In order to complement a robust product and excellent customer support department, Eagle Software is always looking to increase its resources available to Aeries users. Aside from standard documentation and training videos, there is an assortment of outside-the-box resources that can help in your day-to-day use of Aeries. Some of these are new, while others may have been around for a while, but you may have missed them in the past:

Teacher Resource Center

In an effort to assist teachers with quick and easy access to critical information, we have developed a dedicated site with teacher documentation, Common Task Videos, Tips and Tricks, a Teacher Portal Roadmap and a look at What’s New with Aeries.  Teachers also have direct access to this resource on their home page in the Aeries portal. Check it out today at http://teachers.aeries.com/

Another resource is found linked in the Aeries Teacher Resource Center -- a new community forum just for teachers called Aeries Community.  This collaboration tool will allow teachers to help each other find what they need in Aeries.  To visit the Teacher Community directly, visit http://aeries.answerbase.com/

Also in the Aeries Teacher Resource Center is the Aeries Gradebook UserVoice – a place to submit your great ideas and to vote for feature enhancements for the Aeries Teacher Gradebook. You can also keep track of the status of all pending features and hear feedback directly from the Aeries development team. To visit the Aeries Gradebook UserVoice site directly, visit http://aeries.uservoice.com/

Aeries Online Help – Aeries.net Field Mapping

As always, all documentation that is released by Eagle Software will be posted both on its main website under the Downloadable Documents page and on the Aeries Online Help in a web format. The context-sensitive help icon located within Aeries.net also continues to link directly to the most appropriate web help document within the Online Help.

One heavily-requested feature is now being added to the Online Help – Field Mapping guides for Aeries.net. These field map images will be included with the documentation with using the question-mark help icon within Aeries.net.

Example of the Attendance History form with each field identified

Aeries_Talk Listserv

The Aeries_Talk (also known as Aeries Arena) listserv was formed by an Aeries customer district independently of Eagle Software as a means of seeking feedback from fellow Aeries users. Hosted as a Yahoo! Group, you can join over 1,300 other Aeries users and have the emails forward to a folder within your inbox to view at your convenience. To sign up, visit http://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/aeries_talk

Future Resources

Keep an eye out for expanded resources that are made available in the future through the website, in Aeries itself, and mentioned in emails and newsletters.

Custom Reports in the Aeries Web Version has been structurally redesigned as of the December 11th, 2015 update.  With the new design, redundant procedures have been eliminated to ease the effort of creating a custom report.  The process is also similar to the process of creating Dashboards within Aeries Analytics™.  The Custom Report Admin can create Pre-Configured Custom Report Items and setup Color Layouts. Custom Report users can create a report by selecting the pre-configured report items to include in the report.

Accessing Custom Reports

Custom Reports can be found in two places: on the View All Reports page and in the navigation tree under School Info | Configurations.

Creating Custom Report Items

An Admin user or users with Admin permissions to Custom Reports can create a pre-configured item bank. The items will need to be added before users can create a Custom Report.  Users can create a custom report item by adding a new item or copying an existing item.  There are four different item types currently available: Table-Field Value, TST Table Score, CST Table Score (strands), and CTS Table Score (college).

Users with Update permission to Custom Reports can also create Color Layouts.  The report can be associated with a Color Layout to display different colors for the different levels that will be printed on the report.

Creating a Custom Report

Creating a Custom Report is as simple as giving the report a name and selecting which pre-configured report items to be included.  Admin users or users with Admin permissions to Custom Reports can share a custom report to other security groups.

Importing Existing Custom Reports

If districts have existing Custom Reports, an Import MDP Report option is available.  The Import MDP Report will display all existing reports from the MDP – Multi Data Profile tables.  To import existing custom reports, simply select a school and choose a report from the list to import.

Sample Custom Report – CELDT Scale Scores

Documentation can be found at the Aeries Online Help.

If you’re not keeping an eye out for the Aeries revision notes posted in conjunction with new updates, you may miss out on some of the finer details involved with the constant progression of Aeries® SIS. As we continue our emphasis and concentration on the Aeries Web Version (Aeries.net), brand new functionality will continue to regularly be added with an emphasis on user interface and user experience. The following are some recent changes that you may have noticed in your day-to-day use of Aeries.

In With Reporting Language, Out With Home Language

It was brought to our attention that our "Home Language" field in our Student table (STU.HL) was mislabeled.  There is no direct-translation of this value from the Home Language Survey, so none of those titles worked either.  Upon discussion both internally and externally, we have decided to relabel this field to "Reporting Language," since that is its true purpose.  Anywhere that you have seen "Home Language" in the past should now display "Reporting Language."

