ParentSquare

ParentSquare is a simple-to-use platform that provides a safe way for everyone at a school to connect. With ParentSquare, you'll be able to:

• Receive messages from the district and school via email, text or app notification
• Choose to receive information as it comes or all at once at 6 p.m. daily
• Communicate in your preferred language
• Comment on school postings to engage in your school community
• Direct message teachers, staff and other parents
• Participate in group messages
• Sign up for parent-teacher conferences
• Sign forms & permission slips
• And more all from your phone or web portal!

1. Teachers & staff share school-related news on ParentSquare.
2. Parents & guardians receive, respond, sign up and get automated reminders in their preferred language!
3. Everyone has easy access to all interactions in one place.

ParentSquare Tips for Parents - English

ParentSquare Tips for Parents - Spanish

Watch a quick video or complete a parent training module to get started using ParentSquare today! The videos and training module below are designed to help you tour ParentSquare and set your preferences.

Parent Training Module - designed to take 15 minutes and covers the things you need to know about using using ParentSquare as a parent!

Confirm Using Web Browser

1. Log in to your main ParentSquare account.
2. If you have unverified contact information, you will see one or more contact cards under, "Action Required: Confirm Your Account Information".
3. Confirm Email and/or Phone. Click:
   1. Confirm Email or Phone: A verification code will be sent to the email or phone number. Enter verification code to confirm.
   2. Edit Email or Phone: Correct your email and/or phone number. A verification code will be sent to your corrected email or phone number. Enter verification code to confirm.
   3. Skip For Now: You will be able to verify or correct your contact information the next time you sign in. (You'll continue to receive notifications.)
4. Confirm Child(ren). Click Confirm or Not My Child for each child.
5. Confirm your name and school affiliations. Click Yes, this is me or This is Not Me.
6. If you clicked Skip For Now on any information on a contact card, you will not see the choice, "Yes, This is Me", and must select Skip For Now or This is Not Me.
7. Your school will be notified of corrections in order to update their student information system. After school updates information, it will show in your account. Depending on your school’s settings, you may see the corrected email or phone number immediately in your account or the following day.

Confirm Using Mobile App

1. Log in to your main ParentSquare account.
2. If you have unverified contact information, you will see one or more contact cards under, "Action Required" and "Confirm Your Account Info"
3. Tap arrow to right of Email and Phone to confirm or edit.
4. Select Confirm, Edit or Skip For Now. Repeat for phone number.
   1. Verify Email or Phone: Tap Confirm. A verification code will be sent to the email or phone number. Enter verification code to confirm.
   2. Correction to Email or Phone: Tap Edit and enter correct email and/or phone number. A verification code will be sent to your corrected email or phone number. Enter verification code to confirm.
   3. Skip For Now: You will be able to verify or correct your contact information the next time you sign in. (You'll continue to receive notifications.)
5. Confirm Child(ren): Select Confirm or Not My Child for each child.
6. Tap Yes, this is me or This is Not Me.
7. If you select Skip For Now on any information on a contact card, you will not see the choice, "Yes, This is Me", and must select Skip For Now or This is Not Me.
8. Your school is notified of corrections in order to update their student information system. After school updates information, it will show in your account. Depending on your school’s settings, you may see the corrected email or phone number immediately in your account, or the following day.

Watch this video to see how parents can update account information, notification settings, preferred language settings and view account activity.

Easily jump to these sections in the video:

• Edit Profile (0:30)
• Notification Settings (2:00)
• Preferred Language Setting (2:00)
• Account Activity (2:42)

Users can fine tune their notification settings for both school and notification type. For General Announcements, you can select Digest, Instant, or choose to turn off notifications altogether (excluding emergency alerts and notices) for email, text, and app notifications.

These settings allow a secondary parent/guardian contact to turn off all notification except for emergency alerts (particularly useful if their partner parent/guardian manages school-related daily activities).

ParentSquare allows users to customize their notifications based on notification type and select their preferred delivery method for each school. The Instant setting will send all post notifications in real-time. The Digest setting sends direct messages, alerts, and time-sensitive posts instantly, but sends all non-time sensitive posts at the end of the day, reducing the number of notifications you receive daily. (We recommend the Digest setting.)  

Notification types include:

• Emergency Alerts & Notices includes any urgent alerts and attendance notices (cannot be disabled).
• General Announcements & Messages includes any posts, direct messages and reminders.
• School Alerts includes any Smart Alerts and other student notices.

For General Announcements, you can select whether you want to receive Instant or Digest notifications.

