End User Conference, Wednesday March 11
A Day in the Life of an Elementary Secretary
How to Use PowerSchool Features to Complete Daily Tasks With Ease (Elementary School Focus). This session will provide training surrounding a typical day for an elementary secretary or elementary school counselor using PowerSchool. Topics covered will include student enrollment and withdrawal, attendance, reports, grading, log entries, and getting data out for daily inquiries.
Advanced Student Searches
After a quick review of basic student searches, this session will explore the various search methods of searching for information in PowerSchool. Topics to be covered:Brief overview of how data is stored in PowerSchool, review of search comparators, compound searches, search codes, using the search functionality on the PowerSchool home page (advanced, multi select, stored searches, stored selections,) creating search groups, searching for parent/guardian accounts and special function searches.
Attendance Functions & Reports
Learn how to take daily, or multiple day attendance for an individual student or a group of students. View the many different attendance reports that are available in PowerSchool.
Basic Student Searches
Do you want to know more about searching student records? This hands‐on session will provide suggestions for performing basic searches, using search commands, compound searches and search codes. You will also learn how to save stored searches and selections.
Class Rosters
In this session, you will learn to use the Class Rosters function to print a custom PDF listing all students in a specified class. With Class Rosters, you can generate specific check sheets by class that include as much or as little student information as you need. This report is perfect creating paper attendance sheets, creating a quick list of parent contact information, or even keeping track of the health or guardian alerts for students in your classroom.
Elementary Scheduling - Manual Scheduling & Changing Student Schedules
Attendees will walk away from this session with an understanding of the a Master Schedule and scheduling students in an elementary setting. Topics will include: working with courses, working with sections, dependent sections, enrolling students individually and in mass.
Excel Design for Intermediate to Advanced Users
In the first half of this session users will discuss the important characteristics of a well-designed spreadsheet and workbook. This will be followed by examples of data validation, conditional formatting, and worksheet/workbook protection. Attendees should be comfortable with large data analysis and use Excel as a regular part of their work projects. Those with a limited knowledge of Excel may have difficulty with this session.
Excel for Advanced Users - Pivot Tables and Mail Merge
This session will focus on the set-up and manipulation of pivot tables and associated pivot charts. Learn how to organize your data and quickly analyze with pivot tables and charts. Then create an individualized email blast using mail merge. Attendees should be comfortable with large data analysis and use Excel as a regular part of their work projects. Those with a limited knowledge of Excel may have difficulty with this session.
Excel for Beginners – Navigation, Control, and Formula Basics
This session will focus on manipulating Excel cells and worksheets for ease of use. Topics covered willbe ditching the mouse, freeze panes, filter and sort, format pain, auto fill, and dealing with duplicatesWe will also touch on the basics of formulas, including relative and absolute cell references and how touse the function wizard. Attendees who are comfortable with large data analysis may pick-up a trick ortwo, but this session will really focus on the casual or less experienced Excel user. Certain tips and tricks may not work for Apple users.
Excel Formulas – Moving beyond Average
This session will move beyond the basic sum and average formulas to focus on text related (LEFT, PROPER, CONCATENATE, etc), reference (H/VLOOKUP% MATCH), logic (IF & IFS) functions, and error functions. Goal seek will round out the discussions. Attendees should have knowledge of the formula wizard and be able to navigate easily in Excel.
Exploring PowerTeacher Pro
This session will introduce the PowerTeacher Pro gradebook and walk users through the setup process ending with creating categories and assignments, and finalizing grades for report cards. We will discuss traditional grade calculation methods, total points, term weighting, standards or category weighting; district versus teacher created categories, associating assignments to multiple classes, and entering scores via direct entry or through the score inspector. We will review finalizing grades for report cards.
