GUIDE TO ONLINE COMMAND SCHOOL DEMO


Demo Doc V1.1

Program V 1.3



This document is meant to be an assistant in moving a potential new user of the program through Command School’s features. The data in the demo database is “flushed” generally every 24 hours, so any changes you make will not be available the next day. In cases, we have extended this time window when requested.


There are four levels of login capabilities in Command School. In summary, they are:


Admin – all powerful, can edit and view everything

Teacher – can edit and view only certain things

Parent – can view only, and only those items that pertain to their children

Health – can edit and view only those matters related to health


Let’s get started. Let’s login as admin, assuming we are a new user. Point your browser to the demo site (unless you’ve been instructed differently the demo site is http://demo.swifttide.com)


The admin username is admin, and the password is _______. (You should have been provided this information, as it changes often).


You should now see the main administration menu down the left hand side of the screen. Let’s set some factory defaults. Click on Table Maintenance. Note how once you do this the screen changes to tell you that you are in Admin Table Maintenance. It’s hard to get lost inside Command School! Now choose Configuration.


This is where you set the default login message (in this case, the principal has advised his staff to check the site first thing in the morning for cancellations, and he posted that school is indeed cancelled due to poor weather). He posted an inspiring message to his Teachers, and a message to parents to see when they login. Since we manage the Indianapolis, Kentucky school district, we don’t want to have to type that 5,000 times for the 5,000 kids we need to input. So we tell Command School that “unless we type something different, the city is Indianapolis, the state is Kentucky, and the zip code is 55555”. You can also set a default entry date (which says “unless we tell you differently, the date of entry for this student is 01/01/01” or whatever date you might choose.)


Let’s click on School Names. Here we’ve got our 3 schools in the district listed. It’s simple to add another, simply type it in the box and click Add. If a school name should change, just click edit in the table above and change its name. You can remove schools, but there must be no information tied to that school, or the system will not let you remove it. This prevents overworked administrators from making innocent but devastating mistakes.


Managing Ethnic codes is just as easy. In fact, one of the most popular feedbacks we get on Command School is that once a user figured out how to do one thing, he or she could easily apply it to the rest of the program. Click on Ethnicities and you’ll see what we mean. Need to add a new Ethnic code? Type it in and click Add. Want to change one? Click Edit. Need to remove one? Click remove. It’s all that easy through the whole program!


You’re being paid to manage student data, not learn a cumbersome and unfriendly program!



We followed this rule throughout the entire design of Command School.


Grade Comments, Attendance Codes, Infraction Codes, Generations (Jr. Sr. 3rd, etc.) and Titles (Mr., Mrs. Dr., etc.) are all the same and allow people inputting the student data to minimize typing errors.


The last setting here is “Customized Fields”.


When was the last time you dealt with software that had all the settings you needed? Never! So we made it possible for you to add an UNLIMITED number of custom fields to Command School!


Some schools use fields like “ESL (English as a Second Language) or Title I, or AfterSchool Homework Club. Any piece of data you want to store is so easy, just add a field name and you’re ready to go.


Under Health Codes, is the same format. Add codes for Office Codes (reasons for office visits, like Felt Sick, Black Eye, Stomach Ache, etc.), Immunization Codes, Allergy Codes, and any Medications that the student might be on. Adding fields is as simple as typing in a name and clicking Add, editing them is as simple as clicking on Edit, and removing them just requires you to click on remove.


Now, click on Main Admin Menu under Main Menu to go back to the main administration menu. Now, we’re ready to see some kids in the system!


What’s the easiest way to find students in your database? Anyway you choose!


So Command School allows you to search for students based on ID number, or Last Name, or School, Home Schooled, Special Ed, any different number of ways! So let’s see a typical student. Since you are new to our district, and you just got a harried call about needing information about a student (you didn’t catch the full name, but the last name began with a J and the first name sounded like Dustin), we need to be creative! Let’s not bother the caller to please clarify who they want, we’ll let Command School find it for us! Click on Manage Students, and then click the letter J under “Display by Last name Initial”. Note how we have three students, and the last one in the list is Dustin Jirvin. Click Select to view details on Dustin.


Need to add another contact for Dustin? Just click Add Contact. Note how the Primary Contact is displayed, and if this is the student’s residence the word “residence” is displayed in red. With just a quick glance, we know Dustin’s Teacher, birthdate, main phone numbers, who he’s living with, etc. Let’s add another contact.


Command School allows an unlimited number of contacts for each student!


So, let’s add a new contact for Dustin. Click the Add Contact button. Here’s the familiar “fill in this information screen.” But what if one of Dustin’s contacts is already in the system? Let’s see! Dustin’s other contact is Robert Knoliston. So type Knoliston in the box that says “Or Choose Contact from Database: Last Name”. Then click search. There’s Robert Knoliston. Select a relation (how is Robert related to Dustin, let’s choose Uncle). And this isn’t Dustin’s residence so we won’t check off the residence box. Now click Select. Click OK on the box that comes up. Just like that, you’ve added a contact to a student. Imagine a parent with 5 or 6 kids in the school, and each student has 3 or 4 contacts. Under most Student Information Systems, you’ll be typing for a while! With Command School, we take away the tedious tasks and allow you to spend your time managing schools!



