Any schools who have been using Saturday School to make up days of ADA for absent students need to pay close attention. Due to new attendance submission requirements in CALPADS, the CDE now recommends that students whose absences are changed to count for ADA by attending Saturday School need to keep the original Absence Type in place on a student's record.
To accommodate this new recommendation from the CDE, Aeries SIS has been adjusted to allow for flagging an individual student absence as "Counting for ADA." This ensures that attendance totals for a student remain intact, while still allowing for the collection of ADA for a day made up by Saturday School attendance. Once setup and configured, the process is relatively straightforward for an attendance clerk. After Saturday School is completed, simply click the "Note" icon for the day of absence and choose an "ADA Code" that has been setup by an Aeries System Administrator in the COD table. The date of the Saturday School and a comment can also be included.
As part of our continued efforts to improve the user experience of Aeries and to provide rich tools to enable student success, Aeries Analytics has been greatly enhanced. Users can now Add, Edit, Copy, and Delete dashboards or dashboard items directly from the Analytics Dashboard page. Adding these functionalities to the dashboard area will help users better visualize what the final dashboard would look like. This also allows for easier dashboard creation by not having to leave the Dashboard page.
Add / Edit Dashboard Items
Adding and Editing Dashboard Item is now easier with a new user-friendly wizard style process. The wizard will guide users through the complete process of adding or editing a dashboard item. And to make sure the item is configured the way the user wants, the item can be previewed before it is finalized!
Add / Edit Existing Dashboard
New Dashboards can now be added or existing ones edited directly from the Dashboards page. The Dashboard name can be changed instantaneously without having to go back and forth between the Analytics Dashboard page and the Analytics Dashboard Config page. Shared security groups are now searchable. Adding or removing a security group is now a simple click on the right arrow button or trash can button.
Adding a new item to a dashboard can be accomplished by drag and drop of an item from the "Add Dashboard Items" list onto the dashboard or by clicking on the + button. An Item can be removed by clicking on the x button located at the top right corner of a dashboard item.
Dashboard Chart Item
For each Dashboard item, the summary of the indicator definition associated with a chart item is available for reference by selecting the "i" (info) icon located at the top right of the chart.
Copy Indicator
The ability to copy an existing Analysis Indicator is now available by using the new copy button in the Indicator area!
An Indicator edit area will display with information copied from the existing Indicator. Information can be modified here before saving. The Title field will have a - COPY at the end of it. This is to indicate that this is the Copy. The Title can be edited and the - COPY can be removed.
If the copied Indicator has the same Type value as the copied from Indicator, on Save the user will be prompted with a message asking "Do you want to copy the thresholds". Saying OK to this message will copy the thresholds from the original Indicator to the new copied Indicator.
After a copied Indicator has been saved it will display in the Indicator drop down list and be available to use with Dashboard creation!
As I sit and ponder my nearly 18 years in this seat (well not this seat, but you know what I mean), I felt a tinge of sadness for days gone by. All those long hours, coffee runs, and sleepless nights culminates to this: I am disabling features in a software that I have worked tirelessly to enhance for most of my adult life.
We have come a long way from when our Control Panel looked like this:
Today’s Client Control Panel looks a little different:
Implementing a red alert banner like this wasn't my favorite stylistic choice. Given the time I personally invested in developing this application, it felt like a not-so-fond farewell to an old friend. That said, we had agreed it was perhaps the best, most straightforward method for getting the message across in a clear and unmissable way: Aeries Web truly is the future.
With today’s update, we put to rest a few more processes in Aeries Client. We have paid close attention to ensure we only disable items that work as well or better in the Web version! So far this summer we have disabled the following processes:
- School Options, Calendar, Courses, Master Schedule, Teachers and Staff
- Attendance
- Assertive Discipline, Discipline, Victims and Witnesses
- Academic Plan
- State Seal of Biliteracy
The deprecated Aeries Client version was an important stepping stone in making Aeries SIS the powerful, comprehensive platform it is today, and I'm proud to have been an inaugural member of the team that brought it to life. I know you'll love the improvements to the speed, efficiency and user-friendliness of these processes as they are added to Aeries Web—and stay tuned for future transitions from Aeries Client, too!