Exporting Data from PowerSchool
Explore the data fields available for exporting student information...how to find them, what the fields mean, and how to export this information in multiple ways/formats. Learn how to use Quick Export and List Students to produce a spreadsheet and/or list of students and information from the Students table (information such as race, DOB, gender, disability/LEP/gifted status, addresses/phone numbers, entry/exit information, STI, activities, etc.) Then learn how to use export templates that can be saved and used as needed. If time permits there will also be an introduction to narrowing down student selections/groups for use in these exports; and include an introduction to DDE
Form Letters and Mailing Labels
Form letters allow you to "personalize" generic letters for individual students. Mailing Labels are like a miniature form letter that can be used to create labels for Avery or other types of label paper. In this session you will learn to create mailing labels and form letters in PowerSchool. Time will be set aside at the end of the session to allow participants to work on their own letters/labels. This session will be "hands on" so attendees will need to bring a laptop to participate.
Incident Management
As Districts begin to become familiar with the implications of moving to SBAR, we are beginning discussions with PowerSchool regarding the viability of using Incident Management to track and report discipline for the state. This session will give users the opportunity to see Incident Management in action. Since the state has not finalized their requirements, this demonstration will only include examples of what we think the state might require and how those requirements will fit the Incident Management model. There will also be time for questions and answers from a PowerSchool representative.
Industry Certifications
In this session, you will learn how to utilize PowerSchool to view and manage students’ industry certifications. This session will cover linking credential exams to courses, importing exam results, and generating the Career and Technical Education Credential Collection (CTECC) report at the end of the school year.
Performance Matters:Assessment Design & Delivery(3-hour session)
During this session, participants will access Performance Matters to create basic item interactions and build, administer, and score assessments. Participants will learn how to build assessments for both online and paper-based delivery and navigate Test Center to deliver online assessments. Finally, participants will have the opportunity to explore the student’s online testing experience and learn to utilize the Online Administration tool to monitor students as their testing. Finally, participants will also learn to score student work using OnlineScoring and Scoring Assignment.Audience: Teachers, ITRTs, School Administrators, District Administrators
Performance Matters:Dialogues with Data for District and School Administrators
Participants will work in a collaborative settint to analyze compare assessment data to make data-driven instructional decisions. In this session, participants will focus on best practices for building and analyzing reports in Baseball Card, Scoreboard, Comparative Reporting & Student Item Analysis to track standards on district created assessments.Audience: School Administrators & District Administrators
Performance Matters:Dialogues with Data for Teachers
In this session, participants will focus on best practices for indentifying patterns in student growth & achievement. This session will give participants the opportunity to analyze data in Student Item Analysis and practice using Baseball Card and Scoreboard to create customized reports. Lastly, participants will explore My Dashboard and the Student Details Report to access data on student population.Audience: Teachers, ITRTs, & School Administrators
PowerScheduler - Course Preferences, Relationships and Constraints
Learn everything you need to know about the many (but important!) course preference settings for your courses, how courses can relate to other other courses in your catalog for the Build and Load, and the role of constraints in forcing PowerScheduler to find a way to build and load exceptions and absolutes that are specific to your school.
PowerScheduler - Entry Level
This session will be to help you start your Scheduling. We will talk about Setup, Parameter and Resources that need to reviewed
PowerScheduler - Open Workshop
This 90 minute session will start with open group discussion/questions you have about PowerScheduler setup items or unique scheduling challenges and dilemmas for your school - we'll devise constructive and practical strategies on how to get you going in the right direction! Once general discussion and questions for the group are concluded you will have the time to work with the trainer on your live server PowerScheduler data to set up scheduling items you still have questions about, or to get the hands-on assistance you need in diagnosing errors, issues or how to avoid problems that have afflicted you in scheduling your schools in the past.
PowerSchool 101 / Functions on the Main Screen
PowerSchool 101: This session is designed for those who have been using PowerSchool for only a few months. PowerSchool is a web-based application. As a web-based application, PowerSchool functions in real time, meaning that users see information the instant that it is updated in the system. PowerSchool provides tools for School administrators, teachers and substitutes, students and parents. This class will explain how each of these groups uses PowerSchool.