Codification and You

Have you ever wondered why some dropdown lists allow you to type whatever you'd like and others require a selection from the list?  When codes are defined in the COD table for a given table and field, only values in that list of codes are allowed to be entered.  When codes are not defined, one of two things will happen: code-based dropdowns will allow any value within the field-size and description-based dropdowns will not allow any input.  Examples of code-based dropdowns are user code fields, such as STU.U10.  Without codes defined for STU.U10, you can enter any value into that field.  Description-based dropdowns are fields like Administrative Actions in Assertive Discipline (DSP.DS).  Without codes defined, you cannot enter any value into this field.  This restriction was enabled specifically to ensure the integrity of your data.  Aeries highly recommends codifying any field that you want to easily analyze for frequency.

Other recently released or imminent features in the Aeries Web Version

• -Custom Reports redesign – 12/11/2015
• -Print Off Campus Pass – 12/11/2015
• -Print Student Envelopes – 12/18/2015
• -Intervention Dashboard – 12/18/2015
• -Print Fee Letters – 1/8/2016
• -Extracurricular Activities – in beta
• -District Assets – in beta
• -Required Fields for Data Entry
• -Highlight CALPADS Fields

As always, you can see our detailed revision notes on the Training & Support page or Updates page on our website. If you have not already, don't forget to subscribe to our RSS feed!

Anaheim City School District took advantage of a tight integration between its Aeries Student Information System and Hayes TIPWeb-IM Software to improve efficiency.

About Anaheim City School District:

• - Over 19,000 students across 24 schools
• - Large Urban District, PK-6 Grades
• - District uses Local Control Funding Formula & Local Control Accountability to fund district initiatives
• - Aeries Student Information System client since 2007

Challenge:

The district was looking for real-time inventory and material tracking with transparency of textbooks and assets across the district. The current policy included too many steps and staff member hours to manage textbooks and other assets. Further, Anaheim City USD needed to manage textbook surpluses and deficits across its schools. This was a direct compliance issue per the 2004 Williams-Settlement law in California. 

The District needed a solution that would work with their SIS, Aeries, to gain access and integrate with the district's data.

Actions:

1. 1. The district assembled a committee of district staff members who were involved in textbook management.
2. 2. The committee evaluated its current inventory control policies.
3. 3. The district searched for a streamlined solution that could meet their needs.

Solution:

Anaheim City School District chose Hayes’ TIPWeb-IM software as the product of choice. By upgrading its textbook and material management with TIPWeb-IM software, the Anaheim City School District can anticipate gaining several advantages, including real-time inventory accounting, streamlined material tracking, and greater accountability for and transparency of all textbooks and materials across the District, including assignments to students.

The committee found that Hayes’ TIPWeb-IM web-based software system best matched their needs, largely because it is specifically tailored for K-12 instructional materials management right out-of-the-box. With TIPWeb-IM, Anaheim City can expect to gain greater efficiency by reducing the number of steps and staff member hours involved in textbook management. The Hayes and Aeries partnership mitigated the need for additional programming to make the two systems talk. The unique partnership between the two like-minded companies was an added benefit for districts who wanted the “Best-In-Breed” software products without having to add programming hours and customization to the bottom line.

Aeries Users' Conference

Hayes Software Systems is a constant attendee of the Aeries Users' Conferences. Hayes will be presenting their software and its tight integration with Aeries SIS during the upcoming conference on Tuesday, March 8th, 2016. To sign up for their session, please visit http://www.aeries.com/conference and proceed to the Events site to choose session #850.

Find out more about Hayes Software by visiting http://www.hayessoft.com/

In order to fully maximize the effectiveness of Aeries® Student Information System, the time has come to transition your school or district over to the Aeries Web Version (formerly known as Aeries.net). After years of co-development in the Aeries Client and Web Version, beginning this summer, the web version will feature critical functionality that will no longer be available in the Aeries Client Version, including all CALPADS Extracts and next year's SBAC Test Results import.

It is important to note that as of July 1st, 2016, while the client version of Aeries® SIS will continue to be supported, usage of the Aeries Web Version will no longer be optional.

To aid you in this transition process, we have provided a toolkit with the following:

• - More information on the history of Aeries development & the reason for this change
• - A platform to vote on the remaining items yet to be converted from the client version in order to prioritize their development
• - A clear-cut chart on how this affects your individual school or district
• - A list of advantages of making the switch to the web version of Aeries
• - Suggested steps for adoption of the web version
• - Suggested transition plans for districts with varying levels of web version experience
• - Links to additional resources, such as training videos, our blog, our Online Help, online demos, a letter from our Director, and a sample email to send to your staff

Visit http://maximize.aeries.com to view the toolkit.