James D Kelly
Special Projects Manager / Senior Programmer Analyst
We are happy to assist any customer with a transition to Aeries Web. Training resources are available, along with extensive documentation. Please contact maximize@aeries.com or visit http://maximize.aeries.com for more information.
Modern day parents, guardians, and students rely on up-to-date student data to stay engaged with classroom activities. For many years, Aeries has offered the Parent and Student Portal providing information via a Web Browser.
Many Aeries districts are now offering the Aeries Mobile Portal to further enhance the parent and student portal experience. Aeries provides a mobile portal app for both iOS and Android smartphone systems. This app provides real-time access to information when it matters from the convenience of a smartphone. The Mobile Portal App is easy to download from the Apple App Store and the Google App Store at no cost to the smartphone user or the district. Currently, the Mobile Portal app is getting a lot of use with 2.5 million page hits across 400,000 sessions per day.
The Mobile Portal app allows Parents and Students to access Grades, Attendance, Contacts, Demographic, and Aeries Communications information in a concise, mobile-friendly format. Parents, guardians, and students can use their preexisting Parent/Student accounts to gain access to their data. For those parents or students who do not already have accounts, the Aeries Mobile Portal will guide them through the account creation process. Additionally, the Aeries Mobile Portal allows districts to post report cards and progress reports directly in the app for easy-access rather than sending such documents home via US mail saving districts postage costs.
Parents and guardians get a quick overview of any absences or tardies on their student's record, helping them stay informed and maximize student success. Additionally, districts using Aeries Communications are providing parents and students a safe and collaborative communications with educators directly from their smartphone using the Mobile Portal App.
New features are continually being added to the Mobile Portal. The 'what-if' grade calculator feature allows parents and students to virtually adjust scores on pre-existing or future assignments and can even create new assignments teachers have not yet added to the gradebook. This makes it easier than ever to ask "what if?" and experiment with scenarios and outcomes, mapping out what your final grade might be in advance. And recently a biometric authentication feature was also added to allow parents and students to authenticate into the app using a smartphone enabled with either Touch ID or Face ID.
Additionally, users of the Mobile Portal app are provided a feedback feature providing parents and students access to assistance, especially when portal logins are not working. District staff, with appropriate access, can view the feedback page and reach out to parents having trouble with the app.
Ultimately, the Aeries Mobile App provides a higher level of convenience to parents, guardians, and students with devices they commonly use, facilitating simple and easy communications across classrooms, schools, and districts. For a basic overview that can be shared with parents, guardians, and students, please visit https://aeries.link/mobile-app.
For assistance in configuring the Aeries Mobile App for your schools, visit https://aeries.link/configure-app or contact Aeries Support for assistance.
The Attendance Management page was recently added to Aeries Web Version. With it, a quicker, easier, and more intuitive process for managing attendance has arrived to support attendance clerks in their daily routine. This page will result in significant savings in time and reductions in the daily efforts of anyone who manages attendance on a regular basis.
Attendance Management streamlines the process for viewing and updating unverified absences during a specific date range. Instead of changing a student’s unverified absence from an individual student's attendance page, users will be able to view and modify all unverified absences for all students on the same page. Other absence codes can be selected, so users are not limited to only unverified absence codes. A user-friendly interface allows the user to filter the list by student name, ID, or number, as well as by date ranges.
The Attendance Management page will help to ensure that all unverified absences are identified and cleared or changed as needed. The page is available for schools using Daily and Period attendance, as well as negative and positive attendance schools. Just like a student's attendance page, this page also supports entering attendance notes for absence dates. To support verification of attendance data, a popup window of contact information for students is provided. In secondary schools, period codes can be modified along with the All-Day code, according to the Fill Period options.
Aeries Software continues to lead the industry in providing advanced data solutions that help schools provide a safe and comfortable learning environment for students. The 1/30/2019 version of Aeries allows schools to record the Gender Identity of students no matter what the value. This change is built on top of another industry-leading change available for years in Aeries: the ability to track Students' Preferred Name separate from their Legal Name and only display the Preferred Name throughout Aeries: http://www.aeries.com/blog/legal-vs-preferred-student-names-and-genders In combination, these two features allow a student to be completely known and recognized by the gender and name identity of their choice while still allowing the school to effectively report student data on state and federal reports.
