How to allow students to attend college games

The COVID-19 pandemic forced most schools to shift to online learning, affecting students across the spectrum, from kindergarten through college. Now that vaccines are widely available and case numbers are coming down, school administrators are looking for solutions to normalize education and participation in extracurricular activities post-pandemic.

As events and sporting activities resume, it’s necessary to maintain precautions to protect athletes, other participants, and spectators. There may be limits on attendance for some time. Many schools are implementing spectator policies that will allow fans to participate but also maintain safety through smaller crowds.

To meet these stricter requirements for college games and other student activities, it’s important to have a reservation system in place to regulate the number of attendees at the event. Jotform is a convenient solution for collecting student attendance requests and managing the registrations of those who are allowed to come into the stadium. 

Follow these tips to create an online reservation system for college game attendance.

1. Design an attendance request form

Jotform offers more than 100 templates you can use to create a reservation request or appointment form. Select a template and customize the form fields to match your unique needs. If the predesigned templates aren’t a good fit for your event, you can build a form from scratch.

What fields should you include on your form? Make sure you request information that identifies the student, such as their name, phone number, email address, and more. Additionally, the appointment field can help you manage and schedule reservations using specific parameters for capacity limits, dates, and times.

For best results, it’s a good idea to require spectators to submit their attendance requests at least 24 hours in advance. Since capacity will be limited, you’ll probably want to go with a first-come-first-served policy for attendance registrations.

2. Use liability waivers

Holding these events could increase the school’s liability, which is why it’s wise to ask attendees to fill out liability waivers before the game. These waivers protect the school from liability if anyone contracts COVID-19 while attending the event.

Anyone who signs the digital form agrees that they maintain the risk and responsibility for anything that might happen through their voluntary participation as an athlete or spectator. 

3. Require self-declaration forms

A digital self-declaration form is an effective way to track and assess potential risks and symptoms among attendees. You can include health questions that will help you discover if anyone currently has symptoms or has recently been exposed to someone with the virus. Requiring attendees to report their medical status reduces the risk of spreading the virus to others at the event.

One of the benefits of using Jotform to create a self-declaration form is that you can opt for HIPAA-friendly if needed. This gives you the ability to gather necessary information for health and safety while also protecting the security and privacy of your students.

4. Maintain health and safety precautions

Registration requests, liability waivers, and health declarations are all critical steps for maintaining participant safety, but make sure you continue using other strategies recommended by the health department to minimize the spread of the virus.

If you want to make the event accessible to more people, many schools are also integrating hybrid models that combine in-person and digital participation options.

How using Jotform can help with college game attendance

Jotform’s digital forms provide colleges and universities with no-code tools that make it easier to ensure your school stays within capacity limits at sporting events. The appointment feature integrates easily with other software solutions, giving you a streamlined workflow to manage attendance.

Not only can you choose from many form templates, but submissions automatically populate the Jotform table associated with your form. That means you can oversee event registrations and attendance in one centralized location. This information is essential for ensuring that every attendee completes the necessary paperwork and is registered to attend the game.

If you’re a university administrator who needs to oversee the registration process for school activities, Jotform is a helpful tool. It also offers a variety of other education forms for teachers and staff members. Jotform gives your school the ability to collect data online and offer a secure solution with integrated forms and tables that you can customize to match your unique needs.