With the recent announcement that the web version of Aeries® SIS will soon include essential functionality no longer available in the client version, Aeries Software has made a concerted effort to improve the web version based on user feedback. As mentioned previously, as the gap narrows in matching and exceeding functionality in the web version of Aeries, focus is shifting towards improving the user interface and experience of the web version, while continuing to offer brand new functionality.

One particular set of functions that is actively being converted to match functionality in the web version is the Scheduling Process. In the past several weeks, numerous Scheduling feature enhancements have been released. One new feature that drastically improves upon user experience is the Scheduling Dashboard, released on 02/26/2016.

The new Scheduling Dashboard aims to offer users a workflow similar to the Scheduling Cycle located in the client version. As with the Scheduling Cycle, the steps shown are not necessarily always the exact steps needed for every user in every case, but are a good guideline for the Scheduling process.

Each individual section can be expanded on its own by clicking on it or all sections can be expanded by clicking on the top “Scheduling Dashboard” bar.

Each step shown gives a direct link to the form or report listed. For those users that primarily deal with scheduling, it is recommended to add the Scheduling Dashboard to the “My Favorites” links in order to quickly switch back to the Scheduling Dashboard after completing each step.

The steps shown with a PDF icon next to them take users directly to the Report listed.

As experienced schedulers know, it is a good idea to backup and restore scheduling results often. This allows for flexibility to try several different options during the scheduling process and to choose the best result in the end. This function is included in several sections for that reason.

We hope the Scheduling Dashboard proves to be a useful guide and time-saver as users continue to make the switch to the web version of Aeries® SIS. Keep an eye out for the Aeries revision notes to keep track of other valuable scheduling features added to the web version in the coming weeks.

At Aeries Software, the needs of our customers and their students have always been at the forefront of the development of our Student Information System.  In recent years, several states have amended existing laws to include prohibiting discrimination on the basis of gender identity.  For example, in 2013, California passed Assembly Bill 1266, which permitted transgender students to use school facilities and participate on organized sports teams that aligned with their gender identity, regardless of what was listed on their birth certificate and other records.  This bill also required schools to respect the desired identity of transgender students on campus.  For some districts, this became a challenge due to existing laws requiring the use of a student’s legal name and gender, as is the case when printing official transcripts, assertive discipline reports, or when submitting CALPADS reporting.

In order to help our clients comply with all federal and state laws, and most importantly, create a gender respective environment for every student, Aeries has modified existing name and gender fields on the student demographics page to reflect a student’s preferred name and gender while maintaining the ability to use a student’s legal name and gender where required by state and federal law.  Moreover, through security settings, only those users with valid permission settings will know that a student has a discrepancy between their preferred name/gender and legal name/gender.  Access to the legal names/gender fields and the ability for a user to enter this information is regulated by security access to the new "Student Legal Information" security area (Note: all Aeries "Admin" type accounts have access to all data in Aeries, including the new Student Legal Information). When a user has the appropriate security permissions, a "Show/Hide Legal Name" button becomes available near the bottom of the Student Demographics page, where it is not easily seen by passersby.  In all other instances, teachers, substitutes, or any other administrator, will only be able to see the student’s preferred name and gender, regardless of whether that is the legal name or preferred name and gender. 

Districts can now remain compliant with all state and federal laws, while respecting a student’s preferred name at the same time.  In situations where school staff or administrators are required by law to use or to report a student’s legal name or gender, such as for purposes of standardized testing or state reporting, school staff and administrators will not have to worry about mistakenly using the incorrect name.

Each student and each family have different concerns regarding privacy and confidentiality regarding a student’s gender identity in the school environment.   In this regard, it is important for districts to ensure privacy and share information with school staff only on a need-to-know basis. Moreover, from a legal perspective, these issues should be handled as one would a medical issue under a student’s right to privacy.  At Aeries Software, it is our goal to enable educators and administrators to focus their efforts on fostering an exceptional academic environment for all students while we provide a solution that can take care of the rest.

Documentation can be found at: http://www.aeries.com/Downloads/Docs.1234/Procedures/Legal_Student_Information.pdf

Aeries Software is pleased to release its latest set of training videos. As announced previously, the future of Aeries® SIS is on the web and the latest training videos fittingly cover various aspects of the web version of Aeries. Expect to see more videos to supplement documentation as brand new functionality is added that is only available in the Aeries Web Version. Some new video series include:

Aeries Web Version Student Groups

The Aeries Web Version Student Groups capability greatly improved upon and capabilities of the original feature in the Aeries Client Version, as we detailed upon its release. The new form allows for the creation and maintenance of ad-hoc student groups, which you can easily filter down to on the Student Search and View All Reports screens, making looking up, reviewing, and running reports for specific Student Groups a simple process.

