When will Aspen be available for teachers?
Currently our GoLive date for teachers is 8/11/2014.
Will Chancery SMS will available after Aspen’s GoLive date?
No, Chancery SMS will no longer be available once we transition to Aspen.
Will Aspen be available outside of school?
Yes, Aspen can be accessed outside of the district on desktops, laptops and mobile devices.
Will transportation information be available in Aspen?
Yes, the student’s bus routes will available in Aspen.
Will a student’s Special Ed information be available?
Yes, IEP Direct information will be integrated in Aspen to the extent that people with the appropriate permissions
can view a student’s IEP and 504 plan.
Training
How do/will they train general faculty members?
Please refer to the teachers’ section under the “All Training” Tab on the this website.
When will they train general faculty members? . . . Summer or Professional development days?
Last two weeks of School – Overview
Summer – Advanced Gradebook and Pages (websites)
When will there be compensation for teachers if they are trained in the summer?
No, summer training is voluntary. However, teachers can request PD hours through PDP Premier for the training.
Please note that trainers will be compensated at an hourly/day rate comparable to the summer curriculum rate that is established in the district.
Attendance
How do you change attendance after it has been posted? For example, you may mistakenly mark a student absent and later realize the student was present. How do you correct this?
It is possible to correct your attendance posting. Go back into your attendance list, make the attendance change and re-post your attendance.
Can attendance be taken by the end of the day instead of period by period?
Technically – yes, but that would mean that class attendance reports being run during the day would be inaccurate and we wouldn’t know if a student is in a class or not as class attendance is defaulted to present. Students who enter the class after the class is more than 50% over, are considered absent for that session and should be marked as such.
Will the elementary specials be able to take period by period attendance?
This is currently being reviewed.
Will PE be able to to take attendance using their iPads on the fields because currently they do not have service out there?
If you don’t have internet service on the fields, you won’t be able to take attendance.
Will Aspen keep track of class attendance and kick back warnings to teachers automatically when a student is in attendance jeopardy?
We need to look into this in more detail. Aspen will provide warnings for issues with daily attendance and we can create reports that teachers can schedule to run with regards to classroom attendance.
Can teachers automatically be notified when students are absent more than 4 times in a semester class or 9 times in a full-year class? Can the system automatically generate the appropriate alerts and letters? Should the main office print/send these out instead of the teacher if they’re automatic?
Teachers can run a report to obtain the information mentioned above. However, this does not occur automatically and would require a customized workflow. This may be a consideration at a later date.
Interim Reports & Report Cards
Will there be a simple 5 week/quarter report or will more be expected from us in regards to reporting?
The 5-week reports will be required as in the past. The report will be generated through the Aspen grade reporting system. The format will be similar to SMS. Teachers will have the ability to enter a Course Grade, a Narrative Comment or IR Standard Comment.
When will Elementary Report Cards be available?
Elementary Report Cards are due at the end of January. After creating the report cards and having them tested by teachers, we would hope to have them ready mid-December.
Teacher Gradebook, Planner and Pages
Can supervisors see gradebooks? Why?
Yes, supervisors and principals will have access to gradebooks as they do now. The Aspen gradebook is seen as an electronic version of the gradebooks that teachers are currently using.
Is the planner feature in Aspen private? For example, could an administrator see my lesson plans?
No, it is not private. Supervisors and principals will have access to teacher’s planners just as they do the gradebook. The Aspen planner is seen as an electronic representation of the lesson plans that teachers currently use.
Can you exclude individual students from an assignment and not have that assignment visible in their grade book?
The assignment would appear on the student’s list, but you could create an “exclude” code which would mean the student would not be graded for that assignment. The feature to be able to exclude students from assignments is scheduled to be available in December’s release of Aspen updates.
Can teachers view the planning calendar for all their own courses at the same time so they can see when exams and units overlap between courses?
When you click on all the classes on the left side, the assignments & tests for all of your classes will be shown on your planning calendar. You cannot just select assignments or tests.
Will teachers that share students be able to see other teacher pages with assignments and announcements? This would be useful for Homebase as well as Special Ed and lab classes.
Teachers who share students will be able to see assignments in the other class if the assignment is not marked private, but will not be able to see the class pages. One way to accomplish this is to make a group page and create a list of assignments & exams that can be shown by date.
Can you share a planner calendar between teachers who teach the same course or are on the same team (not co-teachers)?
No, but one way to accomplish this would be to make a group page and create a list of assignments & exams that can be shown by date.
If a student’s schedule is changed, do his grades in the grade book move with him? For example, midway through the third quarter, Joe Smith is moved from my 2nd period science class to my 6th period science class. Assignments are the same in both classes. Do Joe Smith and his grades automatically transfer from my 2nd period grade book to my 6th period grade book?
If the teacher and the assignments are exactly the same, the system can move the assignments and grades from one class to another. If the teacher is the same, but the assignments are not the same, the student will be listed as withdrawn from the first class, but the teacher should still have access to those assignments and grades and would have to manually add appropriate grades and assignments to the second class.
Can the grades in the gradebook be backed up onto a flash drive or other external storage device?
Yes, your can generate a report of your students assignments and grades into an excel spreadsheet and save that a flash drive or other external device. However, you cannot import these back into your gradebook without having a custom import designed for the district.
Other
Will we still be able to email Fitnessgram results home to parents with this new system?
Yes, if parents have added their email address to Aspen, then it will be imported into Fitnessgram so that you can email results to parents.