Fire Drills

Fire Drills

Overview (Shared Across all Users)

This guide explains how to schedule fire drills, how recurring schedules work, and how to complete/log a fire drill so it appears in reports and on the Centre Calendar.

Scheduled Fire Drills

Scheduling fire drills is optional. You can always record a completed fire drill without scheduling it first. However, scheduling fire drills provides two key benefits:

  • Calendar visibility: Scheduled drills appear on the Centre Calendar, making it easy to see upcoming drills at a glance.

  • Dashboard reminders: If you have the Fire Drill widget enabled, your dashboard will display your next scheduled fire drill as well as the most recently completed drill, helping ensure compliance and timely completion.

Completed Fire Drills

A completed fire drill is recorded after a successful fire drill is completed, and its purpose is to record who was evacuated, how long it took, which staff were present and any notes or observations related to the fire drill. Completed fire drills can be viewed in a report in Reports > Tools > Fire Drills.

To record a completed fire drill, you can select a scheduled fire (on the calendar) drill to complete it, or you can insert a brand new fire drill that was unscheduled. New fire drills can be inserted either by clicking on the calendar, or by selecting "Fire Drill" from the "New" menu.

Centres vs Dayhomes

Fire drill workflows differ between centres and dayhomes due to licensing requirements and security settings. The key differences are outlined below.

Centres
  1. Centres can schedule fire drills, complete scheduled fire drills and record new completed fire drills directly on the centre calendar.
  2. When centres record fire drills, the details include which groups of children participated in the fire drill, which staff were present and which staff logged the fire drills.
  3. Centre staff can record fire drills both on the desktop app as well as the mobile app.
Dayhomes
  1. Dayhome educators cannot schedule fire drills, and cannot complete scheduled fire drills.
  2. Dayhomes typically cannot access the calendar due to agency security settings.
  3. Dayhome educators must record fire drills using the +New option in the mobile app
  4. Dayhome fire drills allow selecting individual children who were present, rather than groups.
  5. The person logging the fire drill is automatically assumed to be the dayhome educator.

Desktop App (Centre Staff Only)

Scheduling Fire Drills

Fire drills can be scheduled in Admin > Calendar > Fire Drill Schedule. The Fire Drill Schedule displays all scheduled drills for the next 12 months, and KinderLogix automatically maintains a rolling future window to ensure continuous coverage.

When scheduling a fire drill, you can:
  • Schedule a single fire drill
  • Create a recurring schedule (daily, weekly, monthly, yearly)
Enable Avoid closed days to prevent drills from being scheduled on weekends or closure days.
  • Weekend closures are configured in Admin > Calendar > Business Hours
  • Closure days (holidays, Christmas break, etc.) are configured in Admin > Calendar > Closure Days
Scheduled fire drills appear on the calendar as "Fire drill (scheduled)".

Completing Scheduled Fire Drills

Scheduled fire drills can be completed in two ways:
  • By selecting the scheduled drill directly on the Centre Calendar
  • By selecting Complete in Admin > Calendar > Fire Drill Schedule
When completing a scheduled drill, you must enter the evacuation time (in minutes). The Save button will remain disabled until this value is provided.  Once completed, the calendar will list the drill as "Fire drill (completed)".


Recording a New Fire Drill (Unscheduled)

You can record a new (unscheduled) fire drill by selecting Fire Drill from the New menu in the desktop header, or by clicking a date on the calendar and selecting Fire Drill from the options menu.

Required fields include:
  • Date
  • Time
  • Evacuation time (minutes)
  • Logged By
Fire Drill Colour

You may select a colour for the completed drill using either a predefined colour or the colour picker. For consistency and readability, it is recommended to use the default fire drill colour. If using the colour picker, you can switch between RGB, HXL, or HEX formats.

Mobile App (Centre Staff)

Completing Scheduled Fire Drills

Scheduled fire drills can be completed in two ways:
  • By selecting the scheduled drill directly on the Centre Calendar
  • By selecting Complete in Admin > Calendar > Fire Drill Schedule
When completing a scheduled drill, you must enter the evacuation time (in minutes). The Save button will remain disabled until this value is provided.  Once completed, the calendar will list the drill as "Fire drill (completed)"

Recording a New Fire Drill (Unscheduled)

To record a fire drill, tap + New and select Fire Drill. Required fields are Date, Time, Evacuation time (minutes), and Logged By. All other fields are optional. The Logged By list displays all currently active staff.



Mobile app users cannot schedule fire drills.

Mobile App (Dayhome Educators)

What Dayhome Educators Cannot do

  • Cannot schedule fire drills
  • Cannot complete scheduled fire drills
  • Typically cannot access the calendar due to agency security settings

Recording a New Fire Drill

Dayhome educators record fire drills using the + New option in the mobile app. Required fields are Date, Time and Evacuation time (minutes). Dayhome educators must also select the children who were present during the fire drill.  All fire drills created by a dayhome educator's account are assumed to be supervised and logged by the dayhome educator.