The driving force behind this change was California's SB-179 (the Gender Recognition Act: https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201720180SB179), which was signed into law officially recognizing "nonbinary" as a legal gender in California. The result is that Aeries SIS now supports tracking and managing student genders beyond the traditional "Male" and "Female" values. "Nonbinary" (code "N") is now a valid value in Aeries and additional values can be added by Local Education Agencies according to local policies. The new Student Gender field replaces the old Student Sex field. Many accommodations were coded into Aeries to allow for backward compatibility of existing custom extract routines and database queries.
With this change, all reports and pages throughout Aeries have been adjusted to display "Gender" instead of "Sex" with various shortened versions like "Gndr" depending on the space allowed. At this time, CALPADS does not yet support nonbinary gender values so students with a nonbinary gender need to still have a Legal Gender populated of either M or F.
This year marks my 25th year as a classroom teacher. I recall my first years requiring me to take attendance on a piece of paper and then put it on a clip near the classroom door so a student worker could come around and collect it every period. I also recall keeping track of grades in a gradebook that included green sheets that kept every messy detail. It would be frustrating when a new student was added and their name had to stay on the bottom of the class list until I rewrote the class list or until the next grading period. It was also a pain to manually calculate the grades and then successfully communicate academic progress to parents and students in a timely manner.
The dreaded green paper gradebook
Fast forward a couple of decades later, and now not only do I have a way to take paperless attendance in real-time, but now I have a way to also grade, and communicate those grades in real-time. Aeries SIS has allowed these routines to happen seamlessly in my classroom, so much so, that my students now anxiously watch me input an assignment and then refresh the Aeries app on their phone to see their updated grade. But then again, they may have already known what their grade would be since they used the “What-if?” edit mode on their app.
The massively-popular "What-if?" feature within the mobile app
This last decade has also seen the addition of G Suite for Education in the classroom. This has allowed the following to happen:
- Real-time feedback and collaboration on assignments through the use of shared Google Docs, Google Slides, and other G Suite apps.
- Classrooms moving to a more paperless environment due to fewer copies needing to be made because of the use of apps like Google Classroom that allows the teacher to make virtual copies of an assignment for every student with the press of one button.
- No more “lost” assignments since almost everything is automatically saved in Google Drive.
- No more running out of storage space, and no more need to carry around a flash drive to hold all your files since Google Drive storage space is unlimited for G Suite for Education accounts.
I don’t think I need to sell the positive benefits of implementing G Suite tools in the classroom, but I do think it is important to note the ways that G Suite and Aeries work together to help my grading workflow.
Some of the G Suite and Aeries integration features I find invaluable include:
- Students are automatically enrolled in linked Google Classrooms. Yes, even the new students that are enrolled throughout the school year.
- The scores from assignments that are graded and returned in Google Classroom can be imported directly into the Aeries Gradebook. No more having to split screen or print out scores in order to manually input scores in Aeries Gradebook.
- Grades are now shared in real-time with parents and students through the Aeries Parent Portal and Aeries mobile app. This paves the way for timely communication regarding grades through Aeries Grade Reports and through Aeries Communications.
These integration features have made my grading workflow (a little more) pleasurable and have saved me countless hours. Thanks G Suite for Education and Aeries for making me one happy teacher!
Lisa Ceja is a Google for Education Certified Innovator and Trainer, an EdTech Specialist, an Intervention Specialist, a Yearbook Advisor, and a High School Math Teacher with 25 years of experience in the classroom, currently as an Advanced Placement Statistics Teacher at Pioneer High School of Whittier Union High School District. Lisa implements daily what she is most passionate about: G Suite for Education tools and Educational Technology. Her passion for teaching and sharing carries over to her work with educators when empowering them to implement the same in their own districts, schools, and classrooms. She is proud to be Googley, a UCLA alumna & a life long learner.
Aeries SIS is full of powerful features. As our users go through their days dealing with all kinds of student data scenarios, create a variety of reports, and record all kinds of data, those features come in handy and often may save the day. If we call those features special powers for saving the day, maybe some other features can be called superpowers for their extraordinary utility and value.
