Fair/Contest Setup

Site Setup

Our software has many customization options. When setting up your event for the first time, we recommend following these instructions so that you can easily find settings and edit your site to fit your event. If you are a seasoned zFairs user, these instructions can be useful to keep you updated on changes we make to better streamline your experience.

Information Icons

The information icon (i) can be located at the bottom of the page and next to individual setting options.

The "i" icon at the bottom of the page will open up to help you with just about anything zFairs. You can scroll and select the most common issues, or type in the search bar to find specific information about ways to set up and utilize zFairs to fit your needs. If you want to find multiple related settings easily, use the "i" and do a search. For example, you can find all registration settings grouped together by searching for "registration setup" or you can find all Judging options by searching for "judging".

The "i" found on the right side of each setting gives a brief description of what that setting is for. If you don't know if you need to use a certain setting, or what that setting is for, clicking on the information icon will help you figure out if that setting is right for your event or tell you what you need to enter.

Getting Started

Click on the "i" icon at the bottom of the page and search for "Easy Start". This will bring up a grouping of settings that will help you get started on setting up your event.

Important Dates:
Event Time zone: This field is for selecting the time zone that the fair/contest is in. If you are in an area that uses daylight savings, you will need to manually adjust so that your contest opens and closes at the correct time.
Event Season*: Select what year range your event is taking place Participant-Registration Starts*: This allows you to select when participants will be able to start registering. This can allow you time to get the schools/teachers registered first.
Participants-Registration Ends Date: This is the deadline for when you allow participants to create an account.
Participant-Late Registration Ends Date: This deadline can be set to allow a "late" registration for participants. This can be associated with a fee if you select.

If there is no registration fee, or late registration fee, then set the date to be the same as the 'Participant Registration Ends' date. Otherwise, this will override the 'Participant Registration Ends' date.

Participants-Information Freeze Date: After this date participants will no longer to be able to to edit their project/personal information. Note: Staff/Admin can still edit the participant account if needed.
Event Start Date: This is the date that your fair/contest actually begins.
Event End Date: This is when your fair/contest will end.
Judging Begins Date: This allows you to select the day/time that the judging will begin.
Judging Ends Date: This allows you to select a deadline for the judging for your fair/contest.
Awards Ceremony Begins: (optional) This allows you to post when you will be holding your awards ceremony.
Awards Ceremony Ends: (optional) This allows you to post when you will be ending your awards ceremony.
Post Awards Online: (optional) This allows you to select when you would like your fair results posted.
Public Access Opens: (optional) This allows you to post when the public display will open.
Public Access Closes: (optional) This allows you to post when the public display will end for visitors.

All Settings

You can see all of the configuration settings together on the "All Settings" page. The "All Settings" page is best used after initial setup to easily locate particular configurations that need to be altered to fit the event's needs. The search bar at the top of the settings page allows you to search for individual settings, or groups of related settings.

You can locate "All Settings" by clicking on the information icon (i) and scrolling down to "All Settings", or by clicking on the "Staff" tab and scrolling down to "Advanced Settings"

Registration

You can find all registration settings in convenient groupings by navigating to the information icon (i), located at the bottom right of the screen, and searching for "Registration". Opening "Registration Setup" will walk you through setting up registration for all your zFairs user types. Follow the prompts and click on the "i" next to the setting, if you don't understand what the setting is for.

Setting Dates and Sessions

Click on the information icon (i) and search for "dates". Open "Dates and Sessions".

This shows all the configurations to set special dates and user sessions for your event. Once filled out, these dates will show in the "Fairs" tab under "Schedule".

Customizing Your Site

Clicking on the Home Screen Editor (...) on the right side of the Home Page, you can add posters, pictures, and information about your fair.

Use the "Main Page Content" to add written details about your fair. Copy and paste from a document, or write in your own. HTML styling is available if preferred.

Adding a Logo and Changing Site Background Color

Click on the "Site Style and Theme Settings" tab. Here you can upload a logo and change the primary color to your website. You can also customize you page through CSS editing.

Adding Widgets

You can add widgets that show on the home screen of your webpage. These will show for any visitor to your website.

Types of Widgets:

• • Location: You can add maps, addresses and room numbers to this widget so participants know where the event is located and where they need to go on the day of the event.

• • Schedule: This shows important dates and times for your event. You can also hide scheduled dates until you are ready to have them show on the widget. NOTE: You will need to individually input the dates for what you want to show on this widget. The date and sessions configurations will not show here.

• • Important Links: This is a great widget to use to guide users to school websites and additional important web URLs that they may need to get information about the event or even event sponsors.

Adding a School

Via settings you can turn on or off school registration, you can also limit who can edit/add schools.

1. In the menu click on Staff then Schools
2. click "Add" to add a School
3. Type in the school's information and click "Save" when finished

To Edit a school

1. Locate the school to edit and then click the Manage button to the right
2. Make your changes
3. Click Save when finished

Adding/Editing School District

1. Click on the "i"
2. Search for and open "School Districts"
   • If adding a new district click "Add", edit fields, and click "Save"
   • If editing a district click on the edit pen to the left of the district name, edit fields and click "Save"

Setting Emails to be sent to Students During Registration

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Settings"
4. Under the "Students" tab select the email settings you would like

File:Emailsettingsforstudents.PNG

1. Click "Save"

Making Sponsors Page Visible

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Settings"
4. Under the "Fair Features and Settings" section turn click "Show Sponsor(s) Information"
5. Click "Save"

Collecting Donations

You can turn on the feature to collect donations during the checkout process.

