This article contains recommendations/tips for Queensland schools to assist with effective automatic attendance notification use.

For detailed information on Attendance Notifications including types, configuration, delivery status and access permissions, please refer to the 'Attendance Notifications' article from our Knowledge Base.

Configure your Attendance Notifications to include a 'One Time Link'

- Accelerates the process of adding an Attendance Note/Approval for parents. 
- No requirement for parents to log in to their Compass portal in order to complete and submit a Note/Approval for their child’s unexplained absence.
- Reduces time and resources spent by school administrators to follow up unexplained absences.

Configuration Steps:

1. Navigate to Administration Tools via the Tools (cog) menu, then select ‘SMS - Attendance Config’.
2. Select ‘(Edit Template)’ next to the Attendance Notification you are utilising, then click on the Communications tab.
3. Use the Parent Email or Parent SMS tab to compose the message that you would like to be sent. Incorporate the {attendanceUrl} placeholder to insert a ‘One Time Link’.

Review the Morning's Unmarked Rolls on a Daily Basis

Checking in on the day’s unmarked rolls approximately 10 minutes prior to automatic notifications being sent out is highly recommended as it assists school administrators in identifying any rolls that are yet to be marked so that they can be followed up on and marked before communications go out. 

In most cases, unmarked rolls are not taken into consideration when automatic Attendance Notifications are triggered. This behaviour ensures that any unmarked rolls at the time of your automatic notification do not unnecessarily alert the parents of students who are actually present. 

Important Note: This rule does not apply to the ‘Student Not Present in one or more classes. (Irrespective of Unmarked Rolls)’ Attendance Notification template (shown last in the list below). 

     

The image above shows the different types of notifications available. Schools can choose to use one or more of these (depending on their needs) and when editing, have control over delivery method (SMS/email) as well as which year levels are included.

To reduce time and resources spent by school administration staff following up on unmarked rolls and to ensure that parents of all unaccounted for students receive notification on the day of their child’s absence, it is important to establish an understanding between all school staff of what time rolls are expected to be marked and the resulting outcomes should a roll not be marked before then.

Benefits:
- Assists in ensuring that parents of all unaccounted for students will receive notification of their child’s absence from school.
- Indicates which rolls have not been marked and the teacher responsible for marking them. 

How to view the day’s Unmarked Rolls:

1. Navigate to the Organisation menu and select Attendance.
2. Select the Unmarked Rolls tab.
3. Use the calendar icons inside the start & finish date fields to select the present date.

Check the Chronicle Communication Failure Report

To assist you in identifying whether any of the Attendance Notification communications have been unsuccessful, you can use the ‘Chronicle Communication Failure Report’. This report will reflect which recipients have not received the Attendance notifications and display the reason why. 

Benefits:
- Efficiently identifies which parents have not received communication regarding their child’s unexplained absence.
- Indicates why the communication was unsuccessful in reaching each specified recipient.

How to generate the report:

1. Navigate to the Organisation menu and select Chronicle. 
2. Click on the Chronicle Reports drop down menu and select ‘Chronicle Communication Failure Report’, choose the relevant report bounds. If you are wanting to check today’s report, leave the bounds as they are. 
3. Select ‘Attendance Notifications’ from the Categories field. 
4. Click ‘Generate CSV’, then ‘OK’. 

Complete a Data Integrity Check

1. Navigate to the Organisation menu and select People Management.
2. Select the Export and Stats drop down menu and click ‘Detailed Parent Accounts’. This will download the file to your device.
3. Locate the downloaded file and open to view Email Address, Parent Mobile and Contact Order data. You may like to use MS Excel filters to pinpoint specific information within this report.

Review Notes Entered by Parents

To assist you in ensuring that all the attendance information being entered into Compass and being reported to the Department of Education is complete and accurate you can review all attendance notes that have been entered into Compass by a parent or guardian. This is achieved through the attendance module, under the ‘Notes/Approvals’ tab.

Benefits:
- Effectively identify and correct/confirm erroneous attendance data entries.
- Allows you to be sure that every student who has an absence reason entered makes sense and is accurate to the student.
- Reduces the risk of a student misusing their parent's login or phone to enter fraudulent attendance notes.

How to view parent entered notes:

1. Navigate to the Organisation menu and select 'Attendance'.
2. On the Attendance page, click to the 'Notes and Approvals' tab.
3. Filter the ‘Entered by’ column to parent entries by entering ‘Parent’ into the column header.
4. If desired, you can filter this list further by filtering dates or reasons to narrow the list down.