Aeries Analytics and Query are two Aeries superpower features. Query allows the ability to LIST all records you need from any Aeries tables. When you use Query, you have the awesome power to mass CHANGE records, quickly get total counts of student data points, KEEP sets of students for other actions and more.
On the other hand, Analytics has the power to help you see through student-related information, categorize the data and find answers to your complex questions. By using Aeries Analytics, you have a tremendous capacity to analyze, classify and understand your data to see the big picture and more.
What if we were to combine the powers of these super powerful features? What if you could get what Aeries Analytics provides through Aeries Query? As an example, what if you could list the attendance percentages of your students that are currently in a 504 Program, or run a KEEP on your students in foster and whose science subject area grades are F? Wouldn’t you call this a superpower?
This superpower is exactly what our newest feature, Extended Query Fields, offers. This tool is an integration between Aeries Analytics and Aeries Query which allows you to build straight-forward queries that will list values derived from any Aeries Analytics Item Definitions.
Consider the Special Education Teacher who is vigilant about the success of the Special Ed students in her school. The end of the first reporting period is a good time to see how they are all doing in their Math and English classes. In addition, she wants to view attendance because we all know if attendance goes down everything else follows. Using the newly acquired superpowers, the following query will answer her questions:
LIST STU ID FN LN GR ENGLISH_GRD MATHEMATICS_GRD SPECIALED ATT_PERC IF SPECIALED = YES AND ATT_PERC < 95
At this point more conditions can be added to the query, a KEEP query can be used to view student related pages for this group of students, or labels can even be generated for a letter to be sent home.
To help you make the most of this superpower right away, we have built in some quick-start tools. Our Aeries Analytics Item Definitions have been pre-set for all districts updated to the April 19, 2019 Aeries version, including those free LCAP definitions that have been included in Aeries Analytics for free for quite some time. To create additional Extended Query Fields for your local Aeries Analytics Item Definitions, the Extended Fields Management Page has been added to your database, allowing you to manage what other Analytic items you want to make available for Extended Query Field access (only users that have security access to Student Indicators will have access to use Extended Query Fields). We hope that with this new superpower you will have all the strength accomplish more in less time.
Aeries Software is pleased to announce Andrea Bennett as the inaugural keynote speaker for the 2019 Annual Fall AeriesCon, September 23, 2019.
Andrea has a total of 30 years’ experience, as a programmer and database manager. She has served as a Director of Student System Services and Director of Information Technology Services at two large California school districts, East Side Union High School District and Oakland Unified School District. Since 2006, Andrea has been the Executive Director for the California Educational Technology Professional Association (CETPA). At CETPA Andrea works with the CETPA Board of Directors in providing vision and planning while leading the CETPA programs, meeting the organizations goals and objectives. Andrea represents CETPA, as a liaison, to governmental and external organizations both on a local and national level.
Throughout Andrea’s tenure directing CETPA, she has promoted leadership, advocacy, learning and community as the cornerstone CETPA core values. Andrea has created and facilitated meaningful programs, such as state-wide Student Data Privacy awareness along with creating the CA Student Privacy Alliance and CTO Mentorship programs. The CTO Mentorship Program is extremely successful in promoting over 250 CTO California K-12 candidates through an extensive training, leadership, and mentorship program. Andrea has been a key advocate in bridging all disciplines of K-12 technology by writing and publishing meaningful articles in many Ed-Tech forums and promotes partnerships with local and state K-12 agencies along with private technology providers.
Aeries is very fortunate to have Andrea at AeriesCon this fall and we can’t wait to hear what she has to say about K-12 technology innovations and education.
Ensuring data quality throughout your system shouldn’t be a daunting task for any Aeries administrator. With so many requirements for state and federal reporting, not to mention local business rules, how can you quickly identify and resolve problems with all of your data?
That's where Aeries' powerful new Data Validation system comes to the rescue. Validation rules can be defined — or applied right away from samples provided by Aeries — to check for anomalies in data and report those issues to the staff who can correct them. Best of all this core functionality is free and is included with the SIS; you only need to contact us to activate it!
Here are some examples of how Data Validation can help:
Confirm that every student has at least 2 emergency contacts and at least one phone number for each contact.
Scrub invalid email addresses. Rules could ensure all email addresses in the system do not contain bogus data.
Make sure that siblings have certain key pieces of data in sync.
