November 2022
As the end of the quarter approaches, your teachers will need to go through the ReportCard input process. This means an administrator will allow input, the teachers will enter grades into the ReportCards and then the administrator will close input. From there, you can either print the ReportCards or permission them to be viewed by parents online. Opening up teacher input for 1st Quarter ReportCards will require:
- Changing input for 1st mid-quarter from ‘Allow Input’ to ‘Input Complete’ in ‘ReportCard Input Controls’
- Changing input for 1st quarter ReportCards from ‘Not Yet’ to ‘Allow Input’ in ‘ReportCard Input Controls’
- Having teachers go through the 1st quarter ReportCard input process
- Closing the input process by changing ‘allow input’ to ‘input complete’
If your school is printing report cards, keep in mind that you can allow your parents to view them online. This option will save your school time, money and the environment. If a parent signature is needed to verify that they have seen the report cards, then you can create a WildCard field where parents can enter in their initials and the date electronically, letting you know they have viewed the report card. Here are the steps to allow viewing online:
- Go to ‘Grades’ then ‘Parent View Controls’
- In the ReportCard column, choose which grade levels will need their ReportCards viewable online and change those grade levels from ‘NO’ to ‘YES’.
- Click ‘Submit’
You will need to make sure that input has been set to ‘Input Complete’ in ‘ReportCard Input Controls’. Click here to read more about setting up a WildCard field for a virtual signature!
Review Your ReportCards! One very important step in creating report cards is to make sure everything has been set up correctly. This requires looking over a report card to double check:
- Course names
- Subcategories
- Grade scales/marking codes
- Formatting
- Printing
As the end of the trimester approaches, your teachers will need to go through the ReportCard input process. This means an administrator will allow input, the teachers will enter grades into the ReportCards and then the administrator will close input. From there, you can either print the ReportCards or permission them to be viewed by parents online. Opening up teacher input for 1st Trimester ReportCards will require:
- Changing input for 1st mid-trimester from ‘Allow Input’ to ‘Input Complete’ in ‘ReportCard Input Controls’
- Changing input for 1st trimester ReportCards from ‘Not Yet’ to ‘Allow Input’ in ‘ReportCard Input Controls’
- Having teachers go through the 1st trimester ReportCard input process
- Closing the input process by changing ‘allow input’ to ‘input complete’
If your school is printing report cards, keep in mind that you can allow your parents to view them online. This option will save your school time, money, and the environment. If a parent signature is needed to verify that they have seen the report cards, then you can create a WildCard field where parents can enter in their initials and the date electronically, letting you know they have viewed the report card. Here are the steps to allow viewing online:
- Go to ‘Grades’ then ‘Parent View Controls’
- In the ReportCard column, choose which grade levels will need their ReportCards viewable online and change those grade levels from ‘NO’ to ‘YES’.
- Click ‘Submit’
You will need to make sure that input has been set to ‘Input Complete’ in ‘ReportCard Input Controls’. Click here to read more about setting up a WildCard field for a virtual signature!
Review Your ReportCards! One very important step in creating report cards is to make sure everything has been set up correctly. This requires looking over a report card to double check:
- Course names
- Subcategories
- Grade scales/marking codes
- Formatting
- Printing
If the parents at the school are scheduling automatic online payments in FDpay, then you’ll want to get familiar with the Schedule Payments Report! You’ll be able to see who has set up automatic payments, the amounts, the frequency and to which finance accounts.
To see which parents have set up scheduled automatic payments in FDpay, you will go to Finances>Schedule Payments CSV Download
Here are a few things to know about this report:
1.) You can check mark the option ‘Include Completed Scheduled Payments’ before clicking the report button if you want the report to include any scheduled payments that have already been completed
2.) This report will have the following information:
- Name
- Finance account
- Payment frequency
- Payment amount
- CC or ACH
- Date of 1st payment
- Date of next payment
- Payment duration
- Number of payments remaining
- Final payment amount
While FDmail and Bulletin Boards are effective tools for keeping the school community connected, they may not be necessary for everyone. For the staff accounts that do not need to receive FDmail or have a Bulletin Board, administrators have the option to hide these accounts from displaying in the list of staff.
For an administrator, here are the steps to hiding a staff person’s name in the list of recipients in FDmail:
- Go to People, then Staff
- Click on the name of the staff person who should be hidden from displaying the recipient list of staff names
- In the staff person’s account information, towards the bottom, check mark the box following the line that reads ‘Exclude {name} from FDmail to “All Teachers/Staff”
- A few lines below that, check mark the box following the line that reads ‘Exclude {name} from appearing in any recipient lists for FDmail messaging:’
- Click the change button for that staff person
For an administrator, here are the steps to hiding a staff person’s name in the list of staff in Planner:
- Go to People, then Staff
- Click on the name of the staff person who should be hidden from displaying in Planner
- In the staff person’s account information, check mark the box following the line ‘Hide Bulletin Board:’
- Click the change button for that staff person
If your school is tracking attendance hours for day care or before/after school care in our Timer feature, then you will have access to an Extended Care Report.
Timer is a component in FastDirect that allows schools to track the attendance hours of students who are in day care, preschool, before/after care etc. If your school is using this component, then the time that you are being billed for in Timer will be in an Extended Care Report. This report not only allows you to view specific date ranges, but you can also specify which children you want to appear in the report. For those parents that need to submit forms to their employers or for taxes, this report will be exactly what they need! To access this report, follow these steps:
- Log into your parent account
- Scroll below your FDmail and below all of the grade viewing report options
- Underneath the line that reads ‘Extended Care Report’, select the dates you need and the student option then click ‘View Report’
If this report is not on your Home page, then consider talking with the administrators about using Timer at your school.
- Can I have a specific group of students always appear in the Extended Care Log for Timer?
- How does the system calculate the average grade?
- How do I add a link to my bulletin board?
- How do I set up the Unexcused feature for attendance?
Helpful FAQs from November 2021:
- How can I exclude (hide) a student’s name from my grade book?
- How can I create a staff directory?
- What is File Manager?
- On the grade scale viewable in GradeBook, what is the meaning of click %?
Helpful FAQs from November 2020:
Watch this video tutorial to find out how to make batch receipts, charges, and send out finance messaging to multiple families:
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