• 1. Overview & Methods of Use
• 2. Creating Student Groups & Adding Students
• 3. Creating Student Groups for Teacher Use

Aeries Web Version Custom Report Builder

The new and improved Custom Report Builder released in the web version allows Custom Report Admins to create Pre-Configured Custom Report Items and setup Color Layouts. Custom Report users can then create a report by selecting the pre-configured report items to include in the report.

• 1. Introduction & Printing Existing Custom Reports
• 2. Creating & Editing Reports
• 3. Report Types
• 4. Color Layouts
• 5. Importing from Aeries Client Version

Aeries Web Version Installation

This video series details the steps involved with installing Aeries Web Version - unless you decide to have Aeries Software handle this for you with our hosting services. Some topics covered include planning enough server resources, considering virtual machines versus physical machines, preparing servers, database setup tasks, file system tasks, reporting database connections, message queue settings, threads, SMTP settings, the FileStore, IIS setup, performance monitoring, and Aeries security.

• 1. Planning & Preparation
• 2. Installing the Admin Portal
• 3. Installing the Teacher, Parent, & Student Portals

As always, you can find these videos on our Training/Support Videos page.

Also, keep an eye out for training videos embedded directly on the applicable page within the Aeries Online Help. This is part of the dedicated effort to make all Aeries resources available as readily as possible.

As reported in our December 2015 and May 2016 newsletters, the Microsoft and Aeries support of SQL Server 2005 ended (mid-April 2016).  If your district or school is still utilizing SQL 2005 on the server where your Aeries database resides, then it is time to upgrade.  SQL Server 2005 will no longer be updated or patched by Microsoft; even if a major security vulnerability is later found, Microsoft will not fix it.

Does this mean that Aeries will cease to work on SQL 2005?  No, Aeries SIS will continue to run.  However, there are several sections of our programming code which are there specifically in support of SQL Server 2005.  Unfortunately, this code does hamper some operations from running at their best possible performance.  For this reason, Aeries developers will start to phase out these sections of programming code specific to SQL 2005 in favor of optimizing Aeries code for newer technologies. The best practice is to update/upgrade software utilized for all critical applications like your SIS.

We are nearing the end of a school year and preparing for the new year.  Also, now is the time to start planning for the Aeries Database rollover.  This would be the best time to migrate your data from an old, unsupported SQL server version to a new server, or update the SQL version on your current SQL Server.  Aeries SIS supports SQL Server 2014 and pre-release versions of SQL Server 2016 (estimated to be released in June 2016) have passed all quality control tests thus far as well.

Migration can be accomplished in a variety of methods:

• ·        Upgrade to our Aeries Hosting services platform.  This setup alleviates the workload of virtually all administrative functions, which will be handled by the Aeries hosting team.  Databases are optimized, backed up, and stored for archival requirements by Aeries Software, with all updates and version changes taken care of as well.  Click here to read the document that describes all the services provided to you as an Aeries hosted client.  This alternative is competitively priced; please contact sales@aeries.com for more information.
• ·        Contract with Aeries to migrate your data and security to a new SQL server provided by the school district.  All that is needed is the new server with SQL Server installed (virtual or physical servers supported).  We offer this service at special pricing for Aeries customers.
• ·        Complete the migration to a new server in-house.  This represents the most work required by the school district staff, but is highly recommended to be completed before the new school year begins.

Aeries Software highly recommends that you move off SQL Server 2005 and onto a new version of SQL as soon as possible.

It is very important to complete an upgrade or migration before the Aeries code is completely optimized to preclude SQL 2005 support.  The removal of supported code will take place as Aeries development leads to enhanced and additional functionality.  It will not necessarily be documented in revision notes when the SQL 2005-specific code is removed.

Many schools are taking advantage of the Smarter Balanced Interim Assessment providing summative and/or formative testing assessments. These interim assessments are a great testing resource that provides educators assessments on their student progress and identify strengths and areas of improvement in relation to the Common Core Standards.

SBAC Interim Assessment results are managed by a school’s CAASPP administrator with the ability to download test results from their SBAC Portal. Aeries now provides a new procedure allowing the import of Interim Assessment results into the Aeries testing tables. This will ultimately provide greater analysis using Aeries queries, reports, and Aeries Analytics Dashboards & Early Warning System when designing appropriate remediation and interventions to improve learning.

