Dear Parents and Carers
In order to ensure the health and safety of our staff, students and wider community, the decision was made in March 2020 that non-essential visitors should not enter the school site, unless in exceptional circumstances. Restrictions have now relaxed but we have decided to continue to hold parents’ evenings on-line as this format has proven to be very successful. The Year 7 parents’ evening will take place on Wednesday 11th May at 4.30pm until 7.30pm, via video appointments. This is a wonderful opportunity to speak to your child’s teachers about the progress your child is making, whilst ensuring all parties remain safe. Given the importance of this academic year for your child, we hope many of you find this approach a helpful way of gaining further knowledge on how to support your child as they continue their Key Stage 3 studies.
You will be able to book appointments until Wednesday 11th May at 3.00pm. As there is likely to be high demand for appointment slots, it would be advisable to book your parents’ evening appointments as early as convenient, as each teacher has a limit on the number of bookings they can take across the 3 hour event.
We are using a piece of software provided through School Cloud and you can access the booking system through the following link: https://allsaintsmansfield.schoolcloud.co.uk/
Using the School Cloud Website
Parents and Carers, with School Cloud access, are those individuals who were listed as Priority One and Two contacts on the admission form at the beginning of the academic year. It will be parents and carers who have parental responsibility and that includes those with a court order in place. It is important that your forename and surname, and your child’s name and date of birth is inputted in the same way that it is on the school system. If you are struggling to login, it may be because you are not listed as a Priority One or Two contact, do not have parental responsibility including a court order, or because there is spelling or numerical error on our system. In any of these cases, please contact, Mrs Scott with the nature of the problem: scott.l@allsaints.notts.sch.uk. By having both Priority One and Two contacts, it means that parents/ carers, who may live separately, can both be involved in finding out about their child’s progress.
At login, you will be asked for an email address; this is not authenticated with the email address that you listed on your child’s admission form at the start of the year; it is merely for School Cloud to send a confirmation email to you when you have successfully booked and saved your appointments.
The instructions at the end of the letter outline how to access the website in order to book appointments. Then, on the evening of your appointments, you will simply need to login using the same link and follow the onscreen instructions to begin the appointments you have booked.
There will a button stating: ‘Join Video Appointments’ which you should press.
There is nothing to install as the video appointments run through the School Cloud website and it is compatible with the following web browsers:
- iPhone/iPad: Safari
- Android: Chrome or Firefox
- Windows: Chrome, Firefox, or Edge (latest version only)
- Mac: Safari, Chrome, or Firefox
The minimum requirement for this software to work is an audio connection*.
*Parents or teachers joining a video call using an iPhone/iPad running iOS 14.2 are likely to experience stuttering audio which may stabilize itself after some time. This issue is not specific to SchoolCloud Parents’ Evening and affects joining any video through the Safari browser on iOS 14.2. This is caused by a bug in iOS 14.2 which is logged on Apple’s bug tracker. We recommend you not use Apple devices running iOS 14.2.
The appointments will be four minutes long and there will be a countdown. The appointment cannot be extended; when the countdown gets to zero, the software automatically stops the call. The appointment begins at the allotted time of booking; therefore, if you are late, you can join within the remaining time of the four minutes, however, the appointment cannot be extended. If the appointment is missed, there is no way to rearrange this.
You will see a schedule for the timing of the appointments along with the teacher’s name and there will be a large square which states Start Appointment; in order to begin the appointment, you have to press this. The video appointment will begin when the teacher also presses this.
Once a call has finished, the schedule will update and then the next call will need to be initiated. There is no need to sign in or out.
Then at the end of all scheduled appointments, a confirmation button indicating that the appointments have finished will show and prompt you to sign out.
Further Guides can be found at School Cloud- link here
https://support.parentseveningsystem.co.uk/category/458-parents-evenings
Whilst we are hopeful that all elements have been considered, as with any use of technology on a wide scale, there may be some technical issues. We ask you for your patience during this time. Any queries regarding using the software should be directed to our ICT Support Office: marsden.a@allsaints.notts.sch.uk
Yours faithfully
Mr C Hutchinson
Acting Deputy Head Teacher