Assistant Registrar

Yesterday I woke up with an incredibly sore throat. Today I felt much the same so I didn't go in to work.

Yup, that's my sexy voice right there. I told my husband that I was really grateful that I'm no longer a teacher. I didn't have to make sub plans, worry about the sub actually doing what I ask, and then cleaning up whatever mess happened while I was away. I do feel a bit bad because my coworkers will have to work extra hard today since I'm out and so is one other person in the front office.

It got me thinking. I don't think many of you know what I do during a typical day. I know I definitely didn't know what the assistant registrar did when I was a teacher. Here are the things I do with various levels of frequency:

• Answer my phone - usually it's a parent asking about enrolling/withdrawing their student or how to change their address with us. It can also be other schools who need records for a student.
• Enrolling students - this can be a complicated affair
• First, the student does an online application (at home)
• If they are from out of the state, we have to have their shot records before they can enroll. Getting those records, having them checked by the nurse, communicating back to the parent what shots are still needed, and receiving proof of those new shots can take days.
• Then, they come in and I photocopy all of their papers (birth certificate, social security card, parent's ID, transcript, and proof of residency)
• I then give them a few more papers that we have to have hard copies of. While they are doing that, I check their enrollment information. Does the name match the name on the birth certificate? Is their address in our district? Are they ESL (English as a Second Language)? 
• If the student has not special programs (I'll explain that next), I send them to the counselor to get their schedule and start classes.
• If they have special programs, there's more paperwork. A student with a 504 (a disability that affects learning such as ADHD, dyslexia, or even health issues such as anxiety) has a different counselor. A Sped student (special education) will have a diagnostician who needs to be notified that they are enrolled. An ESL student has extra papers to fill out and I have to notify the Bilingual Department of the district. A student with a severe allergy has extra paperwork that gets sent to the nurse. The student then goes to the counselor to receive their schedule and start classes.
• After the student leaves, I log into a spreadsheet that the student was enrolled. I then request official records from their previous school. For students coming from out-of-state, that means a fax. For in-state students, Texas has an online program through which we can request records. It's pretty nice . . . when it works.
• Withdrawing students - this process has a lot fewer "if this, then that" going on.
• The parent or guardian fills out a paper explaining why they are withdrawing and where the student will next be enrolled (since schooling is required by law)
• I print out a lot of papers: current schedule, transcript, shot record, attendance, etc. I give a copy to the parent to help them when they enroll in the new school. 
• The other copy of those papers I keep. It is signed by me and by our associate principal.
• I also collect anything the student needs to turn-in: library books, JROTC uniforms, Chromebook. etc.
• The new school then requests records from us. We send those records along with a proof of enrollment form so that we can prove the student is not a drop-out. Unfortunately, some schools take their sweet time to request records or the parents take their time enrolling their child in the new school. Waiting for that request can take weeks or months.
• The paperwork then goes back into the student's perm folder (permanent folder) and we keep it in a room specifically for student records. We hold on to that folder until the student is 21 years old (state law).
• Requesting/Sending records - Requesting records is fast. Sending records takes time because I sometimes have to wait to receive specific records. I don't always have copies of the student's special education, ESL, or 504 records. I then ask for them from our special education department, bilingual department, or the 504 counselor. Once I have them, I have to scan them and send those documents along with the transcript, attendance, etc.Our fax machine isn't very reliable so sometimes I have to send it four or five times for it to go through.
• Hunting down where I student is enrolled - On the first day of school, if a student does not show up to school they are automatically withdrawn. Many show up in the next few days. Those who do not come in are counted as drop-outs unless we can prove otherwise. We have until the end of September to find out where these students are enrolled. That means calling parents and sometimes having to remind the parents that they are legally obligated to enroll their student in a school. A few cases I had to report to our truancy officers who then might file charges against the parent and/or student.
• Working with registrars from other schools - it can take a lot of time to figure out a student's educational history. Sometimes I receive records for a student and it notes that the student is ESL. Well, the student didn't tell me that when they enrolled so now I have to get in contact with the parent and have them do additional papers. Or I might receive records stating a student is in special education but the school did not send any special education papers. I have to contact the school to find out how I can get the records. Often a student has gone to many schools for high school so I get little pieces of the puzzle each time one of the schools send records or requests records. It's fairly common for me to call a registrar to ask them more information about a student. They can tell me that the student came from school X in October of last year and then left in February for school Y. Well school Y has no record of them. It's my job to find out if the student enrolled in any school at all and if they did, to find that school.
• Reading legal documents and understanding them - if a parent comes in with a divorce decree I have to read through it and see how the decree affects the student's education. It may say that only dad can make educational decisions. That means that I need to note that mom cannot withdraw the student. It may say that mom has sole custody and dad can only visit if mom is present. We need to know that information. This is honestly the most heartbreaking part of my job. Already I have had to read a lot of paperwork for divorces and restraining orders. It has really opened my eyes to what some of our students go home to.
• Gradebooks - I'm in charge of making sure teachers print out and submit their gradebook at the end of every grading period. For us, that's the end of this week so I hope that I'm feeling better soon!

