Chess academy glossary
This glossary defines the operator-side vocabulary of running a chess academy: the academy operations terms and the product concepts that come up while scheduling batches, tracking fees, and reporting to parents. It sets aside pure player-improvement terms and keeps to the language academy owners, coaches, and parents actually use day to day. Each definition below is extractive by design: a short, standalone answer, not a pitch.
Every term links up to a full guide on the blog, so once you have the definition you can read the how and the why.
Terms people mix up most: the make-up credit definition, progress report definition, retention rate definition and rating sync definition. For how ChessCore handles personal data, including how long records are kept, read the privacy notice.
- Terms
- 14
- Areas
- 2
- Letters
- 10
- Full guides
- 13
9 terms · A B C D E F M P R
Academy operations
Batches, make-up classes, retention, demo classes, and the other words academy owners run their week on.
- Lives in B2 Intermediate › Attendance
Attendance register
An attendance register is the per-session record of which students were expected, whether each was present, late or absent, the reason for any absence, who marked it and when, and any correction. It can be kept on paper or in software, and a class nobody marked is recorded as unknown, not absent.
Attendance register definition - Lives in Batches › B2 Intermediate
Batch
A batch is a group of students an academy teaches together under a recurring plan, with an assigned coach and a roster. A batch can meet on one day or several days a week. Academies group students by teaching needs, using rating, age and a placement lesson, and batch size sets how much feedback each student gets.
Batch definition - Lives in Coaches › Coach Elena
Coach load
Coach load is the total teaching commitment one coach carries over a period, usually a week: hours taught in every assigned batch, plus preparation, game review and parent and admin time. As a sum, it is teaching + preparation + review + parent and admin time, over the same period. Counting only the hour in the room understates it.
Coach load definition - Lives in Enquiries › Trials
Demo class
A demo class is a single trial session a chess academy offers before enrollment, so the family can judge the coach and the batch before committing to a paid seat. It follows an enquiry and usually a booking, and it should end with a recorded decision and a next step, because an unfollowed demo quietly becomes a lost lead.
Demo class definition - Lives in Enquiries › Funnel
Enrollment funnel
An enrollment funnel is the tracked path a prospective student takes from first enquiry to a defined enrolment milestone, usually through a booked and attended demo class. Many academies count first payment received as the milestone. An accepted offer and an authorised fee mandate come earlier and are not the same as money received.
Enrollment funnel definition - Lives in Fees › Mandates
Fee mandate
A fee mandate is permission for scheduled recurring payments, such as UPI AutoPay, within an approved amount and frequency. A parent approves it once, usually in a payment app, and later charges draw on that approval. It authorises collection. It does not mean a fee has been paid.
Fee mandate definition - Lives in Mia G. › Credits
Make-up credit
A make-up credit is a recorded entitlement to one replacement class, issued under an academy's written policy. The record names the student, the class it replaces and the date issued, with an expiry date if the policy sets one. Where and when it can be used depends on the policy, the student's level and free seats.
Make-up credit definition - Lives in Reports › Lucas M.
Progress report
A progress report is a periodic account of a student's recorded activity, the coach's observations where supplied, and the next learning focus, written for the family. It can cover a month, a term or an event. It differs from a class recap, which covers one session, and from an engine game analysis, which covers one game.
Progress report definition - Lives in Insights › Retention
Retention rate
Retention rate is the share of a starting group of students who are still enrolled at a stated later date, shown as a percentage. Divide the starting students who are still enrolled by the starting students, then multiply by 100. New joiners are excluded, and the dates and scope, one batch or the whole academy, should be named.
Retention rate definition
5 terms · A G P R
Product concepts
Approval queues, guardian portals, engine analysis, and the concepts coaching software is built from.
- Lives in Approvals › Waiting
Approval queue
An approval queue is a holding area where drafts and proposed actions wait for a person to review them before anything happens. In chess academy software it usually holds AI-written report text and high-stakes actions, such as marking an invoice paid. Fixed-template reminders do not wait in it.
Approval queue definition - Lives in Analysis › Games
Game review queue
A game review queue is the list of a student's games waiting for engine analysis or already analysed, each with its own status: Pending, Analysing, Done or Error. The status reports engine processing only. It does not show that a coach has taught the game or approved any explanation of it.
Game review queue definition - Lives in Portal › Mia G.
Guardian portal
A guardian portal is a private login where a family sees the academy records shared about its own child, such as attendance, fees, receipts and progress reports. Unlike a shared WhatsApp group, it keeps one family's records in one place. History stays until the academy deletes it or the family requests erasure, subject to legal holds.
Guardian portal definition - Lives in Messages › Diego Garcia
Parent update
A parent update is a message that tells one family about its own child's academy activity, such as a class reminder, a fee notice, an attendance note or a progress report. Its channel and whether a person reviews it first depend on the message type, so each update goes to that family only, not a batch group.
Parent update definition - Lives in Lucas M. › Ratings
Rating sync
Rating sync copies a student's public online ratings from a linked Lichess or Chess.com account into their academy record. In ChessCore, each sync stores the account's blitz, rapid, bullet and classical ratings and, when the value has changed, adds a labelled rating snapshot to the student's history, so coaches read a trend without retyping numbers.
Rating sync definition
To Diego Garcia
Term map
How the terms connect
Each definition names the terms it leans on, and the lines below are those links: 25 of them across 14 terms. Point at a term to light its neighbours; every term opens its definition.
- Attendance register
Links to Batch, Make-up credit, Coach load
- Batch
Links to Coach load, Make-up credit, Attendance register
- Coach load
Links to Batch, Attendance register, Retention rate
- Demo class
Links to Enrollment funnel, Batch, Retention rate
- Enrollment funnel
Links to Demo class, Retention rate, Fee mandate
- Fee mandate
Links to Enrollment funnel, Guardian portal, Parent update
- Make-up credit
Links to Batch, Attendance register, Demo class
- Progress report
Links to Parent update, Guardian portal, Rating sync
- Retention rate
Links to Enrollment funnel, Demo class, Parent update
- Approval queue
Links to Parent update, Game review queue, Guardian portal
- Game review queue
Links to Approval queue, Rating sync, Coach load
- Guardian portal
Links to Parent update, Progress report, Approval queue
- Parent update
Links to Guardian portal, Progress report, Approval queue
- Rating sync
Links to Game review queue, Progress report, Parent update
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