Test

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This page is used to send messages via email or SMS, and to generate letters. This page can also be used to record the details of phone calls and meetings. All of this information is saved on the student's contact log.

Accessing the External Contact screen

There are a variety of reasons you may want to contact parents from PARS. The External Contact page is always used to send the messages, but the method for accessing the External Contact page changes, depending on the reason you are contacting parents.

For General Messages

The page is simply accessed via:
Main Menu > Contact Management > External contact

You can also click the External Contact button on the Quick Launch Bar at the top of PARS.
Quick launch external contact.jpg

For Absence

You should use the Attendance View page to identify the absent students (see the Attendance View page for instructions to do this). You would then click Contact > External Contact on the Attendance View page.

For Behaviour Incidents

This is to contact parents about individual behaviour incidents i.e. contact all the parents of students who received a Head Teacher's Award this week; contact all the parents of students who received a C4 today; etc. Parents receive one message per behaviour incident and the messages can include information about the behaviour incidents, such as the grounds or the comments.

The Edit Behaviour Incidents page is used to select the behaviour incidents for which you will contact parents (see the Edit Behaviour Incidents page for instructions to do this). You would then click the External Contact button on the Edit Behaviour Incidents page.

For Detentions

This is to contact parents about specific detentions. The messages sent to parents can include information such as the reason that the detention was given, or the date and time it is going to take place.

The Edit Scheduled Detentions page is used to select the detentions for which you will contact parents (see the Edit Scheduled Detentions page for instructions to do this). You would then click the External Contact button on the Edit Scheduled Detentions page.

For Assignments (Homework)

You can contact parents about a homework assignment, either to notify the parents and/or students that a homework has been set (and email any attachments). Alternatively you can notify the parents of students who have not completed the homework.

Open the Assignment Diary and select the Assignment, then click the External Contact button. See the Assignment Diary page for more information.

For Low Attendance

You first need to run an Attendance Report to identify the students with low attendance (e.g. lower than 85%). Attendance Summaries > Individual Percentages > Selected Individual Session Attendance is a good report for this purpose.

Attendance Reports are accessed via:
Main Menu > Attendance > Attendance Reports

The report then needs to be filtered to show only those students with less than a certain percentage attendance. The Reports page explains how to filter reports. Once the report is filtered click the External Contact button at the top of the report.

Using the External Contact Screen

Batch send messages / batch generate letters

Click the generate batch button at the top left of the page. You will be taken to a new page with 3 tabs.

Stage 1

The Stage 1 tab when batch sending messages

On the left side of the page you will see a list of students whose parents are to be contacted. Deselect any students whose parents you do not want to contact.

In the middle column select the type of person you are going to contact. There are four options:

  • Students

Contact the students themselves. Emails will be sent to their 'work' email addresses (as set in SIMS)

  • Priority 1 contact with Parental responsibility

Contact people who are both priority 1 and have parental responsibility

  • Priority 1 contact regardless of Parental responsibility

Contact people who are priority 1

  • All contacts with Parental responsibility

Contact people who have responsibility

On the right side of the page select the method you wish to use to send your messages. Some of the options include the phrase falling back to. In these cases, the second method will only be used if the recipient does not have any details to use for the first method e.g. When SMS falling back to email is selected, parents will only receive an email if they do not have an SMS number in SIMS.

Note that there are some settings that will affect the options shown on this tab. If some options appear to be different or missing, see the Additional section at the bottom of this page.

Stage 2

This tab will check that, for each student, there is a person in SIMS who can be contacted based on the options selected on the previous tab.

Each student will be listed and any valid contacts (according to their Priority Number and Parental Responsibility) will be shown next to the student. Students are highlighted in red if they cannot be contacted for any reason.

External contact batch stage2.jpg

  • If a student has a contact with a Court Order, the contact's name will appear with a warning symbol. By default contacts with Court Orders will not be contact. See Archie Ansell above.
  • If a student does not have any contacts with valid Priority and/or Parental Responsibility, then no names will appear next to the student's name. See Adrienne Frost above.
  • If a student has a valid contact but that contact does not have appropriate contact details (e.g. no SMS number or no email address) then the contact's name will appear with a black icon. See Hilda Boson above.

Stage 3

This tab is used to enter the message that will be sent. If you have messages saved in the message bank, dropdowns will appear allowing you to select these messages. Click the relevant button (Email, SMS or Letter) to edit your template message or manually compose a message.

For instructions to add messages to the message bank, see the configuration section lower down this page.

After clicking the SMS, Email or Letter buttons, a Compose Message window will open. You can add merge fields to your message by clicking Insert > Field > .... When sending Emails or SMS messages, there is a Send at field which is used to delay sending the messages until a later time. This can be useful when sending large volumes of emails. When sending Emails you will see an additional tab to add attachments to your email. Every recipient will receive the same attachment(s).

If your letter includes General Attendance or General Behaviour merge fields, a Range button will appear on the top toolbar. This button is used to select the date range from which the attendance data will be gathered.

When sending a letter there is an option to Upload a copy of the letter to the student's linked documents in SIMS.

Send single message

Messages can be sent to students or contacts individually. Each person will have their available contact details listed. Click on the Email or SMS buttons to send a message to that person's mobile phone or email address.

You will then see a window to compose your message. You can access the message bank by clicking Insert > Template, or access merge fields by clicking Insert > Field.

Record meetings or phone calls

You can type and save the details of any phone calls or meetings using this screen. For telephone calls, find the telephone number that was used then click the Call button next to it. For meetings click the Ad-Hoc button next to that contact.

When recording telephone calls there is an additional Contact Type option. This is used to record whether the call was successful, or whether there was no answer, a voicemail was left, etc.

When recording meetings and telephone calls most information will be recorded on the contact log. This includes the date, time, the name of the staff member recording the information, the person contacted and the student. In the case of telephone calls the telephone number is also recorded.

View contact log

There Contact History and History Report buttons are used to access a student's contact log.

Contact History shows a summary of contacts made, but to see the details of each contact you must click the view button. This report is easier to read at a glance but requires more clicks to see the details of a message. The Contact History report can also be used to edit and delete items from the contact log.

The History Report shows all information from the contact log. It is not possible to view the details of letters using this report. Items on the contact log cannot be edited or deleted using this report.



There are two other methods for accessing the contact log. Both of these methods involve using different pages in PARS:

  • Pupil information
  • Contact reports

Configuration

Emails

In order to send emails, PARS needs to be given the SMTP details of your email server. These settings are entered into PARS via:
System management > Preferences > Email

At the bottom of this section there is a Send Test Email link which you can use to test the details you have entered. We cannot tell you what these details are; if you do not know your SMTP details, you must find them yourself.

SMS

In order to send SMS messages you must have an account with TextAnywhere and enter those account details into PARS. If the details have not been entered into PARS you will be able to select SMS as a method of contact.

File:NoSMSonGenerateBatch.jpg

The details of your TextAnywhere account are entered into PARS via:
Contact management > Configure > Configure SMS

Message Banks

Additional

FAQs

One or more of my templates is not available from the dropdown

I only see "Students" under the Recipients section of the Stage 1 tab

What date range is used for attendance data?