Author: Azroy Kandan

Administrative Attendance

Azroy Kandan2 Comments

Many schools want to track specific items about a student’s attendance. For example, did the student leave early (“Early Dismissal” or “Half Day”), or was the student suspended. If a student is expected to be absent  due to vacation or medical reasons, an administrator might want to note that down in the Attendance module, even if it’s several days in the future.

The current Attendance Module within QuickSchools is designed for a homeroom teacher or subject teacher to take attendance when class starts. Often times, the teacher does not know the reason why a student is absent or tardy. This is why, the Attendance Roster only has 5 available settings: Present, Absent, Tardy, Absent with Excuse and Tardy with Excuse (Note: some of these fields can be hidden or renamed based on specific requirements of your school).

Attendance Defaults to Not Yet Taken
Attendance Defaults to Not Yet Taken

Once attendance is taken, an administrator or office manager can review the attendance taken for the day, and make any adjustments based on follow-ups with the parent. So for example, if a student is marked “Absent”, the administrator or office manager would typically call the parent and verify what happened, and would then update the system accordingly (if the student is sick, for example, the admin can change the record from “Absent” to “Absent with Excuse” and add remarks).Read More »

Montessori Assessment App

Azroy Kandan2 Comments

In a recent post, we highlighted how the Gaia Plan on QuickSchools works great for Preschools. If your preschool also offers the Montessori curriculum, there is now an App in the QuickSchools App Store where you can make assessments in line with the Montessori Method.

Here’s an example of what the Montessori Assessment App can record for any particular student:

Montessori Assessment in QuickSchools
Montessori Assessment in QuickSchools
  1. Record progress / observations on specific work goals / objectives. This includes the level of progress (Presented, Practiced of Mastered) as well as when the observation was made. You can even add comments.
  2. You can also add general notes independent of the work list.

To install the app, just go the App Store, and review/install the Montessori Assessment App:Read More »

Printable Student Profile

Azroy Kandan3 Comments

Summer is coming to an end, and we’ve released a new feature for the new school year (more new features will be announced soon). If you open a student record on your QuickSchools account, and click on the “Actions” dropdown, there is now an option to “Print Profile”:

Printing the Student Profile
Printing the Student Profile

When you click on it, there will be some additional options on how what you want to display on the PDF profile:Read More »

QuickSchools Gaia Plan for Preschools

Azroy Kandan2 Comments

Here at QuickSchools, we cater to a wide variety of schools, thanks to the simplicity and flexibility that we have to offer. We keep your student data safe, by employing the latest standard in network security, and by backing up your data both in real-time and daily to a separate secure location. Your data is not shared with any other external parties either.

For preschools in particular, the Gaia Plan is quite useful, as it provides an entry-level set of features which incorporates all the benefits mentioned above. And with our new QuickSchools App Store, you can also pick-and-choose specific apps that suit your school.

QuickSchools Gaia Plan
QuickSchools Gaia Plan

Here are some benefits to starting with the Gaia Plan:Read More »

Default Attendance

Azroy Kandan1 Comment

A little known enhancement that was released on QuickSchools earlier this year: You can now change the default attendance when taking attendance. So instead of having all students appear as “Present” by default (when you click “Take Attendance”), you can set the default as “Absent” or even as “Not Yet Taken”.

Attendance Defaults to Not Yet Taken
Attendance Defaults to Not Yet Taken

The configuration screen is available under the “Attendance” > “Attendance Settings” screen (if you have it enabled):Read More »

QuickBooks Integration App (Beta)

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Wonderful news! We are now offering integration with QuickBooks Online via an App in the QuickSchools App Store. The app is still in private beta (as of Aug 11, 2014), so if you don’t see it on your App Store menu, please come chat with us to request access.

This first beta version will allow users to do the following:

  • Connect with your QuickBooks Online Account
  • Map products/services in your QuickBooks Online Account with Fee Tracking Categories in your QuickSchools Account.
  • Map customers in your QuickBooks Online Account with either students or primary payers (for Family Billing) in your QuickSchools account. If customers have not been created in your QuickBooks Online Account, you can export them (exported records will be mapped automatically)
  • Export Charges, Invoices and Payments from your Fee Tracking Module in QuickSchools into your QuickBooks Account
QuickSchools QuickBooks Equivalent
Fee Tracking Categories Products / Services
Students / Primary Payer Customer / Accounts
Fee Tracking Charges, Invoices and Payments Invoices and Payments

In this article, we’ll run through a few quick steps on setting up integration with your QuickBooks Online account. For a list of supported countries check out:

https://qboe.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/3680

The first time you access the QuickBooks App, you will be faced with the following screen:

Connect to QuickBooks
Connect to QuickBooks

Simply click on the “Connect to QuickBooks” button to log into QuickBooks. The following login screen should pop-up:

Logging into QuickBooks Online from QuickSchools
Logging into QuickBooks Online from QuickSchools

Once connection has been established, you’ll be faced with the following options:Read More »

Fee Tracking Improvements for 2014

Azroy Kandan13 Comments

School is OUT! And what that means is, you can expect many new improvements in QuickSchools before the new 2014-2015 school year starts in the fall. Be sure to let us know what features you’d like to see in future releases.

We’d like to announce a couple of awesome new features that have just been released in our Fee Tracking module, as well as some that our on the way:

  • Fee Deadlines and Payment Allocations
  • Printable Invoices and Receipts
  • Coming Soon: QuickBooks App
  • Coming Soon: Alerts

Fee Deadlines and Payment Allocations

Many of you have requested the ability to note down when a payment is due for specific fees. And so we’ve built in a new to do just that. But in order to track whether a fee deadline has been met, we’ve also built-in the ability to allocate payments to fees (this is typical for accounting programs).

To turn on the feature, just go to the “Settings” > “Turn Features On/Off” and click on the “Configure” link next to the “Fee Tracking” module:

Turn on Fee Deadline and Payment Allocation
Turn on Fee Deadline and Payment Allocation

Just make sure to check off “Turn on fee deadlines & payment allocations”, and you’re all set.

IMPORTANT: It’s important to note that once you turn on this feature all payments will need to be allocated to a fee/charge (otherwise the system will warn you of unallocated payments). So for those who have been using the Fee Tracking module for a while, it can be difficult to transition to this new method. Please contact our support team for more info.

Once the method is enabled, your “Fee Tracking” > “Student Billing” List will display all Unpaid Charges:

Student Billing / Unpaid Charges
Student Billing / Unpaid Charges

When you click on a record, every payment will have an “Allocate” link, which will allow you to allocate payments to previous fees/charges. The “Allocate” link will always be displayed, even if the payment has already been allocated, in the event you’d like to re-allocate the payment differently:

Read More »