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Schools

Board of Education Creates Communications Platform for Families

The new communications platform will give families in the West Orange School District direct access to school and district announcements, academic progress reports for their child and more.

Submitted by Amy Simon


The West Orange Board of Education has created a comprehensive communications program to serve every student and family at every stage of their West Orange public education. To receive information from your school(s) PTA, school administration and the West Orange Board of Education, parents should sign on and sign up for the communication platforms available.

 

The first platform that a West Orange public school parent should sign up for is the SCHOOOL MESSENGER/CONTACT MANAGER service. SCHOOL MESSENGER is a comprehensive communications system that will keep you informed of district and school announcements, school closings, and emergency issues. When you register your child as a student in the West Orange public schools, your information will automatically be populated into the School Messenger platform. You will receive a letter in the mail with an access code to the site. With this information you can sign up for the service CONTACT MANAGER by logging on to http://contactme.schoolmessanger.com. Once you sign up you may follow the easy instructions to choose how you are contacted, whether by home phone, mobile phone, email or text message. It is highly recommended all users include an email address.

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The second action a middle and high school parent should take to keep connected to your child’s academic progress is to sign up for POWER SCHOOL/PARENT PORTAL. Visit www.woboe.org and click on the PARENT PORTAL link on the left column of the Home Page. In POWER SCHOOL you will have access to your child’s grades and attendance, see grade history, attendance history, email notifications and teacher comments. Visit the email notification tab and choose which reports you want to see, how often you would like to receive them and have them emailed directly to your inbox. There is even a PARENT PORTAL application available through ITunes for your mobile device. PARENT PORTAL is active during school months only, September through June. During the summer months the administration is populating the site with your child’s classes for the following academic year.

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In addition to SCHOOL MESSENGER/CONTACT MANAGER and POWER SCHOOL/PARENT PORTAL there are communications platforms specializing in each of the three academic stages of your student’s career in West Orange. At the Elementary School level one should sign up for your school’s news bulletin, PTA news bulletin and individual Facebook pages, if available.

 

Middle School parents should sign up for POWER SCHOOL/PARENT PORTAL, their school bulletin, PTA bulletin and individual Facebook pages, if available. In addition, students may begin to utilize the platform EDMODO.

 

EDMODO is used at the high school level as a tool for teachers to assign work, follow a student’s progress, communicate with students about school work outside of the classroom and host after-school conferences, tutorials and projects. It is also being slowly introduced at the middle school level. It looks like Facebook but is purely an academic tool. There are parent access areas on EDMODO. Speak to your child about how to log on. If you see child on-line talking to others, or looking at videos or other material, they may be using EDMODO.

 

Once your child is enrolled in West Orange High School all of the above platforms will remain important for you, SCHOOL MESSENGER/CONTACT MANAGER, POWER SCHOOL/PARENT PORTAL, the PTA news bulletins and Facebook if available, and EDMODO for your student. In addition, you and your child should sign up for NAVIANCE/FAMILY CONNECTION. NAVIANCE/FAMILY CONNECTION is a college and career readiness platform with helpful information, tutorials, research and planning tools for students and parents. The program has a robust newsletter and bulletin feature, and is a primary platform for information to students and families from the guidance department, including Back Pack News, news from your student’s specific academic school, flyers on activities and programs from many departments. Your  child’s guidance counselor will help set up the account and with the parent’s email addresses included in the profile, you can receive flyers and announcements from the WOHS guidance department.

 

The West Orange Board of Education website at www.woboe.org is the foundation of the district’s communication platform and one can always find information on virtually every subject by visiting it. The latest news and announcements are on the home page, access to any of the eleven (11) individual school websites can be found with a click of the mouse from the top menu. You can find WOBOE board meeting agendas and minutes, forms, menus, curriculum information and much more. From the district home page you can sign on to the WOBOE Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/woschools, and the WOBOE Twitter feed at https://twitter.com/woschools, where you will receive up-to-the-minute posts of all that is going on in the district.

 

For complete access to all of the Parent Teacher Association information in the West Orange School district, and at each school in the district, sign up for the Council of PTA’s WOZONE e-newsletter. Visit http://westorangeptas.org/wo-zone.php.

 

Sound complicated? It’s not. Once you are signed up for these services, you will be in the know about all that is going on in the district, the emergent news and everything that your student is working on and doing at school. Access to communication is a powerful opportunity and one that will help you to be fully engaged in your child’s education and in your school community. Get yourself connected. Follow these steps below;

 

1-    Set up your account preferences on SCHOOOL MESSENGER/ CONTACT MANAGER, http://contactme.schoolmessanger.com.

2-    Sign up for POWER SCHOOL PARENT PORTAL, http://www.woboe.org.

3-    West Orange High School students sign up for NAVIANCE/PARENT CONNECTIONS https://connection.naviance.com/family-connection/auth/login

4-    Join the WOBOE Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/woschools

5-    Follow WOBOE Twitter at https://twitter.com/woschools

6-    Join the WOZONE at http://westorangeptas.org/wo-zone.php

7-    Make sure you are on your school’s email list for bulletins and on your PTA contact list by following the instructions provided to you by your school.

8-    Visit your student’s EDMODO account periodically

 

Remember to update your information if your cell phone number or email account change. If you have any questions or, for more information, contact your school directly. All technical questions about any of the platforms listed above should be directed to Fil Santiago, Director of Technology at fsantiago@woboe.org.



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