Note that in the next screen, we are asked if we wish to add this user as a “web user”. Doing so would allow Robert the ability to login and check on Dustin's attendance and discipline events.


Let's click the link that says “Back to Student”. Click on Attendance, and here's a nice list of all the absences and tardies Dustin as had. Click on Details to review any of them in depth.


Now click on Discipline, and we see a similar screen. You can also click on Details to get more information on any event.


Again, once you've figured out how to do one thing in Command School, doing others is just as easy as what you've already learned!


We're going to skip the Health System and visit that as a nurse. So click on Logout.


In this case, our Health person is Ray Kronis, usernmae rkronis, password rkronis. So login with those credentials.


One of the most popular parts of command school is our Student Health Summary. Click on Student Summary, and there's our familiar “find a student” dialogue. Let's click on the letter J again, and use Dustin Jirvin again. Once he comes up in the list, click on Select. Now, here's a page a school health office can really use!


All on one page, the student's birthdate, main contact with phone numbers, allergies, immunizations, medications, and recent health office visits! Some schools buy Command School solely for this one function! You will not find another health package out there that can return this much information this easily! Click on Health Office Visits to see just those, and click Details to view the details of one of the visits. You can do the same thing with medications, and immunizations as well as allergies. Again, once you've learned one part of the program, all the rest falls right into place!


Notice in the health menu down the left side we see Health Codes, Immunization Codes, Allergy Codes, and Medication Codes. These are the same to setup and administer as the Infraction and Attendance codes we did earlier!


Feel free to click on items in the Health Area. Once completed, click logout, we are now going to login as one of our teachers. Our teacher is Ray Smith, username rsmith and password heaven.

You will notice teachers have fewer choices than the admins, and no access to the health portion of the system.


Again, familiarity! Searching for students, Attendance and Discipline all look and feel similar. But we do have a new setting here, Bulk Grades. This is for when teachers need to enter 50 or 100 grades. Click on Bulk Grades. Now, Mr. Smith teaches 7th Grade Math here at Seatown Elementary. Choose Seatown Elementary from the drop down list, Grade 7 from the grade list. Type in Math in the Subject box, and the term (let's say Fall 2005). Click on Build List.


If you scroll down, you'll see 42 students can have grades input by Mr. Smith. He just clicks Select on the first student, and he's off and running! A new window opens and here he enters the grade data he wants. The parent can be notified of this new grade entry by leaving the “Notify Contacts” checkbox checked. When he's done, he clicks on “Update Note” and the next window tells him he successfully added the note, and to “Click here to go the next student”.


So let's try the email feature! Imagine just seconds after you enter the fact that a student has a discipline event, or attendance event, the parent is notified. No need to send notes home that the kids intercept before Mom or Dad get home. Parents can get their email right at work. Let's set one up.


Logout and then log back in as admin.


Click on Manage Students, and let's click the letter J. We will use Duston Jirvin again, so click on Select when his name comes up in the list. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click on “Edit Primary Contact.” Insert your email in the email line (by default, it may say dougp25@hotmail.com or some such address. Simply highlight that address, press backspace, and then type in your email address). Be wary of using “free” email addresses, as they often don't do a good job of distinguishing between regular and junk email and could move the email the system sends to a bulk folder, making it difficult for you to find.


Once you've added your email address to the email field, click on Update Contact. Now, you can set up a username and password for you, the “parent” in this case. Or you can just use the username and contact already stored. Click on Set As User.


Now, click the Back to Student link. Click on Discipline, let's say Duston had some bad behavior just now. Well, we see that Duston has been no angel, he's already got some Discipline events from previous days! Let's click on Add Discipline Note. Select an Infraction from the Infraction list, a date that it occurred (any day you choose) and Administration Start and End Dates (what day does he start and finish the penalty). What Action to be Taken (Detention, Suspension, 1 Day Privilege Revoked, anything you want.) Who Reported the Infraction (Mr. Jones, Luch Lady, Janitor, anyone). And any notes (Duston was very rude when confronted with this, for example). Now click on Add Note.


Now let's log out and check your email. Do you have a message from “School Principal” in your inbox? We process messages in about 2 to 5 seconds so you should see it immediately. If not, find a button or menu on your email client that says “Send and Receive” or “Check for New Messages” or something similar, as some email systems will only check for new email once every ten minutes. If you open the message, it should say something similar to “A new discipline note has been added for Duston Jirvin. Please log in to the parents interface website for more details”. As you can see, we give out no unnecessary information in the email, no link to the website either, nor the nature of the event. So you're Duston's parent, let's login and see what he did.


Login to the website using the parent username and password you setup or the one that was already there, and click on Duston's name (you would see other names here if you had more than 1 child in the school). Click on Discipline Notes, and right there at the top, is today's discipline event that you just added (as admin). Not only that, Mom or Dad now has a chance to see ALL the discipline events Duston has had lately.


What a powerful way to get parents more involved! No more arguing about what a student did and when, a parent has full access to all their child's attendance, discipline and grade events at the touch of a mouse. From anywhere in the world, 24 hours a day!!



This ends the demo document for Command School. We can perform a more comprehensive demo with you over the phone if you would like. Please call us at 1-800-211-2850, or email us at info@swifttide.com to set up a broader demo. If you like Command School but feel it is missing some key feature, let us know! With your feedback, we are building a true Student Management System that once again brings parents, teachers, students and administrators together.