Import Test Results is a new screen in the Aeries Web Version which will allow users to easily import state test result data into the Aeries Student Information System. At this time only the CAASPP Interim Assessment data can be imported using this screen, but as development continues more test result formats will be added.

The procedures to import test results in the Aeries Web Version are similar to those used in the Aeries Client Version:

1.  1. Select the File Layout for the test scores that will be imported
2.  2. Select the file(s) that contain the test results data (more than one test result file can be loaded at a time if necessary)
3. 3. Load the test results
4. 4. Match the test results to students
5. 5. Review/update the default Test Date and Administration
6. 6. After all students are matched import the test results by clicking on the Update Test Tables button.

Test results can be imported either at the district or school level. When importing at the school level, the matching process will only match students that have records in the school that the user is logged into.

After the test results have been added to the testing tables an email will be sent to the user detailing which testing tables were updated along with the number of records that were added, updated, and deleted. A list of the files that were uploaded will also appear at the end of the email.

Complete documentation on the Import Test Results screen can be found on our Downloadable Documents page, under the Testing and Assessment category. Below is a link to the document:

Import_Test_Results_Aeries_Web.pdf

Aeries Software is excited to share a complete redesign of the Aeries® SIS security pages, complete with some valuable new features which were crafted to not only empower administrators to be able to design a multi-year security scheme quickly, but also to ensure consistency in that security scheme between all years.

Manage everything from one location

In the newest releases of the Aeries Web Version, all user accounts, group associations, and permissions will come directly from your district’s default database as defined in your AeriesNetConnections config file.  Now there is no need to log into all of your databases to create a single user and set up permissions.  Instead, you will be able to create the users once, and define their permissions for the current year, last year, and all years prior to last year all from a single location.

Take advantage of expiration dates

When setting up those permissions for your users, you will also notice that we’ve addressed the issue of temporarily elevated account permissions.  If a user needs to make changes to data that they are usually only able to view, expiration dates may be set up on individual permissions in a group or directly on a user’s account.  So now there is no need to remember to return to that user and remove those permissions at a later date.

Enforce password security

There are a few added security measures we’ve introduced as well.  When adding a new account or changing an existing one, there is an added option to have the user change their password upon next login.  This ensures that a password that is meant to be temporary stays that way.  Along the same lines any password which matches the user’s username will require a password change upon login.

Emulate anyone

As always here at Aeries Software, we explore multiple avenues in order to gain end-user feedback in order to identify the feature sets which are most-desired, and for this release, the consensus for most-desired features go to account emulation.  Now from the Security Users page, an administrator can emulate a user and see the interface exactly as the user would, including the ability to emulate for parent and student portal accounts on the Manage Student/Parent Accounts screen.

Enjoy enhanced user experience

And to conclude, what would a redesign be without interface productivity enhancements?  On all of the permissions, school access, and push permissions to another school screens, we’ve added select all / clear all buttons.  Also, when creating a new user once their staff id is populated the first name, last name, and email address will be pulled in automatically from the staff table, if that data is not already populated for the UGN record in question.

To view documentation, please click here to vist our Online Help.

The Rollover process is now available in the Aeries Web Version! The fresh, streamlined interface was designed with the user in mind by simplifying the settings selections and guiding the user through the rollover process.

The Settings tab simplifies the option selection process by condensing all of the options from 8 tabs on 3 different forms in AdminCS to one page in Aeries Web Version and then grouping the options into District-wide and School-wide settings.

Once the options are selected for one school, they can be pushed out to all schools with similar requirements through the Push to Other Schools interface.

The selections that are made are automatically saved and rolled into the New Year database to make future rollovers even easier.

The Processes tab breaks up the rollover into three steps, guiding the user through the entire rollover process.  The Pre-Rollover step provides the user with links to reports that should be run and reviewed prior to rolling over the database to the new year. The Rollover step provides reminders to first create the new year database in SQL and includes an interface to add security credentials to perform the rollover.  The Post-Rollover step provides the user with links to reports that should be run and reviewed after rollover has completed to help analyze the data in the new year database.

As each report or task completes the Processes tab displays the date and time.

The Web Rollover in Aeries has been tested to complete about 10 times faster than the rollover using AdminCS. In one comparison of a large district the AdminCS rollover took over 25 hours to complete, whereas the Web Rollover completed in just under 2 hours! This performance enhancement has been achieved by streamlining the rollover process into one run for all schools rather than separate runs by school type, incorporating the Copy Aeries Tables, Update Student Data and Copy Inactives into one process rather than three separate steps, and by utilizing multi-threading processes.