Make sure that key data like courses have the proper state course codes associated with them.
Ensure that any student who has a Contact record with a relationship of "foster parent" is also marked as a foster youth student. Since schools get additional funding for foster students, this could be an opportunity to keep the records clean and maximize resources.
Verify that students living outside the district boundaries have a proper interdistrict transfer on file by comparing the student's address data to the interdistrict transfer code. This would help schools ensure that students from outside the district have the proper paperwork.
Ensure that students who have certain prerequisites have met with their counselor at least once within their first month of school. This could be accomplished by making sure at least one counseling note has been entered for the student during a specific time period.
Data validation promotes accountability for the staff responsible for data entry and reduces the burden on the Aeries administrator to be the perpetual fixer-of-bad-inputs. Validations can be established for simple things like making sure every student has a birth date populated or comparing two fields for consistency. It also scales to more complex functions like ensuring that enrollment and program dates do not overlap. The system has been designed to be as flexible as possible, leveraging the powerful nature of SQL queries to create the definitions. Since definitions are defined in SQL, the types of validations that can be created are virtually limitless!
At Aeries we're building a world where data always empowers, never impedes and we know that Data Validation is a step in the right direction.
Ready to start? Contact support@aeries.com to request participation in the Data Validation Open Beta testing period, today!
Does your Siblings page look more like a full class roster, rather than a true reflection of students who are related to one another? Aeries offers a "Mass Assign Family Key" process that can be run to update any students who have not already been assigned to families.
Aeries links multiple students together by a numeric field called Family Key; students with the same Family Key will be displayed together on the Siblings form, as well as linked in various reports such as Avery 5160 Labels (with the 1 Per Family option) and the Students with Siblings report. So there are some key benefits to having an accurate Family Key assigned to each student.
Since we posted our original blog article on this topic back in 2018, we've made several enhancements to the Mass Assign Family Keys processes. This includes additional contact matching options and a better matching algorithm. This page allows you to define exactly which contact records should count as "family" during the matching process. Options include:
Select the Contact Code(s) to include (CON.CD)
Which Relationship code(s) to include (CON.RL)
Want to only include the top 3 Contacts by Order (CON.OR), no problem!
You can now limit by Primary Contact (CON.PC)
Only the contacts the student Lives With (CON.LW)
How about Ed Rights Holder (CON.ERH)?
Please note that the better defined your Contacts data and options are, the better your Sibling Match process will work! And note that to protect the integrity of your data, this process will only assign family keys to those students who don't already have one. So if your sibling data may have become inaccurate due to improper input or perhaps data was imported into Aeries without family information, then this may be the right time to run this function and get it all sorted out!
Accurate student data helps tell a clearer story about the students under our wings. Knowing their name, face, and family gives us further insight into how we can support their whole student health. You can do it, and we're here to help! Read more about the "Mass Assign Family Keys" process in ourknowledge base.
Names can have some creative spellings nowadays. You'll run into John, Jon, and Jhon, as well as Sarah, Sara, and Serra. So however a student spells their name it's important for educators and administrators to find them as easily as possible. Recent enhancements in Aeries' Student Search capabilities include a Fuzzy Search option which provides a more liberal set of results when attempting to locate a student by name. Students with similar-sounding names, such as Sean and Shawn, can sometimes be difficult to find; the Fuzzy Search option gives you the ability to expand your search by including these homonyms. It also performs a few other useful functions:
Partial Name Matches - searching for "Nat" additionally returns "Abernathy" and "Sinatra". Results allow the search criteria to be located in the middle of the name.
Reverse Names - searching for "Frank, John" also returns "John, Frank". Results allow search criteria to be reversed,
To help put it all into context here's an example we've cooked up.
Student Allan Abbott has been called to the office and the principal wants to look them up in Aeries before they arrive. Without Fuzzy Search enabled, only 1 result is returned.
With Fuzzy Search enabled, many additional results are returned with similar sounding names. (Please note that all Fuzzy Search results will display below exact matches.)
"Fuzzy Search" was recently released in the Aeries platform and we're excited for all our users to take it out for a spin. So whether you're looking for Jaden, Jayden, or Jaiden we know that our new search tool will help you find the results you're really looking for,.
