Parent Portal and Parent App Settings

Go to Students > Parents & Guardians > Parent Portal Settings. On this page, you can update the settings to enable or prevent guardians from accessing certain data. You can also enable or disable access to the Parent Portal and Parent App from this page. 

Before turning on the Parent Portal, ensure that the correct amount of data is displayed to parents. Although you can amend this at any time, setting your preferences before activating the Parent Portal ensures that no extra data is shared.

Top Tip: Switching this on will show all past, present and future data in this area. This cannot be changed. For example, switching on behaviour will show all past incidents, points etc.

Permissions

You will need the General Admin: Administer permission. If you don't have the permission, you'll need to ask your admin team to give you permission using these instructions.

Checking and Amending Parent Portal Settings

Go to Students > Parents and guardians > Parent portal Settings.

Activities

Click one of the fields to choose whether to show clubs or trips on the Parent Portal. This means that parents can view clubs/trips for which the student is eligible, participating in, and has attended, as well as sign up and pay for new clubs (if your school has enabled card payments).

If they are enabled, this will be displayed on the dashboard and also shown on the student's profile.

Assessments

Click one of the fields to choose whether to show Progress results or curriculum tracking.

If they are enabled, this will be displayed on the dashboard and also shown on the student's profile.

Attendance

Click the field to choose whether to show Attendance.

If this is enabled, it will display on the dashboard and also be visible on the student's profile.

Behaviour

In Behaviour, you can choose to display Notes, Detentions, Behavioural Incidents and Point Award Scales.

Click at the top to edit whether Notes and Detentions are displayed.

You can choose whether positive or negative incidents are displayed to parents - great if you want to share your positive incidents but not your negative ones! 

Please note that all types of incidents will be automatically set to 'Off.' If you would like them to display on the parent portal, click to toggle the feature.

If this is enabled, it will display on the dashboard and also be visible on the student's profile.

You can choose whether each of your Behaviour Point Award Scales is displayed to parents - great if you want to share your positive scale but not your negative one! You can also toggle whether to include the comments, who the points were awarded by and in which event.

Change the field to Yes, show point scale and click Save Changes. 

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The points will then be displayed on the Parent Portal.

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Examinations

You can choose to display the Examinations Timetable for the current and past academic years and allow parents to download it as a PDF. You can also make the statement of entry and exam results (including In-house exam results) available. Results will only be available to view once the embargo date and time you’ve chosen has passed.

These features are automatically off by default.

Communications

In Communications, you can choose to display and enable In-app messages for communications with guardians that are not time sensitive. For more information on using In-app messages, refer to this article.

Payments

Showing accounts enables parents to see balances and make card payments for Meals, Clubs or Trips.

It also determines whether parents can see an overall balance for their accounts.

Top Tip: This will show as £0 if the balances are all zero or all positive. This has been designed this way so that a positive account balance on one account does not hide a negative amount outstanding on another account.

This feature is on by default. If you want to switch this off, click the Payments total field, change it to 'No, do not show payments total', then click 'Save Changes'.

You can choose to:

• Show payment accounts but not the Payments total
• Show both
• Show neither

Top Tip: You must have selected to show accounts to display the Payments total. You cannot show the Payments total without first showing accounts.

You can also choose whether to display each Customer Account Type set up on the parent portal - useful if some accounts are for school use only. This also determines what accounts parents can make card payments for.

You can also complete this action from the School > Payments > Setup > Customer Account Types page. Click here to find out how.

If you choose to switch everything off, it'll look like this, and parents won't be able to see or top up their balances.

Student Details

Manage how much student information parents can view and edit on their child's Student Profile. Please note that the changes may require approval from the school. See the section below for more information.

Click a field to edit these settings.

Student Printable Timetable

Choose whether to enable guardians to download a printable PDF timetable through the Parent Portal or App: The Calendar and timetable on the Parent Portal and Parent App

When switched on, you can select the format to be output.

You can also select which event types to include. This, by default, will only include Lessons, but you can select additional event types (interventions, detentions, exclusions, exams, clubs, or trips) using the drop-down.

Automatic/Manual Acceptance of Student Record changes

Using the settings in the Security & Privacy section, you can toggle whether parents can edit basic details about themselves and their children. Please note that only Primary Guardians have access to the Parent Portal.

If you do not want Arbor to auto-accept changes without any administrative checks or approval from the school, then make sure it is set to 'No, do not auto-accept student record changes'.

If you select 'No, do not auto-accept student record changes', then you will be able to accept or decline requests to change said information in the Data Quality Dashboard. To see how to do this, click here.

Enabling access to Parent Portal

When you are ready, click into the Security & Privacy section to enable your Parent Portal (and allow them to use the Parent App as well).

• Change Parent login to Yes to enable Primary Guardians of your current students to log in. These are guardians of students who are currently enrolled in your school, as well as those with a future enrollment date.
• Change Applicant parents login to Yes to enable Primary Guardians of your applicants to log in. These are applicants to your school for this or future years who have an application status that is not Enrolled, Withdrawn or Rejected - read more about this process here