Settings Page: District Settings

From district office all settings are available. Some settings are district specific and will only show up from District Office (PSU for NC schools) while others will show up for individual schools as well. 

To get to the settings page navigate to Settings > BrightArrow Settings

District Only Settings

At the top will be settings that are system wide and do not have corresponding school level versions. These settings apply to all schools where the BrightArrow system is turned on.

  • Contact Tracer: Enable or disable the Contact Tracer page for any school using BrightArrow
    • Rebranded from COVID Tracer to Contact Tracer in Base 2 version 9.2.1 to more appropriately reflect it's usage for non-COVID reasons such as someone attending with lice
  • BrightArrow Search Section Display: How do you want sections to appear in searches?
    • Course Name (Course Number.Section Number) - the default
    • Course Name (Expression)
    • Course Number.Section Number (Expression)
  • List Name for Final Grade Searches: When teachers make a list for students based on a final grade search, what should the list name be? Each time the teacher performs the same task the records will be loaded into the same list so they don't need to type the message each time.
  • List Name for Missing Assignment Searches: When teachers make a list for students based on a missing assignment search, what should the list name be? Each time the teacher performs the same task the records will be loaded into the same list so they don't need to type the message each time.
  • Preserve guardian changes for current selections when using: IF you've requested that parents be allowed to make changes from the parent portal then current selection lists should respect those changes. To do so PowerSchool needs to know what list is used for the parent portal. In most cases this is the All Parents (sync) list so Parents Only is appropriate.
    • Parents Only: Use when the parent portal list is All Parents (sync). Current selections where parents only is requested will use the data from the portal list instead of the values stored in PowerSchool
    • Students Only: Use when the parent portal list is All Students (sync). Current selections where students only is requested will use the data from the portal list instead of the values stored in PowerSchool
    • Parents and Students Combined: Use when the parent portal list is All Parents & Students (sync). Current selections where parents and students are requested will use the data from the portal list instead of the values stored in PowerSchool
    • Always use PowerSchool live data: Use when you only want to use live data. This will ignore changes from the parent portal screen and also will use current data instead of what was imported from the previous day's sync. Useful when you make a lot of changes to phone/emails that day.

District and School Settings

Below the district only settings are the district and school settings. There is a row for district and then a row for each school. The district settings override the school settings. If the district does not enable a feature that feature can not be used at any of the schools either. In the screenshot notice the Teacher portal Report Emailing feature is disabled in the district row and thus the schools do not have the option to turn it on. Further, for feature that have more options than simply on/off the schools can not choose a greater option than the district. 

  • Admin Functions: The basic admin functions. Allow users to see the My List link, use current selections to make temporary lists, send messages to a single user, etc. If this option is off all other options will be off as well.
  • Filters: Filters control what contact information is used as the source of phone/emails. It also controls how some PowerQueries work. District filters set the defaults for all schools. Each school may override the district's filters in certain situations. For more on using filters see Using Contact Filters
  • BrightChat: Customers who have purchased BrightChat can enable links to get them to the BrightChat screens faster. Not necessary for use of BrightChat
  • Staff Contacts: Adds the ability to use the extra staff contact fields that come with the plugin.
    • Disabled: Hide the interface completely
    • Admin Edit Only: Only show the interface from inside the user record
    • View My Contacts: Same as Admin Edit Only but also add in the ability for any user to see their own information by clicking on their initials in the upper right corner > Manage profile > My Contact Info. Information in My Contact Info will read only.
    • Edit My Custom Contacts: Same as View My Contacts except the custom fields in My Contact Info will be editable making it possible for users to update their own information. Stock fields such as home_phone, school_phone, and email_addr will be read only
    • Edit My Contacts: Same as Edit My Custom Contacts except stock fields are editable from PowerSchool as well. These fields are still read only in PowerTeacher as they are not editable from PT per PowerSchool's internal security.
  • Report Emailing: Show the email button from the report queue. Makes it easier to email reports such as report cards, letters for creating Parent Portal accounts, schedules, etc. Also enables the interface to work with MBA reports. More information on Report Emailing can be found by reading Setting Up Report Emailing and Emailing a PowerSchool Report
  • Teacher Portal: Shows the BrightArrow interface in PowerTeacher (PT) and PowerTeacher Pro (PTP). This alone is only the basic features such as sending a message to a section or multiple sections. Enabling this feature reveals the interface only, teachers will still need accounts with BrightArrow to actually send the message.
    • Final Grade: Allow teachers to search by store code for students who have a percent within a certain range. They can then send messages to the resulting students. This feature is also available in the admin portal from a teacher's record.
    • Missing Assignment: Allow teachers to search by store code for assignments where the Missing checkbox is checked and 0 points earned. By default missing assignments must also have the absent, collected, exempt, incomplete, and late boxes unchecked, though there are options available to override those defaults. This feature is also available in the admin portal from a teacher's record.
    • My Lists: Adds a BrightArrow My List option. Since the basic features for PT and PTP all use current selections it was not necessary for teachers to have a My List link. More schools are giving teachers extra lists, this allows teachers to access those.
    • Guardian Portal: Adds the BrightArrow guardian portal page to PT and PTP. Just like the admin side this is the actual page parents see from the guardian portal, if parents can edit so can teachers if this is on. Useful for schools where parents only communicate and ask questions to teachers and not the school, allows teachers to see what parents see.
    • Report Emailing: Adds the ability to email some reports from PT. Currently the setup is the same as admin making this something that would need to be done on an individual basis which is too much work for most schools. We are working on a streamlined method to make it easier on teachers. Currently does not work with PTP reports.
  • Guardian Portal: Shows the BrightArrow Parent Portal page which displays information on what phone/emails will be used to contact them and shows past messages sent to them. Parent Portal Features
    • Disabled: Not enabled in admin or guardian
    • Admin Only: Displays in the admin portal but not guardian. Useful to see what Parents would see before giving it to them. The admin version actually loads the same page as the guardian version. Anything you can edit from this screen will also be editable from the guardian portal. We can disable editing if requested.
    • Enabled: Displays in both admin and guardian portals
  • Permission by Person: When set to enabled users will only see the BrightArrow pages within PowerSchool if they are also enabled. Allows for you to grant permission on a person by person basis within each building. If Enabled at one building and not another only users who are also enabled will see BrightArrow from the Enabled school but all users will see BrightArrow from the school where Permission by Person is disabled

What if I only want to try a feature out at once school?

Older versions of our plugins were all or nothing. Now with individual school control you can turn a feature on in one school and not in any others. And with the ability to use permission by person to control who can see BrightArrow at all you can even reveal the system to just your testers if you wish. 

Ex: In the image above notice that the 3rd school does not allow teachers to use the final grade search or the missing assignment search and has not added the My List page. However that school is the only one showing the parent portal screen to teachers. 

What are the drop downs in the blue section?

They are mass change options. Use them to update all available schools at the same time. Other than the admin option the mass change options will only affect schools where the admin option is enabled.

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