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PowerSchool Tips

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Question: Whom should I call if I have a question?

Answer: Please use the table below to decide whom to contact for various types of questions.

Question Topic	Person to Contact
Grades for class assignments during the current semester	Your student’s teachers. Teachers’ email contact info is available at http://www.riverbendschools.org
Attendance in a specific class on a specific day	Your student’s teachers.
Grades on transcripts, GPA, class rank.	Your student’s guidance counselors Neal Luker or Susan Daniels
Course schedules, graduation progress, and college and careers.	Your student’s guidance counselors. Neal Luker or Susan Daniels
General attendance questions, and questions related to absences excused by parents/guardians	Your school's attendance secretary. Mae Stiles (FHS) - Sheila VanKampen (RBMS) Stacey Dail (FES)
PowerSchool Password changes, or forgetting your PowerSchool password	Cheryl Piercy or Gail Drolema (FHS) - Phyllis Near ( RBMS)-Chris Huizenga (FES)

Question: When will parents get access to the information on the PowerSchool server?

Answer: Parents will receive their logins and passwords during enrollment in the fall, and will be free to access the site at that time.

Question: Do all teachers post grade and attendance information to the PowerSchool server?

Answer: Posting information to the PowerSchool server requires a number of technical skills that teachers have been working to acquire. We ask for your patience as we continue to train and support our staff in these technical areas that enhance their ability to train our youth in their chosen academic area of expertise.

Question: What is PowerSchool?

Answer: PowerSchool is a typical student information system in that it allows us to manage a wide range of information, including the following: grades, attendance, tests, demographics, activities, courses, and photos. Because the program has been designed using modern software tools, it also allows us to connect parents and students to information. We hope the powerful communications features of the program are helpful to parents and to students who are striving to learn and exceed their dreams.

Question: How often can we expect grades to be updated?

Answer: There are many factors that determine how soon a teacher can assess and return assignments. For example, essays and research papers take longer to grade than a quiz. We urge students and parents to be patient as teachers do their best to return assignments and post grades as promptly as their schedule allows. Teachers usually try to post grades on a weekly basis.

Question: How often can we expect attendance to be updated?

Answer. At River Bend schools faculty do their best to record attendance at the beginning of every period.

The attendance office also enters a wide range of attendance codes, as they receive information from parents, the library, and other school locations where attendance is monitored.

Question: Do all teachers use the same grading scales?

Answer: Yes.

Question: What is required to connect to the PowerSchool server?

Answer: Users need the following to connect:

A computer with a connection to the Internet

Internet Explorer 5.01or Netscape 5.0 or more recent (i.e.,a browser capable of 128-bit encryption)

A login and password, to be supplied by the school

Question: What can I see on the PowerSchool site?

Answer: Parents can access the following information on the PowerSchool public site:

http://www.riverbendschools.org

each schools home page also has a link

Grades for current classes, as well as the assignments that make up those grades

Attendance for the past two weeks or for the whole semester, including a legend of attendance codes used by the school

Teacher comments

Reports via Email, which allow parents to request daily, weekly, or monthly reports to be sent via email

Question: Can other people see my son’s/daughter’s grades?

Answer: As long as you protect your password, others will not be able to see your information.

Question: What do I do if I forget my PowerSchool password?

Answer: FHS - 1-815-589-3511 or email Gail Drolema or Cheryl Piercy RBMS 1-815-589-2611 or email Cheryl Piercy or Phyllis Near FES 1-815-589-2911or email Chris Huizenga or Cheryl Piercy

Question: Are PowerSchool logins and passwords case sensitive?

Answer: It depends on the browser you are using and the platform and operating system of the computer you are using to access the site. If all lower case does not work, we recommend that you try the login and password with the case as shown in your letter. For some logins and passwords, it is hard to know whether to use 0 (zero) or O (capital o, the letter). We recommend that you try both. If you still can't log in, please call your child’s building.

Question: How does one get a PowerSchool login and password?

Answer: The school will provide this during enrollment or you can contact the buildings to get on..

Question: What are the guidelines for acceptable use of River Bend’s network resources?

Answer: The school’s acceptable use policy, which is part of the Student Handbook, is available at the following web address: http://www.riverbendschools.org

Question: I know that teachers sometimes weight different categories of grades. How does this affect how a grade is calculated?

Answer: Many teachers use categories such as tests, quizzes, daily work to organize and give different weights to grades; how they weight them is an individual decision. To understand a specific grade calculation, please contact the individual teacher.