• Off: no notifications about posts will be sent to you. Emergency Alerts and Notices will still be sent, and School Alerts if turned on.
• Instant: you'll receive an email and/or text and/or an app notification every time a notice or message is sent.
• Digest: you'll receive an email and/or text and/or an app notification once a day in the evening with all posts from that day.

The default setting is typically Digest, so that you receive all notices and messages in one convenient notification once a day. All emergency notifications still come through instantly, and a school can override settings as needed for an urgent message. If you choose Instant notifications, and have multiple children in multiple schools, that can add up to a lot of messages.

Update your Notification Settings (using web browser)

1. From Home, click your name and select My Account.
2. Under Notification Settings, click Customize your settings.
3. Choose your preferred Notification Settings for General Announcements & Messages (Off, Instant or Digest) and School Alerts (On or Off). Once you've made selections, future messaging will send based on your preferences.
4. If you have multiple emails or phones listed on your account, set the order of your preferred contacts to receive notifications. Notifications will only be sent to one email and one phone on your account.

Note: the “Choose Best Match” setting will select the most relevant email and phone to send the notification to. Notifications related to the student/parent will go to the personal email/phone, while notifications intended for staff only will always go to the staff email/phone. Posts sent to both staff and parents will default to the parent email/phone.

Update your Notification Settings (using web browser)

1. From home screen tap the triple bar menu at top left.

2. Select Account and then Notifications.

3. Select how you want to be notified at each school.
   1. Turn OFF Custom Settings to use the same notification settings for all schools.
   2. Turn ON Custom Settings to set different notifications at each school.
4. Toggle on or off to receive Email, Text and/or App Notifications.
5. Select Instant or Digest for each mode. Note: Digest is recommended – you will receive one notification per day, for all posts, in the evening.

Parents should be seeing all of their children in one ParentSquare account and should be receiving notifications.

ParentSquare gets data from the schools. Most schools put their data in a Student Information System (SIS) such as Aeries or PowerSchool. ParentSquare syncs nightly with the SIS. Changes to parent names and contact information should be made in the SIS. ParentSquare will show those changes after the nightly sync. 

• Data tip: Parents/guardians can share an email or phone number. Children using StudentSquare should use their own email and/or phone number if they have one.
• Sign in tip: Parents can sign into ParentSquare on a computer web browser using their email or cell phone number. You can be on your computer and sign in with your cell phone number!
• Notifications tip: Add the school phone number and the email donotreply@parentsquare.com to your contacts to prevent calls and emails from being marked as spam or junk.

Parents

If you can't sign into ParentSquare with your email or phone number, please contact your child's school. 

If you can sign in, please follow these steps:

1. Check your email and phone number in ParentSquare. Click on your name in the top right and click My Account. If corrections need to be made, please contact your child's school with the correct information.
2. Check your Notification Preferences on My Account page. Are your notification preferences on?
3. Check your spam folder for emails from donotreply@parentsquare.com.
4. Add the domain ParentSquare.com or the email address donotreply@parentsquare.com to the safe senders list in your email client (Gmail, Yahoo, aol, etc.) You can google how to do this. If using Gmail:
   • Go to Settings.
   • At the bottom of the pane, click Mail.
   • In the left pane, select Mail > Accounts > Block or allow.
   • Under Blocked Senders, select the address or domain you want to unblock, and then select.
5. Text the word START to 66458. This will resume text messaging to your phone.

Users should be able to see all of their children and schools in one ParentSquare account.

Examples include:

•  I am a parent, and I do not see any/all of my children in the same districts in my account when I login.
• I am a district staff member, and I do not see my children in my account when I login.
• I am a staff/parent in one district, and I do not see any/all of my children from another district in my account when I login.

If you are missing a child/school, it may be because:

• You have more than one ParentSquare account with different contact information
• Your contact information is inconsistent across the schools' student information systems.

PARENTS: To add a child or school,

• You must contact your school(s) directly to update your contact information. Ensure you have the same email and phone number on file for all children and all schools.

• Contact data is managed, updated and controlled by your school (or district), ParentSquare syncs with this information but cannot edit or change it.

We sync with the school databases nightly. The day after the change is made at your school, you should be able to log out and log back in to ParentSquare to see your updated information.

 

Staff Members Who Are Also Parents

As a staff member and a parent, you will be able to have both your staff contacts and your parent contacts linked to the same account.

If you have a district-issued staff email on your staff record and a personal email address on your parent record, multiple accounts may have been created for you.

• If you already have the same phone listed on your staff and parent accounts, your accounts can be easily linked. The accounts will merge automatically once you complete the verification process and confirm both accounts. After this, both emails will be listed on your account, but you will be required to use your staff email to log in.
• If you already have separate registered accounts under different emails/phones, you can use the Combine Account option to merge them together.