Dang! This post got wordy. I think that explains at least 90% of what I do. Some of these duties are my responsibility alone but a lot of it is shared with the registrar and the data clerk. That's why I'm SO glad that I get along with my coworkers; I have to work with them directly every single day. If y'all have any questions about my job, just ask in the comments! Thanks for reading and I'll catch ya'll later!

-Clare G. S.

BCCC 2019!

It's time to go back in time, y'all! I want to go back one month to Bell County Comic Con.

Bell County Comic Con (BCCC) has become our summer tradition. My husband and I are on staff so we finish the school year and immediately get ready for BCCC. It can be incredibly stressful but I love it so much. The best part is all of the wonderful people who work as staff and as volunteers.

This year was a little difficult because I am in charge of registration but I had to work during pre-registration. I really wish that there could have been a way for me to be in two places at once. However, again, I have wonderful people that I work with and they were able to work pre-registration. I thought that things were going to be as smooth as last year when the doors opened on Saturday but boy was I wrong! I had about 6 people volunteering at registration and we had over 20,000 people enter the event in the first hour! Now, not all of them came through registration but it sure felt like they did! It was odd how it was just a trickle at first but then we were SLAMMED.

Doors opened at 10am and by 11am I had a full-blown panic attack. (This photo was taken after doors opened but before the deluge of attendees) I had a few saving graces: almost all of the staff showed up to help out. They left their jobs to help me and I cannot thank them enough. (Extra thanks to Johnny and Pedro who gave me much needed hugs) Also, my volunteers totally took everything in stride. They were working as a team and helping each other out. Finally, my new friend Stephanie literally held my hand through it. I told her what was happening and she got me to go over to the first aid area (which was just a few yards away from me) so that I could gather myself. The wonderful medics got me water and went back to registration to get me my medicine. It was really helpful to have an area with much fewer people. It was still noisy but I wasn't feeling like I was being trampled. Stephanie then went the extra mile and bought me a mini-cheesecake. She had to basically force me to eat it but I'm very grateful she did. I was being stubborn and I needed someone just as stubborn to tell me to take care of myself.

By 1pm, the crowd had died down quite a bit and my volunteers were able to take a lunch break. The rest of the day went pretty smoothly. I didn't have time to enjoy the convention but that's ok. I'm really proud that I was able to help some people who started their conversation with me irate but left me excited to enter the convention. My trick? Use psychology. The problem I met with the most was people who had not bought enough tickets. They were upset that they now needed to buy more and it would be at full price instead of at the discount they got by buying early. So I pulled up the cost of a full-price ticket and told them it but I knew of some discounts so I then applied the discount and told them their new total. Everyone feels good getting a discount, even if it's not as big of a discount as what they wanted.

The best part of my Saturday was meeting Bumblebee! I had asked her weeks before the con to stop by registration if she had the chance. Sure enough, she remembered my request and took time out of her day to say hi to ME. It made a very crappy day about one million times better.

Sunday is always a much easier day for registration since a majority of our attendees buy weekend passes. They pick up their badge on Saturday so Sunday they don't stop by registration; they just walk in. I was able to walk the whole convention with my friend, Brianna and I even got to chat with my bestie, Jo. It is such an awesome feeling to see what we all worked so hard to complete come together. I also loved that near the end of the day I got to meet a member of an online community I cherish, the FoEs (Fans of Epbot). Side note: if you don't read Epbot, you really should check it out.

You want to know the best part of the whole dang thing? At the end, staff decided to have "closing ceremonies" which was emceed by my spouse. He started his speech by thanking everyone. I missed the very beginning but it went like this:

My husband told a huge crowd that he loves me. ❤️ It was followed by a video recap of the convention. Unfortunately I cannot embed the video but you can find it on the Bell County Comic Con Facebook page.

Sunday evening breakdown started and I hope a new tradition started: everyone told the best part of the con and the weirdest part. It was a great time to tell stories of people paying celebrities to hit them with a metal folding chair, finding underwear and no owner, and having a dance-off with a celebrity.