The AdminCS version is still available for districts who do not want to use this new functionality in the Aeries Web-Based Environment. The New Year Rollover in Aeries Web Version is currently marked as "Beta" in order to indicate that although districts can go ahead and use this new process, we highly recommend being very diligent at checking and verifying the success of the rollover process. Extensive testing was completed on many different district and school configurations but we still recommend that you test this process on test databases and verify the accuracy before running it on your production database.

Documentation for the Web Rollover can be found on the Online Help or directly via download:

http://help.aeries.com/help/Aeries_Web_New_Year_Rollover

New_Year_Rollover_Aeries_Web.pdf

Aeries has a new and exciting new feature called Standards Based Report Card Templates that provides a full WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) editor for report card layout editing.  This new feature greatly reduces the amount of time spent creating or modifying your report cards.  Standard Based Report Card Templates allow users to create multiple report cards in a "sandbox" area without impacting the current report cards that may be in production.

An existing report card setup from the Standard Based Setup (SBE table) can be imported into the Standards Based Report Card Template page and then can be modified.   When the new report card template is complete, it can be pushed to the "live" environment with the "Push to SBE" button. 

The new page features drag and drop ability to move standards onto and around the report card.  All of the existing Standards Based options are available including a new option to "Center" the standard.  Standards can also be added or editing from the page with the appropriate permissions. 

Currently the 2 Column Portrait format report card is supported and the Landscape format is coming soon.

To view the full documentation on our Online Help, click here.

The Aeries Software family is growing! This summer, we are looking forward to adding valuable contributors throughout the company to better serve our customers.

Increasing Response Times, Product Enhancements

Better serving our customers means being able to answer phone calls and respond to emails quicker, to develop and release more product enhancements, and to offer more help resources, such as documentation and videos. In order to accomplish these goals, we are hiring more of the following:

•First level support representatives

•Second level support representatives

•Experienced Software Developers

•Quality Control/Documentation specialists

•Part-time trainers

Product Specialist

In addition to hiring additional representatives in existing positions throughout the company, Aeries Software is also creating a brand new position. The Aeries Product Specialist will be a true advocate for the end-user, maintaining an expert-level knowledge of all major aspects of Aeries and a working knowledge of all other areas of Aeries. This entails knowing not just how the system works, but also why the system works the way it does.  This job function will involve understanding varying target audiences and presenting to them the most applicable benefits of Aeries® SIS.

Why choose Aeries Software?

Committed to you

-Aeries Software’s employees are its greatest assets, and we hope to keep each and every one of them until they retire

-The average Aeries employee has been with the company for close to 10 years

Benefit packages structured to be competitive with prominent school district benefits

-Because 2 out of 3 Aeries Software employees come from a school district background, the benefit package is built around a similar offering

-401(k) profit sharing retirement plan

-Medical coverage (HMO & PPO)

       oHMO monthly premium 100% paid by company

       oIf PPO is desired, employee pays difference between HMO and PPO premium

-Vision coverage 

-Dental coverage

-Available to employee and family

Extensive Personal Time Off

-Escalating PTO with time accrued

       o15 days per year to start

       o20 days after 5 years

       o22 days after 10 years

-At least 10 paid holidays off each year

Access to the company retreat

-Ever want to get away? Enjoy access to the 4-bedroom company retreat located in the San Bernardino mountains for you and your family

A fun, family atmosphere

-Despite founder Jerry Lloyd Sr. passing in 2011, the company continues to be family-owned and -operated

-Experience diverse company outings, typically fun for the whole family

Opportunities for advancement

-Employees are encouraged to apply to job openings and given access to self-improvement tools, such as Lynda.com or PD trainings

Be a part of something meaningful

-Supporting school districts that manage over 2.7 million students is no small feat

-We are all committed to Jerry’s original vision to save educators time in order to allow them to do what they do best – educate

Apply Today

To see full job descriptions, please visit http://www.aeries.com/about/careers

If you are interested in any position, please send a resume to jobs@aeries.com

For years, schools have put forth great efforts to manage students' Career Technical Education data in order to comply with Carl Perkins and newer California Career Pathways Trust (CCPT) requirements. Aeries Software is pleased to introduce a new page in Aeries Web Version to help facilitate the process of identifying concentrators and completers within a specific Career Pathway. The Career Pathway Dashboard will help users identify these students all within one page. The Dashboard gives users the ability to mass add current year participation records and completion statuses all in one single click. Gone are the days of analyzing queries and multiple-step methods to add or import data into CTE to populate the data needed for state and grant reporting.

