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Classes, fees & scoring setup

Two tabs on your Manage page define the competitive structure: Classes & Fees (who competes against whom, and what it costs) and Rubric (how judging works). Both auto-save as you work — you'll see a little "Saved" timestamp — with a Save Changes button as a backstop.

Classes & Fees tab

Choose your class count basis

At the top, pick how bands are sorted into classes:

  • Winds only (the most common), Winds + percussion, All marching members, or Excluding percussion — classes are assigned automatically from each band's member counts.
  • AHSAA enrollment letter — pull the class straight from the school's classification letter (1A–6A).
  • Manual — you assign every band's class yourself at registration time.

If middle-school bands compete, the Middle-school weighting buttons let 6th–8th graders count as a fraction of a member for classification.

Define the classes

Click + Add Class for each class. Per class you set:

  • Class name (e.g., "A", "3A", "Silver Small") and its Min/Max count range (or AHSAA letter codes in that mode).
  • Superior ≥ and Excellent ≥ — the rating thresholds for this class.
  • Band cap — the most bands you'll accept in this class (blank = unlimited). Bands beyond the cap can be waitlisted.
  • Fees — expand this to set per-class pricing and fee tiers: add an Early Bird tier with a lower price and an "effective until" date, a regular tier, a late tier. Directors automatically see the price for the date they register.

Warning

You can't delete a class that has accepted bands in it — move those bands to another class first (on the Registrations tab).

Divisions (optional)

If your event groups classes into brackets — Silver/Gold, Small/Large, morning/evening — switch on Divisions, add each one, and check off which classes belong to it. Divisions can drive the schedule (blocks per division) and award scopes (a Grand Champion per division).

Rubric tab

This is where you design the score sheet your judges will see.

  1. Sections to judge — check off the sections: Overall Band, Drum Major, Percussion, Color Guard, and so on, or add a custom one. Each section gets its own judge(s).
  2. Configure each section:
    • Weight (%) — how much this section counts toward the overall score. A badge tracks your total; it must land on 100%.
    • Number of Judges and, if more than one, the Aggregation Rule (average them, add them, or drop high & low).
    • Captions — the scoring rows inside the section (Music, Visual, General Effect...), each with its Max points.
    • Counts toward overall composite — turn off for awards-only sections (like Drum Major) that shouldn't affect band placement.
  3. A live preview on the page shows exactly what the judge's sheet will look like. What you see is what they get.

Clone and forget

The rubric is the fiddliest part of setup — which is exactly why cloning last year's competition is so valuable. Get it right once, then Save as default template on the Settings tab, and every future year starts from it.

Award definitions (Outstanding Percussion, Grand Champion, perpetual trophies) live on the Awards tab — covered in Scores, awards & publishing.