On behalf of the Aeries Support Department, we thank you for being our customer and welcome you to the 2019-2020 school year! We hope you had a wonderful summer, relaxed, recharged and ready for a productive partnership towards our one goal of student success.
As most staff, parents and administrators would expect, the first few weeks of back-to-school can be hectic. Regardless, we continue to put in effort towards a positive experience for our users.
Ticketing System
Two years ago we started using support.aeries.com and now 48% of requests come in via the portal.We have maintained 95% positive feedback on customer satisfaction and are working hard towards 100%.
We treat all of our customer requests with urgency and understand that you may be experiencing some delays during our peak season.You can also access our extensive knowledge base while our analysts work to get to your ticket:
Our department is growing! Since last school year we have added some new members to our support family.In addition to the friendly voices you all have gotten familiar with, you may have also encountered Suzette (Kellar), Tracey (Berry), Patty (Fonseca-Muniz) and Jill (Knowles).
Each one of us are dedicated to you, our customers and we all look forward to working with you and a rewarding new school year!
I'm proud to say that it's our 24th year providing schools and families the Aeries Student Information System. My father, Jerry D. Lloyd started working in education in the late '60s in the Orange County Data Processing Center, back when computing was done on huge IBM mainframes. He was passionate about technology and went on to found one of the first PC-based SIS in California. Aeries SIS has since evolved into a product that we are very proud of.
Despite change, some important things remain the same. We have so much to be grateful for because of you, our customers and partner districts. You challenge us to improve our product and perform at our best. We wouldn't have been able to build this company without all those who passionately care about our student's futures.
Since the passing of my father in 2011, I've had the honor and responsibility of being the President of Aeries Software. While I have endeavored to do my best as President of such a successful and growing company, today I am proud to announce that I am passing the torch to my nephew, Brent Lloyd. I am confident that Brent will continue the tradition of a family run business that considers both its employees and customers as part of the larger Aeries family. I am certain that he will continue to instill the principles that have made Aeries such a great product that keeps the needs of its customers and users first and foremost. Lastly, I'm excited about the new and invigorating changes that I know he will bring with his tenure as President of Aeries Software.
I started kindergarten the day my grandfather, my dad and uncle started Eagle Software. It was the '90s and since then I've always known what I wanted to do. Some kids have may have an aversion for any sense of predestined path set for them, but for me, I embraced it: learn my family's business and go on the journey to be worthy of the spectacular educational technology legacy they've built.
Being at the crossroads of educational policy and emerging technology is exciting and energizing. I grew up amidst all of this. I attended public school in an Aeries district, I grew up riding my bike with my brothers 'til the street lights came on and then played video games until my parents told us to go to sleep. We've seen the great strides computer science and culture have taken since we developed our first software decades ago. But it's equally important to see how much education has begun to pay attention to more than just the academic performance of our students, but also their social-emotional well being and their challenge-filled journeys from kindergarten to college and career success. Aeries SIS is in a unique place to ensure that the student data within our system empowers and galvanizes the whole community to enable student success.
Jerry Lloyd's original vision for this company remains just as pertinent today as the day we opened almost 25 years ago: continual product innovation. So that is my promise. We've developed the road map on how we're going to keep Aeries products at the top of their game and how to keep you, our customers, our users, our family, first.
The future is bright and our 25th year anniversary is arriving in 2020; we're already planning the party! Along with that celebration, we will be announcing some significant company-wide improvements: a brand new website, more effective communication, and the implementation of the best technology that our industry has to offer.
We went into 2020 looking forward to celebrating our 25th anniversary, as well as taking a few moments to reflect on what got us here. First and foremost, I want to acknowledge our Aeries family, our Eagles, users old and new, that make up this community we've been so lucky to have been a part of for decades.
Our staff is our beating heart and we are able to leverage their wisdom and expertise to support student success in ways that are meaningful to educators, administrators and families. All of what we enjoy today was built upon the legacy and history of our founder and my grandfather Jerry D. Lloyd, Sr. From his roots in 1960s mainframe technology to his relentless drive to innovate education, we continue his legacy. We have combined every lesson learned along our journey with a continued sense of dedication. Even though 2020 has been a year of challenges, it is also a year of opportunities. Together we're bringing to light some of the most exciting innovations and improvements that Aeries has ever seen.