The Career Pathway Dashboard is designed to create and extract the data needed for various submissions, such as CALPADS, CCPT, and the Irvine Foundation Grant Reporting. The setup is simple and the conversion process will pull everything in your current CTE tables to the new tables supported by this new Aeries Web page all in just a few clicks.

The Career Pathways tab on the Courses page has also been updated to reflect a new design for the CCP table. The new design of this table makes the information school-based and replaces the old Completer flag with a Level field of Intro, Concentrator, Completer, or Academic Support.

To view the full documentation on our Online Help, click here.

Additionally, to view a recent webinar on how to utilize the new Career Pathways Dashboard, click here.

On Friday, July 15^th, the Aeries Update contained the import routine for the 2016 CAASPP Test Results.

LEA’s can import the CAASPP student test results into Aeries quickly and efficiently using the Import Test Results screen in Aeries Web. The current import routine is based on the 2015-16 CAASPP Student Results file layout dated July 5, 2016.

With this version, CAASPP test results for the SBAC, CST, CAA, CMA, CAPA and STS tests will be loaded into the Testing Data (TST) and Content Standards (CST) tables. The Early Assessment Program (EAP) Authorization to Release for English and Math records will be added to the Authorizations (AUT) table, and the test Condition Codes will be added to the Test Exclusion (TEX) table.

Once the update has completed an email is sent to the user that initiated the upload with a summary of the records that were added, updated and deleted in each of these tables.

Please refer to the Import_Test_Results_Aeries_Web.pdf for more information on how to import the CAASPP data into Aeries.  Download at Import_Test_Results_Aeries_Web.pdf or view on the Online Help at Import Test Results

NOTE: Please note that the 2015-16 CAASPP Test Results can only be imported into Aeries using the Import Test Results screen in the Web Version, the Client Version will not be updated.

Once the CAASPP data has been added to Aeries, the Student Profile Screen will display the most recent test scores for Smarter Balanced ELA and Math (SBAC) and for the Science tests (CST) for grades 5, 8 and 10.

Clicking on the SBAC or CST link will open up the Test Details screen which will display the Performance Level and Scale Score for the test and the Claims Performance Levels

Throughout California, schools are gearing up for the 2016-17 school year, bringing with it all of the excitement, promise, and liveliness that goes along with millions of students returning from their refreshing summer breaks. While these students are faced with new challenges and opportunities, they may take some time to get back into their peak performance. Likewise, as teachers return to their schools, they too are faced with their own challenges, and must quickly get back into the swing of things.

Enhancements for the start of the school year

Aeries Software looks forward to this time of the year because we are able to present teachers with all of the new features and enhancements made since they last saw Aeries® SIS in the late Spring. The following are some of those enhancements that teachers will be greeted with upon their return:

• -Scores By Class Show Trend option
• -Transfer Grades
• -Show Point Ratio option
• -Gradebook Restore enhancements
• -Status and Comments on the Scores by Class screen
• -The ability to sort Scores by Class by due date or assignment ascending and descending
• -Standards usability enhancements
• -Push Assignments showing most recently created assignment first
• -An option to automatically add and drop students from a class based on Course Attendance dates

You can find a description and screenshots of these changes on our Online Help: http://help.aeries.com/help/Gradebook_Enhancements_Fall_2016

Alternatively, if you want to see these changes in action, check out our video demonstrating each enhancement: https://aeries.wistia.com/projects/k171w3nfhr

The Teacher Resource Center

Don’t forget to regularly check and take advantage of the Teacher Resource Center, which is available directly from the Teacher Portal home page. The Resource Center includes:

• -Access to training videos and documentation broken down by each task
• -Relevant tips and tricks
• -Curated articles on topics like grading policy or behavior management
• -A list of new features
• -A roadmap of features coming down the road
• -A link to the Q&A Teacher Community
• -A link to the Aeries gradebook UserVoice site, where you can submit ideas for future enhancements

Google Classroom

Last school year, Aeries SIS was enhanced to integrate with Google Apps for Education, including Google Classroom. This allowed teachers to create a classroom within Google Classroom directly from Aeries for each gradebook of their choosing, automatically adding their students in the process. Now that the Google Classroom API has been enhanced, Aeries will soon be updated to allow teachers to add Google Classroom Assignments directly within the Aeries gradebook, which will sync together thereafter. Keep an eye for a blog about this new feature in the coming weeks!

Google Apps for Education (GAFE) and Google Classroom are becoming popular with many school districts.  Additionally, Chromebooks deployments in schools are becoming more prevalent for 1:1 initiative and meeting mobile technology needs for educators.

