Swim lesson scheduling software for busy pools

A yoga studio usually runs one class per room. A swim school runs many small groups at the same time in the same water. Every slot has to fit four limits at once: the water (which pool or lane), the instructor, the level and the group size. Change one, say an instructor is off sick or a lane is closed for a gala, and the whole afternoon moves.

That’s why general calendar apps and spreadsheets struggle. They don’t know that Lane 2 can only take one group at 16:30, that the Level 1 group is capped at four, or that the swimmer who moved up last week now belongs in a different group. Ateliem’s calendar is built around those limits.

Pools and lanes are places with a capacity

For a swim school, Ateliem calls your places “Pools”. Add each pool, lane or teaching area with how many swimmers it takes. Every lesson is tied to one place. If you try to put a second group in the same place at the same time, Ateliem won’t save it and tells you which place is already in use. To run three groups in parallel, add three lanes.

Weekly repeats for a whole term

Add a group once and repeat it every week on the days you pick, or every day, until an end date. The end date starts 8 weeks ahead and can go up to a year from the first lesson. Swimmers you add to the group stay on every repeat until that date.

Any lesson length

45, 60 and 90 minutes are one tap. For 25 or 30-minute lessons, set the end time. Back-to-back half-hour groups in the same lane are fine, as long as they don’t overlap.

Instructor and capacity checks

If the instructor is already in another lesson at that time, Ateliem warns you with their name. If a group has more swimmers than the place’s capacity, you get a warning before you save. Both are warnings, not blocks, so you decide.

Private and semi-private lessons

A lesson with one swimmer shows as a 1:1 private lesson. Two or three swimmers share the same list, which works for semi-private lessons.

Changing the timetable mid-term

Edit a lesson and choose This lesson only or This and following. Move a group to a new lane from next week without touching past lessons and their attendance. For a holiday or a pool closure, delete just that one lesson. Days your school is always closed are set in your working hours and show as closed on the calendar.

Week view, list view and filters

See the week side by side or one day as a list. On a wider screen, filter by level and by instructor to check one level’s groups or one instructor’s afternoon. With more than one location, pick the location at the top.

Instructors open the app to their own day: the lesson in progress or next up, how many swimmers are in each group, and marks for an allergy, a swimmer’s first lesson, a birthday or a run of absences. They take the register from the lesson card. Lessons from yesterday without a register are listed until someone takes them.

Parents see their child’s next lesson and the three after it, with the place and instructor, and a calendar of that child’s lessons only. They can’t move lessons or see other swimmers. When a time, place or cancellation changes, parents using the Ateliem phone app (on the way for iOS and Android) can get a push notification. On the web, they see the new time next time they log in.

Each morning, Ateliem lists groups with an open seat in the next 7 days. Where it can, it suggests a swimmer who has lessons left in that level and isn’t already in the group, and opens a message draft for you to send. It doesn’t send anything by itself.

Packs belong to a level, not to one group. So for a make-up, add the swimmer to that single lesson in another group of the same level, and their pack counts it when the register is taken. It’s quick, but it is manual: there are no automatic make-up credits.

• Parents can’t book a slot or pick a group online. Your team puts swimmers on lessons.
• There’s no automatic waitlist or make-up credit system.
• There’s no embeddable public timetable for your website.
• There’s no staff rota or payroll for instructors’ hours.

If any of these are must-haves, read our guide to choosing swim school software. It covers the questions to ask bigger platforms.