Since the start of last school year, Aeries SIS has developed and deployed so many exciting new features.
The release of Aeries' very own native Teacher App.
That's just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the vast amount of improvements we've continued to make to our core SIS. We know it's our commitment to having a modern and well-designed software that has led to some amazing new districts and schools joining our community of users. One of the largest cohorts of new customers came aboard and went live this summer representing 44 LEAs and nearly 130,000 students. They join 600+ educational institutions representing over 2.7 million students who rely on us daily to manage their student data. To say I am honored is an understatement. We are proud to serve these schools and districts and continue to push for innovation in EdTech.
We are lucky to be able to continue our business almost uninterrupted despite these trying times. We were ready and able to provide full remote work accommodations for all our employees and are fortunate to be still operating at 100%. We know that official information has been slow to be shared on requirements and recommendations for how schools will be operating this fall, but we know and trust that the school districts, state agencies, and other organizations have been thoughtfully preparing for the variety of potential scenarios our students may face during these uncertain times. For our part, Aeries has committed to providing guidance and resources, as best we can, to the educational community. You can find them here:
Product development dedicated to making impactful adjustments that will ease the workloads of teachers and administrators:https://aeries.link/hybridfeatures
The release of flex scheduling and other scheduling guidance webinars to help schools find the best scenario for their community: https://aeries.link/2020scheduling
The new school year is here and we're looking to the future and how we will continue to innovate educational technology. We are challenging ourselves to expand our capabilities and redefine what an SIS can do. With your participation in our unique, user-powered Aeries Ideas community, we can focus on building the features you ask for.
We are also excited to announce a much-awaited relaunch of Aeries.com. Our team has been hard at work for the better part of the year in designing and developing our new website that will serve as a critical communication hub between all the partners in our ecosystem. From students and families, educators and administrators, vendors and prospective users, the new Aeries.com is a bold new leap in how we can work together.
The landscape of education has changed. So it's important for us to address how we are handling our annual fall users' conference. We're pleased to announce that this year, we're going digital with AeriesCon Virtual Summit - all the exceptional training you expect with the convenience to access anywhere. We'll be hosting this online-only, 4-day event October 5-8, 2020. We're dropping the price, but giving you all the same great content, and a few more surprises! Please keep an eye out at AeriesCon.com for more details and to register for the event.
Each day, we are encouraged by the overwhelming resolve demonstrated by educators and school administrators. It can be easy to get caught up in the turmoil and uncertainty of everything going on these days, but by enduring these trying times together, the education community has risen to the occasion and proven our resilience. Collectively, our mutual support will continue to drive us forward on our mission towards promoting education and career success for all students.
Let's start by stating the obvious. We are all being asked to rise up to the challenge of successfully implementing distance and hybrid learning models. Very few educators and families across the nation were comfortably prepared for this model of education. However, the fact of the matter is that it's here and a part of our lives for the foreseeable future. Yet the good news, nay – the great news is that there are innumerable resources to show you the way through our ever-evolving educational landscape.
We begin by examining the environment and consulting those who have successfully navigated it. The following article found at the Education Week - Teacher blog serves as a think piece to examine real-life situations while providing commentary in retrospect.
Now let's take a look at the same subject as tackled by a different perspective. This article in the New York times provides anecdotes as well as research to provide another retrospective on the trials and tribulations of online learning.
Everyone's story is different, each situation is unique, but by sharing our experiences we can begin to generate some insight on how we can better navigate this landscape. But reading articles and putting their suggestions into practice isn't the only step in building a better learning environment. It's also important for teachers and parents to engage with and receive feedback from their students whether it's regarding their education or their individual situation. The following 10-minute podcast can help you understand this feedback cycle and present different ways to open the communication channels more clearly.
Now that we've reflected on our experiences let's look to the future and discover what steps we can take in our own lives to find little wins. It's tremendously important at this time for all of us to remember to take care of our physical and mental health. Remember that self-care is not a luxury, it should be a small commitment to maintain and respect one's wellbeing. Times are tough, this is the reality of our situation, but we can all make 5-10 minutes in our day to ensure that we are taking steps to remember that our mental and emotional health are as valuable as our physical health. The following article featured in USA Today gives a bit more insight into the realities of managing our students' and our own mental health during this time.
