SFUSD/School Loop Parent Quick Reference Guide

Parent Quick Reference Guide
What is School Loop?
The school district is rolling out a widely anticipated program that has the power to enhance
communication and collaboration between SFUSD parents, teachers, students and administrators.
School Loop is an easy-to-use web-based tool that will be available to every SFUSD school in Fall
2009. School Loop is safe and secure because all members publish in their own names. Only
registered SFUSD administrators, teachers, staff, students and parents can use School Loop.
*
Parents will be able to:
•
Directly email their student’s teachers via School Loop’s internal mail system, called LoopMail
•
View progress reports and grades
•
Follow school and class news
•
Post news, events and discussions in groups to which they belong
•
Keep track of assignments and upcoming tests
•
Receive alerts about assignments and tests via email. This information may also be available via
a phone messaging system, TeleParent, in up to 22 different languages.
How do I access School Loop?
You will need your child’s student ID number to complete
the registration form. A student’s ID number typically can be
found on their student ID card, locator card or last report
card. If you need help finding your child’s student ID, call
your school office. To register, you must have an email
address. Go to http://www.sfusd.edu/schoolloop. Click on the
Participating Schools’ Websites link in the Parent area of
the page to locate your school. Click Register Now to start
the registration process. Fill in all of the fields, choose a password and click Register when you are
finished. After your initial registration, you’ll receive an email with your password. To enter School
Loop, click the Login button after you enter your Login Name and Password.
With School Loop, you may access details about your child’s classes and assignments. For your
convenience, School Loop can automatically send a daily update to your personal email each day at
approximately 5 p.m. All information you provide is kept private, including your email address.
Please Note: To see your student’s grades, your account must be first approved by a school
administrator. Each school has its own policy for approving parent accounts. Please contact an
administrator at your school for more information. School Loop Support cannot approve parent
accounts and does not maintain information about each school’s approval policy.
What are the icons and links at
the top of the page?
Every School Loop page contains these active
links at the top of each page, for quick access
to LoopMail, News and Groups. Your school’s
link takes you to the school’s homepage. Click the My Portal link to go directly to your own
homepage. Account Management lets you change private account information, including your
password and private email address. You can also change the language you choose to view the
*
Not all school sites and teachers will be ready to use all of School Loop’s capabilities right away. Please
contact your school’s principal/teacher to obtain more information on your school’s School Loop participation.
1
Last update: September 4, 2009
Parent Quick Reference Guide
School Loop interface in, to English, Spanish or Chinese. Help takes you to School Loop’s help
page, where you can view the user manual or submit a help ticket. Logout completely logs you out
of the School Loop site.
What is the
Dashboard?
The first page you will see each
time you login to School Loop is
your My Portal page. It
contains a condensed version
of all information relating to your
student, including a Dashboard
that includes your student’s
courses, absences and tardies,
a link to progress
reports/grades, and current
assignments or tests and due
dates. Please note that in order
to view your student’s progress
reports, your account must first
be approved by a school
administrator.
How do I view my
student’s grades?
Once your account has been approved by a school administrator or a teacher, and a teacher elects
to post grades via School Loop, you can access your student’s grades by clicking Progress Report
in the Dashboard.
How do I receive email alerts about my student’s assignments and
tests?
Participating teachers have the option of posting the class assignments on School Loop. Just go to
the Account Management link toward the top of each page and change to “Yes” by Receive Daily
Emails. If your student’s teacher is posting assignments and tests on School Loop, you will now
receive a daily email that includes this information after 5 p.m.
2
Last update: September 4, 2009
Parent Quick Reference Guide
What is on the Calendar?
The Calendar should contain current and upcoming events relating to your student’s school and
classes. This includes school-wide events such as performances, back-to-school night information,
parent-teacher conference dates and so on. Teachers may also include assignments and tests for
individual classes.
I see a bunch of boxes on the right
side of the page. What are these?
The My Students box is where you can switch
between your children, if you have more than one
student in the school. If you have children in different
schools, you will require a separate login for each
child. My Discussions is where you can view
discussions that are happening in groups to which
you belong. You can enter new topics to initiate
discussions from here. News shows any news
published to the school homepage by school
administrators, on your teachers’ home pages, and
posted by people in groups to which you belong.
Your student’s class schedule is shown in greater
detail in the Schedule box. You can go directly to the
class web site from here, as well as email any or all of
your student’s teachers.
Group Projects essentially are a special type of
discussion with a specific time frame.
How do I join a group?
Parents must be added by someone who is already a
member of the group. Once you are a member of a
group, you can add new members or remove yourself
from the group. Only administrators, teachers and
staff have the ability to view, create, join and delete
groups in School Loop. Students and parents must be
added to the group by an existing member of that
group. When a person is added to or removed from a
group, the person who added or deleted a member is
publicly identified, as well as the date this occurred.
How do I email my student’s
teacher?
On your My Portal page, in the Schedule box, there
is an Email All Teachers link. This takes you to a
page where you can select one or more of your
student’s teachers and send a LoopMail. You can
also use the LoopMail icon at the top of each page to
directly access your mail account.
3
Last update: September 4, 2009
Parent Quick Reference Guide
How do I post news?
On your My Portal page, click the Add News button to open the news page. You can post news to
one or more of your groups or to a teacher’s website or course sites, if you are a contributor. If you
want news to be published to the school’s homepage, select the Request Addition to Homepage
box. A school administrator must approve the item before it will be posted to the school’s homepage.
Click Publish to post your news.
I do not have computer access. How do I get telephone alerts about
my student?
For those families who do not register with School Loop, an automated telephone notification service
called TeleParent will notify parents about their student’s assignments and tests in up to 22 different
languages.
How do I get help using School Loop?
There’s a red Help link at the top of each page. This opens a page where you can view the School
Loop user manual or submit a help ticket directly to School Loop and expect a timely (normally
between 4-24 hours) response.
Web address:
http://www.sfusd.edu/schoolloop
Click on the Participating Schools’ Websites
link and select your school.
Login name:
___________________________
Password:
___________________________
4
Last update: September 4, 2009