This article provides guidance on identifying and resolving duplicate guardian profiles in a school system to enhance communication and reduce costs. It details the steps for merging or deleting profiles, the necessary permissions, and the implications of these actions, emphasizing that merges cannot be undone. It also addresses bulk actions and troubleshooting for unflagged duplicates.
You can identify and resolve suspected duplicate records for:
- student duplicates in preparation for DfE School Census
- guardian duplicates (shown below) to improve communication to guardians and save costs on avoiding to send multiple text messages to the same guardians
- staff duplicates in preparation for DfE School Workforce Census
Please note that once a profile merge has been carried out this cannot be undone, so be sure to carefully check the two profiles you intend to merge before carrying out the operation.
Permissions
You will need the School: General Admin: Administer permission to merge or delete guardian profiles. If you don't have permission, you'll need to ask your admin team to give you permission using these instructions.
Merging or deleting guardian profiles
Go to School > Data > Data Quality Dashboard and scroll down to Suspected Duplicates. This section of the Data Quality Dashboard gives you an overview of all unresolved suspected duplicate records at your school.
Managing guardian duplicates
To merge two guardian profiles go to School > Data > Data Quality Dashboard > Suspected Duplicates > Guardians. Click the row that includes the guardians you would like to merge.
Review the information in the slide over.
Top Tip: Not sure which guardian profile is most recent? Any students linked to the guardian who are currently enrolled will have their registration form in brackets next to their name.
If you still want to merge the profiles, select one of these resolutions from the drop-down box:
- Merge guardian B into guardian A - blank fields in Guardian A will be filled by information from Guardian B and if conflicting information exists for a field, the information from Guardian A and Guardian B will be kept
- Merge guardian A into guardian B - blank fields in Guardian B will be filled by information from Guardian A and if conflicting information exists for a field, the information from Guardian B and Guardian A will be kept
- Delete guardian A - deletes all data associated with the first profile
- Delete guardian B - deletes all data associated with the second profile
- Keep records separate - nothing is changed and there will continue to be two separate profiles.
Click Resolve to implement the changes.
The duplicates will then move to the Resolved tab.
Deleting guardians with no linked children in bulk
To see guardians not linked to any students go to School > Data > Data Quality Dashboard > Guardians > Guardians with no linked students.
To delete guardians to take them off your site, tick the boxes next to their names, then click the Bulk action button. This process cannot be reversed, so make sure this is the correct course of action.
You can also click their name to go to their profile and link them to a student instead.
Deleting a single guardian
You'll need to do this from the Admin section of their guardian profile. This process cannot be reversed, so make sure this is the correct course of action.
FAQ
Can we merge profiles in bulk?
No, it is not possible to merge profiles in bulk. Profiles cannot be un-merged so it's very important you check a merge is needed for each potential duplicate that is flagged.
Can we keep records separate in bulk?
Yes you can - just tick the boxes next to the profiles you want to keep separate. Click the Bulk action button to select Bulk set as 'Keep separate'.
They'll then show in the Resolved tab.
Someone is a duplicate but isn't flagging as one
If you're sure that two guardians are duplicates but aren't being identified as duplicates, make sure that their names are identical. Please note that if a user has a guardian and a staff profile, these do not count as duplicates.
Go to the profile that has the incorrect name, and change their name to exactly match the name on the other profile.
If they're not flagging on the Data Quality Dashboard, be sure to check the Resolved tab to see if someone mistakenly chose to keep the profiles separate.
Can I undo the resolution I chose?
- If you have merged or deleted profiles, this cannot be changed.
- If you have chosen to keep records separate, you can change the resolution.
Click into the Resolved tab and select the resolved duplicates. In the slide over, you can then select a new resolution.
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