As a teacher, you may find that you will need to do several things from updating your password to creating a personal site in SchoolStatus Sites. Below you will find tips and links to articles that review how to do specific things in SchoolStatus Sites and finally a troubleshooting section that you may find helpful as you use SchoolStatus Sites to reach out to your students and parents.
Keywords
The following list of keywords you will find commonly used in SchoolStatus Sites.
- Module/Asset Filter - A module or Asset Filter can be used for different purposes, from creating new pages and departments for a website to storing different types of data to be used in conjunction with the various widgets and finally to create dynamic database-driven pages.
- Widget - Widgets are the building blocks of a page and they can also extend the capabilities of the platform.
- Container - For personal sites, a container is where your personal website is stored
- Model - A model is a preset template that you will need to use to create the initial structure of your personal site.
- SSO - SSO is a way to set up your account so that you can use a Google, Clever or Microsoft account to log into SchoolStatus Sites so that you do not have to remember another password.
Dashboard
When you log into your school/district's website you will be greeted by the dashboard. The dashboard gives you a centralized location where you can quickly locate files or information that your school shares with its staff in the intranet, personal sites and finally with a couple clicks you can update your password, profile. avatar and even how you log in.
- How do I update my password?
To update your password, click on Settings in the upper right-hand corner, followed by Details under My Account on the left side of the screen and finally Change Password. - How do I find/update my profile?
Your profile is what visitors see in a faculty listing on the website. You can update your profile by clicking on Settings in the upper right-hand corner and then Faculty Profiles under My Account. - How do I change my avatar?
While not viewable to the public, the avatar is a way to identify yourself in the dashboard and can easily be updated by clicking on Settings in the upper right-hand corner followed by Details under My Account on the left side of the screen and finally Update Avatar. - How do I locate the files used by my school/district?
Most files, that are staff related and not shared with the public, should be able to be found in the intranet. If you are looking for those types of files click on Intranet in the side navigation followed by View Public Site or click on the eye icon located to the right of the intranet in the middle of the main dash.
Personal Site
A personal site can be a powerful tool that you can use to communicate with students and parents. Allowing you to create pages for homework, reading lists, calendars that parents can subscribe to and much much more. While it may sound overwhelming at first a personal site can easily be created, customized and made public in three steps.
- Create your personal site
To create your personal website click on your account in the top right-hand corner and Personal Sites from the options given. On the following screen click on Add Site which will take you to where you can name your personal site, chose the Container, this is where your personal site will be stored and we recommend choosing either the main site or the department that is for your school, chose Model - Teacher Website in the Model field and finally click Create. - Customize your personal site
- Navigate to your site - You can locate your personal site by going to Personal Sites under your account located at the top right-hand side of the screen. On the following screen click on either View Departments to be taken to your website so you can edit it or View Public Site to preview it.
- Upload files/images - After navigating to your site, click on Files which is found in the module list listed under the title of your personal site. On the following screen click on either Files or Images to upload your files/images to the appropriate location. You can create new folders inside either location if you would like to organize your files more by clicking on +Folder in the upper right-hand corner, you will find yourself in the new folder after creating it. To upload your images/files, click on Upload files and upload your files/images. If you would like to exit the folder you can click on the left pointing arrow located on the left side of the window.
- Edit your Welcome page - Click on Pages in the module list to view all of the pages located on your personal site. To edit any of the pages that are listed click on the pencil icon to the right of the page's title. This will take you to the page editor, where you will need to position your cursor over either + Content, this will bring up either a list of widgets that you will use to build pages, which you will need to select the Text widget from or a widget if you select Edit from the options given.
If you worked on your text outside of SchoolStatus Sites you can easily copy and then using command + shift + V to paste the text in without bringing in any of the styles that are not visible from the original source.
To place an image, click on the Image tool which is located in the second row of the tools in the Text widget. Click on Browse and either locate or upload the image you would like to place. After selecting the photo enter a short description of the image in the Alternative Text field. - Edit your About Me page - Click on the pencil icon to the right of About Me which will take you to the page editor for that page. Now position your cursor over either + Content, this will bring up the widget list which you will use to build your pages. Scroll down and select the Text widget, enter a short biography of yourself, click Create at the bottom of the widget and finally click either Publish or Save Draft in the side navigation.
- Edit your Homework page - Like above click on Pages in the module list to view a list of pages located on your personal site. Click on the pencil icon to the right of the Homework page and this will take you to the page editor, where you will need to position your cursor over + Content, this will bring up the widget list which you will use to create your pages. Scroll down and select the Text widget.
If you would like to link to a pdf, file or an external page select the text that you would like to be a link and then click on the link tool which is located in the second row of the tools in the HTML WYSIWYG widget. Click on either Browse Content or Browse Files and either select the page, file or enter the URL of the external webpage.
For files and external web pages click on the Target tab and switch the Target to New Window (_blank). Additionally for links that will open a file click on the Advanced Tab in the Link wizard, locate the Advisory Title field and enter the name of the file followed by (opens in new window). - Add an event to your calendar - Click on Calendar in the module list to view all of the events located on your personal site. To add a new event click on the +Create at the top right side of the screen, select Event and enter the appropriate information, finally, click either Publish or Save Draft to save the event.
- Navigate to your site - You can locate your personal site by going to Personal Sites under your account located at the top right-hand side of the screen. On the following screen click on either View Departments to be taken to your website so you can edit it or View Public Site to preview it.
- Make your personal site viewable to others
Now that your personal site is created there is an additional step that you will need to take to make it viewable to others. Go to Manage People Profiles under My Account. Scroll down to the Primary Link field and enter the URL of your website. An example of an URL is /~csadmin@innersync.com/another-test, you do not have to enter the part of the URL before the / in front of your email address, that is automatically added by SchoolStatus Sites.
Finally, click either the Publish or the Save Draft. This tells SchoolStatus Sites that you have a website and that when someone views your information in a faculty list to display the link that you entered.
Troubleshooting
There are times when something doesn't work the way you thought it would. Maybe you made changes and they are not showing after you saved or something else. Below you will find some helpful troubleshooting tips that may help you try and figure out what the issue may be,
- Why when I try to edit my profile I do not see Manage People Profiles?
if Manage People Profiles does not appear it means that either you are not permitted to edit your profile or there is not a profile in the system for you. If this happens please submit a ticket into SchoolStatus Sites support so they can look into it. - I just linked to a file, why does it want to download instead of opening up in a new window as I told it to?
Is the file a PDF? If not you will need to re-save the document as a PDF, re-upload, and link to the new file for it to open in a new window when clicked. Only PDFs are viewable in browsers, others can only be downloaded.
