1. Parent Assistant Overview

2. AGENDA What is Parent Assistant?
Parent Assistant Overview
AGENDA
What is Parent Assistant?
What information will be available to you in Parent Assistant?
How do you access Parent Assistant?
Where do you go for technical support regarding Parent Assistant?
I have 10 minutes to introduce Parent Assistant to you tonight. So in those 10 minutes I will explain what Parent Assistant is, what information is available in parent assistant, how you access it, and who to call or if you have technical difficulties.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

3. What is Parent Assistant?
Parent Assistant Overview
What is Parent Assistant?
A web based application which allows parents to view students’ assignments, grades, attendance and other information from any computer with an internet connection.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

4. What information will I be able to see?
Parent Assistant Overview
What information will I be able to see?
Demographic Information
Emergency Contact Information
Attendance information
Class Assignments
Credits Earned to Date
Current Progress
Diploma
Marks/Grades
Standard Tests
Messages
Parent assistant contains all of the items listed on this slide. It allows you to see the demographic information on record for your child and for you, emergency contact information, attendance information, class assignments, credits earned to date – which includes credits earned in prior years, current progress – which is a summary of grades from this year, diploma – which shows you specifically how many credits your child needs to graduate, marks/grades gives you a your child’s current marks, standard tests lists standard tests taken and their scores, and the messages function allows you to read messages sent from the school and also communicate privately and directly with your child’s teachers.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

5. When you first log in… Parent Assistant Overview
The Parent Assistant Home Page is the Current Progress screen. From here you can see the range of functions and features available in Parent Assistant.
There are 5 menu items shown in the purple menu bar at the top, including: General Info, Current Activity, Academic Progress, Messages, and Miscellaneous.
We’ll review what is contained in each of the sub-menus so that you can see the scope of Parent Assistant.
Looking below the main menu, you see the student selected, and if you have more than one child in the system, this is where you go to select a different student. You make the selection from the dropdown, and then click “Display”.
The first of the five main menu items is GENERAL INFO.
The General Info menu item has three items underneath:
1) Password
2) Demographics – review & cover how to make updates.
3) Emergency Contact Information – point out this as the same update function
To change your Parent Assistant password you click on the Password menu item. To review Demographic data, you would click on Demographics.
Let’s look at the Emergency Contact Information screen to see what that looks like.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

6. Parent Assistant Overview
Contact Information
You can review Emergency Contact Information, (and demographic information also) and if there is an error on your child’s record, or you question something you are seeing, contact the school office. All changes or updates to personal information must be made at the school in accordance with the school’s change request policies.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

7. Parent Assistant Overview
Attendance
Attendance is located under the second main menu item, Current Activity.
The school takes Period Attendance, which means that there will be an absence noted for each period where a student was absent, so for example, if there are 4 periods in a day, and a student was absent for the entire day, that student will have 4 (period) absences recorded.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

8. Parent Assistant Overview
Assignments
Assignments is the first of six items under the main menu item Academic Progress. You can easily see all assignments on this summary screen, including when they are and when they were assigned. If you need more information about a particular assignment, you click on the Details button to bring up more information.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

9. Parent Assistant Overview
Assignment Details
On the Assignment Details Screen you are able to review the teachers’ detailed Narrative description of the assignment along with any Parent Tips that may have been provided for the assignment.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

10. Parent Assistant Overview
Credits Earned to Date
The second item under Academic Progress, this screen, Credits Earned to Date, displays the courses completed in prior years by the student.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

11. Parent Assistant Overview
Current Progress
The Current Progress screen (the third under Academic Progress) shows student progress during the current year. The screen displays Courses, the Teacher, Abs [Absences], Tardy[ies], and term and final marks. In addition, for courses currently in progress, the system will display the student’s to-date percentage as well as the equivalent letter grade. If no current grade appears for in-progress courses, it could be either that the student has not yet received any marks in that course, or marks earned recently have not yet been posted in the system (marks will be posted within 5 days of an assignment’s completion).
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

12. Parent Assistant Overview
Diploma
The fourth screen under Academic Progress, Diploma, shows your child’s progress towards graduation. You can clearly see how many credits are required for graduation and how many your child has earned thus far.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

13. Parent Assistant Overview
Marks/Grades
The Marks/Grades screen provides a view of the child’s current marks. It shows current and final marks as well as attendance information pertaining to a particular class. At the end of the year, the columns which are now blank on this sample, would be all filled out with grades for the year and then a final grade along.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

14. Parent Assistant Overview
Standard Tests
This last item under Academic Progress, Standard Tests, shows standard tests taken by the student.
If you click on any of the details buttons on this screen, you will see the second screen shown here, which gives you the student’s score for the test selected.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

15. Parent Assistant Overview
Messages
The Messages function is an important part of Parent Assistant – it allows you to receive messages from your child’s teachers AND school messages. It also allows you to send private messages to any of your child’s teachers.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

16. Miscellaneous, Non-School Days
Parent Assistant Overview
Miscellaneous, Non-School Days
Under the Miscellaneous item, the last on the screen, we have two items, the first of which is a list of non-school days for your reference.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

17. Miscellaneous, Student Schedule
Parent Assistant Overview
Miscellaneous, Student Schedule
The second item under Miscellaneous is the student schedule. This allows you to display your child’s current school schedule. It includes the teacher, course name, time and location for all of your child’s classes.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

18. How do you access Parent Assistant?
Parent Assistant Overview
How do you access Parent Assistant?
Anywhere you have an internet connection you can access parent assistant using this URL.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009

19. Where do you go for technical support?
Parent Assistant Overview
Where do you go for technical support?
Two resources for you:
Ms. Semanthe Bright
Telephone:
Mr. Curtis Pree
These are the people you will go to if you have any sort of technical problem with Parent Assistant.
That’s all the time I have, so I hope everyone enjoys the rest of the evening.
Thank you for your attention.
District of Columbia Public Schools | September 17, 2009