Keep tabs on students with school Web sites

By: Garner Roberts
ReporterNews, Abilene, Texas

August 20, 2009

This is not your father’s school technology.

Parents of students in the Abilene and Wylie independent school districts can now find out when the bus comes, what’s on the menu in the cafeteria, the grades on their child’s latest test, and their attendance records. Parents can even pay for lunches online and learn PowerPoint.

Mark Gabehart, chief technology officer for AISD, says it’s not a novelty anymore.

“It’s part of the way we do business,” he explained.

“Most of these things are pretty well established,” Gabehart said. “It’s considered routine business to share this information with parents. The district uses the Web site to communicate with parents and the community.”

At Wylie, Robin McVay says Family Access on the school district’s Web site is “a very convenient tool. Any parent can use it. People really love being able to pay for their child’s lunch online, and if you have a child you really need to watch, you can follow their grades online.”

Gabehart said Parent Portal on Abilene’s Web site is “very successful and popular. The bus route information is very popular, and we try to make sure our teachers enter grades in a timely manner.”

With their child’s identification number, Gabehart said parents can see attendance records, discipline reports, and grades for homework, papers, quizzes and tests. Also available are bus routes with times and addresses, menus and nutritional information from AISD Food Services, links to school libraries with online resources and databases available, the AISD television schedule, school board agendas and information, and “Ask AL (Atomic Learning).”

On the Atomic Learning pages, parents and students have access to tutorials, training and videos for educational resources, computer programs and software such as Microsoft Office PowerPoint.

AISD also posts a newsletter online to save the costs of mailing. Parents may also complete an online request to have the newsletter sent to them by e-mail.

“This is a growing document, a dynamic Web page,” Gabehart added. “We also can post emergency information when we need to, such as school closings.”

Gabehart said families without computers at home often use a computer at the library or at the home of a friend or other family member. But in addition to access to a computer, Gabehart said Internet broadband access is also important.

“Dialup doesn’t really work anymore,” he added.

Teachers in both Abilene and Wylie schools are also developing their own newsletters and Web pages for parents and students in their classes.

McVay, who works in Wylie’s technology department, said parents apply for their personal log-in name and password when they register their child for school at WISD. The name and password are usually sent by mail to the parents, according to McVay.

On a pull-down menu in Family Access, WISD parents will find the name or names of their students to follow.

Among the popular features on Wylie’s Web site are class schedules with times and teachers’ names, grades, missing homework assignments, attendance records, immunization records, and the balance of their account for lunch.

Parents of students in WISD also can pay for lunch online with a credit or debit card.

McVay said another popular feature at Wylie is the ability to print immunization records to take to a physician’s office or a report to verify grades for employment.

She said a parent’s log-in name and password remain the same as long as the child is in WISD.

“We really encourage our parents to use our Web site,” McVay added.