ParentSquare for Staff

• ParentSquare Academy free online learning opportunities are available at THIS LINK
• Contact Michelle Valenzuela, Communications Director, to schedule a one-on-one or small group training session. 
• While logged in to the web-based ParentSquare, click on the question mark logo in the upper right hand corner of the page to be taken to a searchable database of ParentSquare training articles and videos. ParentSquare even offers free training opportunities throughout the year.

To make a post in ParentSquare, you must have a role or permission that allows you to make posts. Administrators, teachers, specialists and group owners can make posts. 

For those who can post:

CLICK HERE for instructions on how to make a post using parentsquare.com.

CLICK HERE for instructions on making a post on the ParentSquare App.

If you have an announcement that you want made to your entire building and your role does not give you permission, please give your message to your building administrator to post. 

NOTE: Since every building handles conference scheduling differently, make sure your administrator is made aware before you use this function of ParentSquare.

You can create appointment sign-ups in ParentSquare that allow you to list which appointment times you will offer, and parents sign up for the spot that works best for them. 

PRO TIP: To avoid problems for students with more than 1 household, do not choose Limit to 1 appointment per user across all time slots when creating the time slots.

CLICK HERE for a helpful article about how to create an appointment sign up post.

CLICK HERE for an appointment sign-ups FAQ that can help you troubleshoot appointment sign-ups.

All staff can search and view students, staff and parents at their building or any staff member in the district through the Directory setting:

1. Make sure you are in the home page where you want to be (for someone in your building – your school’s name should be in bold in the top left corner, if you are looking up a district staff member, Amphitheater Public Schools should be in bold in the top left corner)
2. In the left hand column, navigate under “Explore” and choose “Directory” – this will take you to a searchable directory. In a building directory, you can also click on a list of classes to view directories for individual classes

Most staff members will not be able to view directory listings of students or parents in other buildings. If you need to contact a family from another building, please contact the office or admin of that building for assistance.

Typically, classroom teachers may contact the parents and students in their own classroom, and Administrators may contact students, parents and staff building-wide in ParentSquare. Occasionally, there is a reason someone might need more access to students or parents from a wider area. For example:

• A staff member such as a specialist who works with students from more than one classroom in their building.
• A staff member who works with students and families in more than one building.
• A staff member who is a coach or club advisor for a different building than their own.

In these kinds of cases, we can add permissions to your ParentSquare account that allow you to be in contact with a wider group of students and parents. Please contact Michelle Valenzuela, Communications Director, or Beth Lake, Community and Family Engagement Coordinator, to request additional permissions.

To support better boundaries for staff, app and text notifications for direct and group messages will not be sent outside your Office Hours. Messages are still delivered and appear as unread in the app, and email notifications (if enabled) will continue. 

Smart and Urgent Alerts are not affected and will still be sent immediately. 

This is applied automatically—just set your Office Hours in account settings.

CLICK HERE to learn how to set office hours for direct messaging.

ParentSquare pulls information from iVisions for employee information. If your contact information is incorrect, please work with your Human Resources specialist to update that information. It will then update in ParentSquare, usually within 24 hours.

ParentSquare pulls student and parent information from Infinite Campus. If a parent tells you their contact information is incorrect, please help them contact their registrar or office staff at their school to help with this.

The two options for messaging someone through ParentSquare are “Direct” and “Group.”

• With a “Direct” message, you can send a message to up to 150 people, and. any replies to your message are private between you and the person commenting (like using the “reply” button on an email).
• With a “Group” message, you can send a message to up to 50 people, and all replies are visible to all (like using the “reply all” button on an email).

CLICK HERE for instructions on sending a direct message using parentsquare.com.

CLICK HERE for instructions on sending a direct message using the ParentSquare App.

ParentSquare offers a few different ways to make newsletters. There are pre-made templates that you can simply personalize, or you can make a template of your own. By default, only administrators have the ability to make templates, but if this is something you are interested in, please contact Michelle Valenzuela, and she can help.

CLICK HERE for how to create a newsletter using a template.

CLICK HERE for how to create custom templates for newsletters and posts.

You don’t have to! When families register their account with ParentSquare, they have the ability to choose from 120 different languages. ParentSquare will automatically translate into the prefeered language.

To select their preferred language, parents go to “Manage Account” in the drop-down menu under their name in the upper right-hand corner of ParentSquare.com. In the column on the left-hand side, they choose “Language Settings” and then use the drop-down menu to choose their preferred language. (Note: Parents will need to register their account in order to access their account settings)

ParentSquare also offers two-way translation. If you are direct messaging with a parent who has chosen a preferred language other than English, you can send a message in English, and they will receive the message in their preferred language. They can send you a message in their preferred language and you will receive it in English.