PowerSchool Tips & Tricks
This session will provide some useful tips or tricks that you may not be aware of that will enhance your PowerSchool experience.
PowerTeacher Pro for Office Staff
Participants will learn how to access the PowerTeacher Pro gradebook through the admin portal. An overview of the PTP gradebook will also be offered during this session. See what the teachers see in their gradebooks.
PSCB Reports
Reports and Custom Report Build: This session will be a review of the System Reports in PowerSchool and review the new PSCB report that are custom created. Will review how to install these reports as a plugin
Round Table Discussions
Join a collection of experienced PowerSchool users to discuss any topic related to PowerSchool. Have a question that wasn't answered? Need to know who to contact for more help? Want to just chat about general PowerSchool topics? Can PowerSchool solve a problem your school or district has? Come join us at the end of the day for an open discussion where you can learn from PowerSchool administrators and other PowerSchool users about how to leverage PowerSchool to help you! Drop in any time between 3:45 and 4:30 to chat and hear what others have to share.
Student Contacts - Working with Student Contacts post implementation
Student Contacts allows you to associate multiple contacts to a student. This session covers how to access and edit information for a contact, check the system to see if a contact already exists, and entering a new contact. Associating, disassociating or changing a contact's relationship to one or several students will also be covered.
Student Data Privacy in your K12 Ecosystem
This presentation will review best practices for integrating educational technology resources, introduce the Virginia Data Privacy Agreement, and provide an opportunity for Q&A related to data governance controls for consumers of student and staff data.Please note that this presentation is not PowerSchool specific.
Support Teachers in Standards Based Grading in PTP
PowerTeacher Pro makes it possible for teachers to apply standards based grading to assignments. Teachers have options to select the standard to be assessed on each assignment. Then a standards based grade for each student is calculated. In this session we will review the process of adding standards to an assignment, using the Professional Judgement Indicator and determining the standards final grade for the marking period.
Tracking Attendance Letters
Learn how to create a custom tracking system for student attendance letters using a student custom screen, custom fields, export template, and the Multi Select plugin.
Quarterly Meeting, Thursday March 12
Excel Design for Intermediate to Advanced Users
In the first half of this session users will discuss the important characteristics of a well-designed spreadsheet and workbook. This will be followed by examples of data validation, conditional formatting, and worksheet/workbook protection. Attendees should be comfortable with large data analysis and use Excel as a regular part of their work projects. Those with a limited knowledge of Excel may have difficulty with this session.
Excel for Advanced Users - Pivot Tables and Mail Merge
This session will focus on the set-up and manipulation of pivot tables and associated pivot charts. Learn how to organize your data and quickly analyze with pivot tables and charts. Then create an individualized email blast using mail merge. Attendees should be comfortable with large data analysis and use Excel as a regular part of their work projects. Those with a limited knowledge of Excel may have difficulty with this session.
Excel for Beginners – Navigation, Control, and Formula Basics
This session will focus on manipulating Excel cells and worksheets for ease of use. Topics covered will be ditching the mouse, freeze panes, filter and sort, format pain, auto fill, and dealing with duplicates. We will also touch on the basics of formulas, including relative and absolute cell references and how to use the function wizard. Attendees who are comfortable with large data analysis may pick-up a trick or two, but this session will really focus on the casual or less experienced Excel user. Certain tips and tricks may not work for Apple users.
Excel Formulas – Moving beyond Average
This session will move beyond the basic sum and average formulas to focus on text related (LEFT, PROPER, CONCATENATE, etc), reference (H/VLOOKUP% MATCH), logic (IF & IFS) functions, and error functions. Goal seek will round out the discussions. Attendees should have knowledge of the formula wizard and be able to navigate easily in Excel.
Incident Management
As Districts begin to become familiar with the implications of moving to SBAR, we are beginning discussions with PowerSchool regarding the viability of using Incident Management to track and report discipline for the state. This session will give users the opportunity to see Incident Management in action. Since the state has not finalized their requirements, this demonstration will only include examples of what we think the state might require and how those requirements will fit the Incident Management model. There will also be time for questions and answers from a PowerSchool representative.
