Office Hours in Starfish.
To use the Setup Wizard:
Indicate the day(s) you hold Office Hours by checking the box(es) associated with each day of the week.
Specify the start and end time of your Office Hours for the day(s) selected.
Specify where your Office Hours occur:
Select from the Type drop down (e.g., in an office, virtual meeting).
Enter a location into the Details text box. (i.e. building name and room number). Note: Additional locations can be added from your Starfish Profile, see Set Choices for Meeting Locations.
(Optional) Enter special instructions into the Instructions text box such as a phone conference code, or which entrance to use.
Select the Set up Office Hours button to finish.
2. Add Office Hours
You can add Office Hours at any time by clicking the Add Office Hours button from the action bar on the Home or Appointments pages. This is the most common and flexible method to setting up your Office Hours.
Complete the form by entering the following information:
- Title: Enter a Title for your Office Hours. This title will be visible to you, students, and calendar managers. If you are going to have more than one type of Office Hours, use the title to make it easy for students and calendar managers to know what type of meetings you take during those hours.
- What days: Select the days on which this hours will occur using the "What day(s)?" drop down.
- What time: Enter a start and end time for the Office Hour block in the text boxes indicated next to the What Time label. Options populate a drop down list as soon as you begin typing in the Enter Start Time text box. End time options populate in a drop down based on times occurring after what you entered as the start time.
- Where: Options presented here will depend on whether you have any locations established in Starfish yet:
If you have never set up a location in Starfish: select a Type from the drop down presented (in an office, by phone etc.) and enter a description of the location in the Details text box (for example: McIntyre Building, Office 312). Enter additional instructions (e.g., use the buzzer) in the Instructions text box.
If you have one location set up: that location will be listed and the check box for it will be checked. Note: Additional locations can be added from your Starfish Profile, see Set Choices for Meeting Locations.
If you have multiple locations set up: those locations will be listed in the Where section and you will need to select at least one where students can meet with you during these hours.
- Office Hours Type: The default choice is to allow both scheduled appointments and drop-in hours, but you can modify this selection to limit the Office Hour block to only scheduled appointments or only drop-ins. If you work at a location with a drop-in Kiosk, select the "Scheduled and Walk-ins (or Drop-ins)" option.
When a student schedules an appointment with you, your Title and Office Hours Type selection in the Add Office Hours form determines what the student sees. For example, if you allow drop-ins only on Thursdays from 1:00 - 3:45pm. In the Title field, you could label this block of time as "Drop-ins only."
In the Office Hours Type drop-down, you will select Drop-Ins Only.
On the Service Profile and the Connection Profile page, the This Week's Office Hours section displays the Drop-Ins Only 1:00pm - 3:45pm time block with an asterisk *.
- How Long: Use the Minimum Appointment Length and Maximum Appointment Length drop down boxes to specify the minimum and maximum duration that students or calendar managers will be able to choose for appointments during these Office Hours.
- Appointment Types: The role(s) you have in Starfish (e.g., Faculty Advisor, Instructor) connect you to one or more appointment types for meeting with students. For example: your Instructor role might connect you to an appointment type called "Teaching Meetings", and your Faculty Advisor role might connect you to an appointment type called "Advising Meetings". If you want to limit this Office Hour block to a particular type of appointment, check the box only for that appointment type.
Note: Students will only see Office Hour availability where the appointment type(s) you selected match the relationship they have with you. Continuing the example with the appointment types above: if you are an instructor for Jane Student, and a Faculty Advisor for Joe Student, Jane would only see Office Hours where you have checked the "Teaching Meetings" appointment type, and Joe would only see those where you checked the "Advising Meetings" appointment type.
Your Starfish administrator sets up the appointment types and which roles are associated with each.
- Instructions tab: Information you enter here is included in the email invitation that the student receives for an appointment. Instructions are optional and is sent to students with scheduled appointments (not drop-ins).
- Start/End Date tab: By default the Office Hours are set to start on the day you create the Office Hours, with no end date. Click this tab to specify a future start date and/or an end condition for this meeting block. For example you might want this block to run only for the first 3 weeks of the term.
(Optional) In the Starts field, enter a future start date in the format mm/dd/yyyy.
In the Ends field and select from among the drop down choices
Never The Office Hours will remain indefinitely. End of Term You will be prompted to select a term. On Date You will be prompted to enter a date. After You will be prompted to select the number of occurrences.
- Click Submit to finish.
Virtual Office Hours
You can convert in-person office hours to virtual with a Phone Number or Zoom Room URL as other locations in faculty and staff Office Hours. This allows students to see how they can connect with you remotely.
Add Instructions to office hours that students will see on the pre-confirmation screen when they make their appointment. This may be helpful if you want to communicate specific instructions for your students regarding meeting procedures as the situation continues to be updated
Tip: If you edit instructions for Office Hours or other meetings, students who have already signed up with appointments will not be notified of the change (i.e. Zoom passwords). However, if the student gets an appointment reminder, that reminder email will include the updated information. If necessary, you may need to select each student in the calendar view and send them a message with the updated information.
3. Scheduling Wizard
The Scheduling Wizard feature allows advisors and other student support staff to schedule a number of Office Hour sessions at once. This feature is particularly useful for advising rush weeks, midterm course meetings or other scenarios where a faculty or staff member has several individual office hour sessions for students within a week.
To schedule Office Hours using the Scheduling Wizard:
From the Appointments page, select Scheduling Wizard.
Complete the first page of the Scheduling Wizard by entering the description, appointment types, location and other details that should be applied to all Office Hour blocks that are to be created. If one or more Office Hour blocks should have different details than the others, they will need to be created separately.
Click the Next button to continue.
Use the < > controls located above the table next to the date to navigate to the desired week in which you want to begin scheduling the office hours. To move to a second week, use the < > controls. Only click Finish when you have entered all of the desired blocks for that week.
In the selected week, enter the start and end times for each block in the appropriate day columns. You can schedule multiple Office Hour blocks on any day within the week. If you need to schedule more than three blocks on any day, select the Add Another Block link in the column for that day.
When all Office Hour blocks have been specified, select the Finish button to complete the process and create all of the office hour blocks.
A summary of the blocks you've created will be presented. The summary will include a list of hours that could not be created due to conflicts between the blocks you specified and existing calendar items. Note the failed blocks before clicking the Finish button to exit the wizard.
To check your set up
- Navigate to Appointments > Agenda sub-tab.
- Existing Office Hour blocks are displayed in the panel labeled Availability.