School districts using Google Classroom benefit from the safe collaboration with learners and sharing of classroom assignments and Google documents.  Google Classroom provides a clean user-friendly interface that is easy to learn and put to use.  Additionally, educators and students using Chromebooks benefit from the device account synchronization through GAFE.

Google has been a great partner in education and has provided tools to integrate with Aeries® SIS.  Aeries Software is pleased to announce some further additions to our current Google Integration with GAFE accounts and Google Classroom.

Current Features:

• -Automatically create and synchronize student accounts into custom Organization Units (OUs) within your Google Domain.
• -Suspend Google Accounts for inactive students.
• -Real time account creation when students are enrolled through Aeries® SIS Web Version
• -Google Authentication in Aeries® SIS portals for students and teachers.
• -Teacher activated creation of Google Classrooms and linking of students to Google Classrooms.
• -Teachers’ capability to link to established Google Classrooms.
• -Automated Google Classroom student linking by section for Aeries activated Google Classrooms.
• -Import Google Classroom results to Aeries Gradebooks

Below is a recent Quote from Doug Davis, Director of Instructional Technology and Student Activities, Kingsburg High School:

“We recently went 1:1 rolling out 1100 Windows 10, 2 in 1 laptops at Kingsburg High.  We used Aeries to create all of our Student GAFE domain accounts and use that for portal account creation.  It has really lived up to its billing and saved us a ton of time.  We also used the "create" your google classroom feature and teachers loved it, as it auto populates their Google Classroom, instead of them getting the code out to their students then having them join one by one.  The two missing pieces of the puzzle were just taken care of this week: Google classroom roster sync to active students in the class, and being able to grade assignments in Google Classroom and Import back over to Aeries.  I enabled this feature 2 days ago, and the response has been a big 2 thumbs up.  The only thing I have had staff getting used to is that the sync feature happens once a night.  Other than that, we at Kingsburg High are so excited that Aeries has embraced the Google Integration.  On my management side, it has been so straight forward, I don't get too many brain freezes during the day!”

Please refer to our documentation in the downloadable documents on our website or on our Online Help to learn more about configuring these new Google integration features: ‘Google Authentication’ and ‘Google Integration with Aeries'  Additionally, feel free to contact Aeries Support to schedule a time to assist in the integration configuration.

District Resources and Assets is a powerful new tool in the Aeries Web Version. Designed originally to replace the old Textbook Inventory System in the Aeries Client Version, the New District Resources and Assets system handles the management of many more types of district assets, such as laptops, projectors, iPads, cell phones, and of course, textbooks. Some schools even use it to track reserved parking spots for Seniors.

Districts can manage their resources through the Check-In and Check-Out process by scanning and assigning items to students and/or staff.  A full history of every person assigned an item is maintained for each item and item information can be quickly looked up using the "Quick Asset Information" page by scanning the asset barcode.  An array of reports is available as well.

Transferring or re-assigning resources between schools is easy.  The Mass Change Assets page handles this quickly and can also be used to quickly mass change the status of many asset items.

Replacement and Damage Fees are quick to assign and the system is constantly monitoring for lost items that appear later.

As we keep expanding the features to support the needs of more districts, more reports and enhancements will be added down the road.

To take advantage of this free, fully integrated feature of Aeries, contact our second level support for implementation and setup.  We can even convert your old Textbook data from the Aeries Client.

Documentation can be found on our Online Help.

The District Student Lookup page in Aeries Web Version recently gained some major enhancements to allow for longitudinal data access from the current school year. This includes functionality previously only available to users of the client version of Aeries® SIS: Copy One student from a prior year. More importantly, the user experience has been significantly streamlined for several daily tasks, by offering the ability to print transcripts and enrollment history from prior years alongside the Copy One process on the District Student Lookup page. Now Aeries web users will go to the same page while working on tasks like copying over students that may have been missed during the near year rollover process or providing information about prior year graduates to colleges or for court orders.

In order to provide quick access to these processes, shortcuts have been added to the Student Search popup (via the “Multi-Year District Search” link) and the Student Demographics page (via the “Import from Prior Year” button):

As always, the District Student Lookup page begins with searches defaulted to look at IDN Records—from the Student Permanent ID Numbers table. Users can also optionally search by STU Records for Active or Inactive records, or only Active STU records.

When a student is selected and data is available, icons will display to generate the Transcript report, generate the Enrollment History report, or use the Copy Student process. The Transcript  and Enrollment  icons will only appear when that year’s data can be found, based on your AeriesNetConfig file.

The Copy Student Icon  will only appear if the Student does not already exist in the current year. Clicking on the icon will add the student to your current school:

Documentation is available at the following link: District Student Lookup