Hi Janelle!
I've tried a couple different methods over the years, but thus far have liked using Sign Up Genius the best. We pay for the silver membership ($100ish/year) and I feel that that does basically everything we need it to do. I like that I can set it up to auto send reminder emails and collect contact information, which has been huge for making day-of group chats, needing to call someone, payment info collection, etc. Workers can also leave comments, which is helpful when we have folks signing up on behalf of fundraising efforts for their club teams and such. It also allows me to input all of our games and slots at once, but I can then use the settings to manipulate when people are allowed to view new dates and sign up. In example, I had a similar issue with folks just snatching up as many slots as possible too far ahead of time for them to actually know if they're free, so I tweaked the settings to only display events 30 days at a time, which inadvertently rewards folks who are frequently checking back for opportunities. I'm also able to "lock" the sheet so that workers can't delete their names from the sign up less than 48hrs from the event without reaching out to me, which I've found has helped the accountability factor a little bit. See here for an example of what a filled out sheet looks like.
The only other thing I've really done is decided I wanted to create a very loose tier system to reward my better workers, so I use data from each season of the sign up to determine workers that have demonstrated reliability and consistency (i.e. hit a certain number of hours or always fill in last minute or have specific positions they want to work and are notably good at) and provide a couple days to a week of advanced access on new sign ups. I've found this to be pretty helpful in forming a semi-core group of workers while also alleviating some of my anxiety around having a sign up full of unknown entities. It also helps folks feel appreciated, which can sometimes be hard with these types of positions!
Hope this helps - feel free to reach out with any additional questions!
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Alex Defuso
Asst. Manager Of Events & Rentals
Massachusetts Institute Of Technology
Cambridge MA
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Original Message:
Sent: 06-27-2025 12:23:34 PM
From: Janelle Kelleher
Subject: Help with Scheduling Seasonal Athletics Workers!
Hi everyone,
Posting here for some guidance! I recently took on a new assignment of handling our seasonal workers and student employees who help staff our athletic events. These workers serve as ball people and penalty box attendants, along with assisting in sport setup and breakdown.
In the past, we utilized more of a "free for all system" where workers added their names to as many games that they wanted to work for a three month period. This meant that some workers were getting no shifts because by the time they checked the Google Sheet, all shifts were gone. It also led to some people working every weekend while others hadn't worked in months, and created challenges when workers called out.
I would love to hear about what you may be doing at your institution! Does anyone use a scheduling software or another method to schedule workers? Do you let your seasonal/student workers pick which games they would like to work, or personally assign them? Any recommendations that you can provide would be greatly appreciated!
Kind regards,
Janelle Kelleher
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Janelle Kelleher
Ice Rink Operations Coordinator
Brown University
Providence, RI
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