Celeste Paul likes to keep up with how her son, Rio, is doing in school. But Paul is busy and at 12, Rio, like many his age, may not always be the most forthcoming about things.
That’s where the Kent School District’s SKYWARD Family Access program comes in. By checking in with the district’s computerized gradebook system, parents and guardians can follow along with their students’ progress, checking on homework assignments, test grades and attendance.
“I love it,” Paul said recently. “I think it gives the parent the ability to stay abreast of what’s going on in their student’s life.”
Paul said it’s not always easy for teachers to get information to parents, especially through middle school students, but Family Access gives her a running log of exactly how Rio is doing.
According to Meridian Middle School Principle Doug Boushey, that’s exactly what administrators had hoped for.
“Students and parents can work together to find out if they need to make adjustments,” Boushey said. “You can zero in on why exactly a student is doing well or not so well.”
“It takes away that lack of communication that comes when kids are starting to become independent,” he said.
The Family Access program was created in 2006 for the middle and high schools in the Kent District. This past fall, a pilot program expanded Family Access to 10 of the district’s elementary schools, though it is slightly different at the primary level, where only student information – not grades – are available.
According to Susan White, who leads the district’s support team of the program, the application was brought in to help create a better partnership between teachers and parents.
“You want to make sure everybody is as up to date as possible,” White said, adding that she hears “very positive feedback from parents.
“Parents love it,” she said. “They can see record and it’s immediate feedback for them.”
Paul said she checks every day to make sure Rio is staying on top of his work and though she says he is “pretty excited” about the program himself (sometimes leading her online to see a grade he is proud of), Paul says Rio would prefer his mother did not have the ability to check up on him like that.
But she says Family Access has allowed her to catch him in a few attempts to get out of doing homework.
“It keeps him honest,” she said. “Skyward’s gonna tell it.”
According to Boushey, the parent-student split is fairly standard.
“I think there’s a lot of students who would prefer it wasn’t there,” he said, but added that parents “really, really love it.”
Boushey said Family Access can help create a “healthy conflict” between parents and students and can help them catch a problem early enough to make a difference on grade books.
“If you find out too late it’s hard to do anything about it,” he said.
Learn more
For more information on the SKYWARD Family Access program visit the Web site www.kent.k12.wa.us/ksd/it/familyaccess.htm.
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