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Settings"
4. Under the "Fair Features & Settings" you can select the "Collect Donations when collecting fees/payments"
5. Click "Save"

Defining Divisions

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Fair Divisions"
4. Click "Add New"
5. Populate fields with division information
6. Click "Save Fair Division"

Editing Divisions

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Fair Divisions"
4. Click on the division you need to edit or delete
5. You can either make changes and click "Save Fair Division" or you can click "Remove" to remove the division

Defining Categories

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Categories"
4. Click "Add New"
5. Populate fields with category information
6. Click "Save Category"

Editing Categories

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Categories"
4. Click on the category you need to edit or delete
5. You can either make changes and click "Save Category" or you can click "Remove" to remove the category

Enabling Invoice Generation

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Settings"
4. Under "Fair Features & Settings" you will have the following two options:

• Allow Teachers & Staff Members to generate invoices
• Allow Students to generate invoices

Creating Coupons

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Under "Other", click "Coupons/Subsidy"
4. Click "Add Coupon"
5. Fill in information about your coupon
6. Click "Save"
7. Give this coupon code to those who will be using it

Setting Custom Questions for Registration

1. Click on "Staff"
2. "Fair Setup"
3. Click "(Student's, Judge's, or Volunteer's) Custom Questions".
4. Click "Add New".
5. Enter your question and the response type

• If the response data type is "multiple choice", enter each possible choice next to "Multiple Choice Options" with each option on its own line.
• If you have more than one custom question, you can set the sort order for each question by typing a number next to "Question Sort Order". (By giving a question a sort order of 1, you are requesting to ask this particular custom question first. By giving a question a sort order of 2, you are requesting to ask this particular custom question second, etc.)

Setting Guidelines and Requirements

This section is for any information you would like your participants to agree to before they register to participate in the fair/contest. You can set custom information for each type of participant.

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Guidelines & Requirements"
4. Click "Add New"
5. Fill in the information/Select the type
6. Click "Save"

Enabling Online Judging

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Settings"
4. Under "Premium Features" click "Enable Online Judging"
5. Click "Save"
6. Return to the home screen and click "Judging"
7. Click "Setup"
8. If the button at the top says "Online Judging: OFF" click it so it says "Online Judging: ON"

Configuring Available Judge Questions

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Settings"
4. Click "Judges" which is found under the "User & Registration Type Settings" section
5. Select any questions you would like to be required

Setting up Judging Sessions

1. Click "Staff"
2. Click "Fair Setup"
3. Click "Judging Sessions"
4. Fill out the information
5. Click "Save Judging Session"

• If you would like to add another session click "Add New" and repeat the above steps.

Viewing Judge's Sessions and Answers to Custom questions

1. Click on "Staff"
2. Click on "Report Viewer"
3. Select "Judges Detail" or "Judges Detail Lite"

How to Generate Rubric for Online Judging

1. Click on "Judging"
2. Click on "Setup"
3. At the bottom of the page, click "Add Judging Category"
4. Create category, and select the weight of the category
5. Click "Save Judging Category"
6. Once a category is added you can click the "Add" button on the right to add assessment categories with their score types
7. Click "Save Assessment"

You will now be able to view this rubric in the Report Viewer. It can be found under Judging Rubrics, and will be titled "Judging Rubric from Online Judging".

For your rubric to work you need to have judging categories and assessments under each category. The assessments are the points the judges will score under each category.

Changing the Assessment Weight of Judging Questions

While creating the rubric for judges you are given the option to adjust the weight of the assessments. The following are a couple of examples of how this feature works.
Note: Changing the assessment weights does not change the overall category weight. It only alters the weight of the assessments within the category. In order to change the weight of the category, you need to edit that category and alter the category weight.

Example 1:

We have created a category of Presentation that is worth 20%. Within this category we have 2 assessments.

• The first assessment is the "Interview" which is set as a Yes/No question.
• The second assessment is the "Project Board" which has a scoring range of 1-10.

If the assessment weight for each assessment is not set, the default will be to have the "Project Board" worth 10 points and the "Interview" worth only 1 point. So within this category which is worth 20%, the "Interview" will be worth approximately 9% while the remaining 91% will be the "Project Board".

These same categories could be altered to have equal weight by setting the assessment weight. If you set the assessment weight of the "Interview" assessment to be 10, this category will now carry the same weight as the "Project Board" question. This will allow both categories to be worth 50% of the Presentation category.

Example 2:

We have created a category of Analysis that is worth 30%. Within this category we have 3 assessments.

• The first assessment is "Relevant" which is set to a range of 1-5.
• The second assessment is "Sufficient Data" which is set to a range of 1-10.
• The third assessment is "Correct Analysis" which is set to a range of 1-5.

If the assessment weight for each assessment is not set, "Relevant" will be worth 5 points, "Sufficient Data" will be worth 10 points, and "Correct Analysis" will be worth 5 points. So within this category which is worth 30%, "Relevant" will be worth 25%, "Sufficient Data" will be worth 50%, and "Correct Analysis" will be worth 25%.

Now, lets say you determine that you want to leave the ranges the same but you want "Correct Analysis to have a higher weight than the other categories. You could set the assessment weight of "Sufficient Data" to 5, and set "Correct Analysis" weight to 10. Now, within this category "Relevant" will be worth 25%, "Sufficient Data" will be worth 25%, and "Correct Analysis" will be worth 50%.

Entry Scheduling

This is a feature used to schedule the judging interview that is currently used by the National History Day.

Automatically Assign Judges

For information on using this feature see: Judge Assignments

Setting up Judge Captains

Our software has the ability to set up "Judge Captains". This will allow you to have a captain for each of your categories and the captain can assist in making assignment for the other judges and ensuring all projects are being judged as many times as they should be. For more information on setting up this feature see: Judge Captains