One note: If you send a photo or PDF with text, the translation will not be possible. Please send and post all key information as text.

CLICK HERE for more information about using translation in ParentSquare.

NOTE: This function is enabled on our ParentSquare platform, however, make sure to get approval from your building administrator before using it.

Secure documents such as progress reports and report cards can be shared through the ParentSquare platform, potentially saving printing and mailing costs.

CLICK HERE for an article and videos about how Secure Documents works

CLICK HERE for an article about how to send secure documents through ParentSquare

While logged into ParentSquare, click on the question mark logo in the upper right corner of the page to be taken to a searchable database of ParentSquare training articles and videos. ParentSquare even offers free training opportunities throughout the year!

Forms such as field trip permission forms, use agreements or receipt of student handbooks can be sent and managed through ParentSquare. You can create a one-time form or a form template that can be used by an entire building. Once filled out, these forms are stored on the ParentSquare platform for easy access. 

CLICK HERE for an article explaining forms and permissions.

CLICK HERE for an article about digitizing an existing form.

CLICK HERE for an article about creating a one-time use form.

CLICK HERE for an article about creating a form for the forms repository.

You can ask parents to donate items you need for an event, project or your classroom through ParentSquare. You can also ask for volunteers and chaperones

CLICK HERE for an article about how to add “ask for item” or “ask for volunteers” to a post

Sometimes, the name of your class in ParentSquare might not be descriptive enough for you to easily keep track of classes (for instance, if you teach 3 periods of 9^th Grade ELA). Even if you don’t have multiple classes, you may want to change the display name of your classroom to fit with a classroom theme or your own preference.

CLICK HERE for a helpful article about how to rename your class in ParentSquare

The first step when you don’t see options or functions you normally see is to look at your Location and your Account.

Location – Each staff member’s permissions are unique to their position. Some may have permissions only in their building, others may have permissions in the district or in mulitple buildings. If you are not seeing what you normally see, make sure you are not in a home page where you do not have those permissions.

• On Web: Look in the upper, left hand corner at what entity is in Bold
• On App: Your location shows at the top of your screen

Account – If you are both a parent and a staff member – you have 2 different accounts, with two different permissions, in ParentSquare. For instance, parents may not post or view parent directories, while teachers can. If you are not seeing what you normally see, make sure you are in your staff account and not your parent account:

• On web: Look in the upper, right hand corner to view which account you are in. Use pull down menu to change.
• On app: click on the triple bar in the upper, left hand corner and choose “Account”

Some families receive “Instant” messages, which means they receive each message when it is posted, and some receive “Digest” messages, meaning they receive all posts for one day in the evening (around 6-6:30 p.m.). The system defaults to the “Digest” setting.

I fyou have a message you want to reach everyone at the same time, you can override the user’s preferred delivery. In the box directly above the Post button, choose “Send Instantly (overrides digest settings).”

Please use the override sparingly to respect parents’ choices. Examples of when the override is useful:

• The post is time-sensitive and the digest setting goes out too late.
• The message is sensitive, and all families should be informed at the same time.
• You are making a post with information that is urgent (“today’s practice is canceled” or “the bus to the game is leaving 30 min. earlier today”) 

Your Delivery Report is your best first step to help a parent who is not receiving ParentSquare messages. At the bottom of your most recent post, look for an icon that looks like an eye with a number and the word “notified.” Click on the number to go to the delivery report for that post. You can search for that parent in the delivery report to see what is happening.

Some common issues include:

• A parent receives “Digest” messages.  The digest setting means that families will receive all ParentSquare message sent that day in one list, and they have to scroll to see each of them. This is a good opportunity to suggest they switch their preferenct to “Instant.”
• A family’s contact information has changed and was not updated in Infinite Campus. If this is the issue, you may see the words “failed”, “bounced” or “Invalid” in the delivery stats next to their name
• ParentSquare messages are not getting through because they were marked as Spam – either by the parent or by their carrier’s firewall. You would see the word “Marked as Spam”, “Blocked” or “Opted Out” in the delivery stats next to their name. Have them check their spam folder and mark the message as not being spam, or check their list of blocked senders and unblock. This is a change that can only be made on their end.
• A ParentSquare message was received but not opened.
• Something went wrong with the post (parent contact info is correct but message failed). Please contact Michelle Valenzuela, Communications Director, or Beth Lake, Community and Family Engagement Coordinator for assistance.