There are some built-in tools and options to manage your old enquiries and applications, and the best practices in OpenApply are as follows:
1. Archiving data
You can archive individual applicants or students to hide them from active rosters while still retaining their data securely within the platform. This ensures that only necessary, current records are accessible day-to-day, without deleting historical data. Archived applicants/students can be searched manually using the search function or by manually filtering for Access & Permissions > Archived.
For more information on access and permissions, you may refer to our help guide: Editing an application
Unfortunately, it is not possible to bulk archive or unarchive as a school user. Alternatively, to bulk archive applicants, you may first filter the enquiries/applicants and export the data from OpenApply. You may share a CSV file with the following fields with the OpenApply customer service team to complete this request:
- OpenApply ID (under Extra fields)
- First Name
- Last Name
- Enrollment Year
- Student Status (under Extra fields)
For more information on exporting, you may refer to our help guide: Exporting data
2. Status-Based Organisation
Students can be marked with statuses like Withdrawn, Graduated, or Declined/Rejected. Withdrawn and Graduated students are automatically archived as withdrawn or archived as graduated, and they move into the Alumni roster. You may add a new status level under a main status if needed. These statuses help categorise students for data retention reviews and transitions. For further information on this, you may refer to our help guide: Editing Status and Creating Sub-Statuses
3. Deleting records from OpenApply
An applicant profile and all its related data, such as a child's and parents' information, can be deleted from your OpenApply system.
Once you have determined your requirements, the OpenApply Customer Support team can assist with bulk deletion. For example, if you would like to delete all students with a specific status in a particular academic year, we can process that request for you.
Alternatively, you may share a CSV file containing either OpenApply ID or Student ID of the records to be removed with the OpenApply Customer Support team. (Both these fields can be found under Extra Fields)
For further instructions on deleting applicant profiles individually or in bulk on OpenApply, you may refer to our help guide here.
Additionally, we suggest that schools manage their own data retention policy, so it is up to the school how long they need to keep the data for.
You may wish to check with your IT team or data protection office to see what your school's data retention policy is, and then you will know when you need to delete this data.