Intro to Object Reports and Visual PST
Object reports allow you to build reports for both admin and teacher users that can be run for a selected group of students or a class. This session will go over what object reports can do, how to create a basic object report and an overview of the different report elements available for object reports. The second half of this session is a demonstration of Visual PST, which is an add-on that simplifies the process of creating object reports. Available for purchase from an outside vendor.
Performance Matters: Maximizing Baseball Card & Scoreboard
Participants will work in a collaborative session to learn to create custom student filters, uploading additional 3 rd party assessments to maximize the potential of the reporting
capabilities in Baseball Card and Scoreboard. Additionally, participants will explore My Reports to further expand on the robust reporting capabilities within Performance Matters.
Audience: District Administrators & Data Administrators
Performance Matters: Early Warning System (90-minute session)
During this collaborative session, participants will discuss creating early warning rules around grades, attendance, & discipline. Participants will also learn to utilize this data to ensure students are receiving the appropriate support and interventions based on the data generated on the early warning rules.
Audience: District Administrators & Data Administrators
Performance Matters: Open Office Hour
Members of the VA EIC Team will be available to address questions specific to school division’s needs. Please stop by with questions regarding your Performance Matters platform. We will use this opportunity to ensure your school division is moving forward in the platform and has a solid training and rollout plan for the 2020-21 school year.
Audience: All Participants
PowerScheduler - Course Preferences, Relationships and Constraints
Learn everything you need to know about the many (but important!) course preference settings for your courses, how courses can relate to other other courses in your catalog for the Build and Load, and the role of constraints in forcing PowerScheduler to find a way to build and load exceptions and absolutes that are specific to your school.
PowerScheduler - Open Workshop
This 90 minute session will start with open group discussion/questions you have about PowerScheduler setup items or unique scheduling challenges and dilemmas for your school - we'll devise constructive and practical strategies on how to get you going in the right direction! Once general discussion and questions for the group are concluded you will have the time to work with the trainer on your live server PowerScheduler data to set up scheduling items you still have questions about, or to get the hands-on assistance you need in diagnosing errors, issues or how to avoid problems that have afflicted you in scheduling your schools in the past.
SQL Advanced
This session will cover how to use more advanced SQL commands to get data out of the PowerSchool database. Topics include: Custom tables and fields, joining tables, IF and CASE statements. It is recommended that users have a basic understanding of what SQL is for this session. This session will be hands-on and users are encouraged to bring a computer. We will also learn how to create a report and import a report in sqlReports to make them available to your end-users. Also, if you have a specific query you would like to work on please bring your ideas and we will work on them in class. SQL Developer SHOULD already be installed and configured on your laptop. Participants will need to download Oracle SQL developer from the Oracle site. Signup is free.
SQL Basic
SQL Developer SHOULD already be installed on your laptop. Are you limited by the export functionality of DDE or export templates and looking for a more powerful way to do exports? Learn the basics of SQL – how to write a basic query, basic joins, and how to retrieve only the records you want.Participants will need to download Oracle SQL developer from the Oracle site. Signup is free.
Student Contacts - Implementation
Preparing your SIS and your staff for Student Contacts. This session provides a working knowledge of Student Contacts from implementation to staff training, and consolidation.
Student Data Privacy in your K12 Ecosystem
This presentation will review best practices for integrating educational technology resources, introduce the Virginia Data Privacy Agreement, and provide an opportunity for Q&A related to data governance controls for consumers of student and staff data.Please note that this presentation is not PowerSchool specific.
Using Decodes and DATs
Data Access Tags and Decodes allow you to modify how data appears on reports, form letters, exports, etc. In this session you will learn how to use these codes to customize the appearance of data related to attendance, demographics, student schedules, grades, GPAs, and test scores. This session will be "hands on" so attendees will need to bring a laptop to participate.