We've recruited our very own Product Manager, Lynn Heatherly, a veteran in education and mother, to provide some tips and advice to lead us into our next topic: care. How can we better treat ourselves through optimized practices, ergonomics, and applied practical experience?
Families are focused on creating successful remote learning environments. One of the most important steps is to ensure good communication between parents and teachers. Students are often evaluated based on their engagement in their remote classes. Parents need to understand what constitutes "engagement" for the student: do they need to email the teacher, join an online meeting, turn in an assignment, etc.? Parents also need to consider what the expectations are for both attendance and grades for their students; in other words, what is meant by attendance and how are grades awarded? For schools using the Aeries SIS, parents and students using the portal can have access to the teachers' virtual classroom, student attendance and grade marks, and easy access to email to promote good communication.
Two buzzwords that have sprung up around remote learning are synchronous and asynchronous. Synchronous refers to those activities and engagements that take place at a set time and usually in some sort of webinar platform, such as Zoom or Microsoft Teams. If a student is expected to participate in synchronous activities, then timing is important. Help the student connect a few minutes early, if possible, to allow time to resolve any technical issues that might arise. Asynchronous refers to those activities that the student can do at a self-directed (or parent-directed) pace. The specific time of day is not as important, but there are generally still deadlines and due dates. Even with asynchronous learning, many schools have the expectation that the student is working and interacting in some way every day. Students who have not had to practice time-management much in the past may struggle with procrastination, so parents can help by setting schedules and milestones. Star charts, check lists or other measures of progress can help to keep students on track and avoid rushing at the end of a day or week to get everything accomplished.
Although it may seem obvious to adults, students often need guidance in how to conduct themselves in a remote setting. Students might benefit from some assistance with their digital interactions. Many students may not have sent an email before, so a bit of coaching, such as showing them how to construct an email. One possible template would include a greeting, a statement of the purpose of the email, a description of any problem or question, a "thank you" and an appropriate signature. This can help make sure their email is understood and well-received. In addition to sending emails, students may need help understanding appropriate interaction in an online meeting. For example, allowing your students to be dressed comfortably (but not in pajamas) can reduce fidgeting and help the student feel relaxed on camera. It is a good idea to consider the background that will be visible and remove items that might be distracting or inappropriate for a class setting or even show their student how to use a virtual background if they prefer more privacy. Virtual backgrounds have the added appeal of being able to be customized to something the student will enjoy and may allow them to express themselves. While phones and games can be a good option during breaks, students probably should not be playing games or on their phones while engaged in an online meeting unless it is a part of the lesson being presented. It is important to know if the school has requirements regarding camera use and then make sure those rules are followed. If there is a reason why a student cannot have their camera turned on, then the student should be careful to engage in other ways, such as the chat box or verbally answering questions. Otherwise, the teacher has no way to measure student participation and understanding. Similarly, the student should understand the use of the microphone and how to mute and unmute so as to avoid unnecessary sounds in the online meeting.
As self-care is an important part of remote learning, we should be sensitive to student anxiety. If the parent has the ability to influence the amount of time that a student is in an online meeting, it should probably be limited to 30 minutes in one sitting. Younger students, particularly, will tend to lose focus after that. Frequent breaks, especially with physical activity like playing outside can help to work out frustrations that children may experience trying to learn in such a new way. Keeping to a predictable schedule and maintaining healthy meals and snacks will also go a long way toward easing anxieties students may have. Children aren't just mini-adults, so they can't be expected to pivot to an 8-hour work day in a home-office as many of their parents have been forced to do. Parents and educators both should be sensitive to the developmental needs of school-age children ensure that the expectations set out for them are reasonably achievable.
Remote learning is new for most families and can be a challenge, but hopefully some of these suggestions will help to create a rich learning environment for students.
You can also read about what resources that Aeries has prepared for districts, educators and families to prepare our community for these topics:
There is a world of topics regarding care and many little ways that you can improve your quality of life. We'll end with a few more recommendations to help you find what works for you, your students and your family.
When we look around we can begin to identify what's in and what is out of our control, where we can spend our energy wisely to improve our quality-of-life, or we can end up misusing our energy and moving in circles. Hopefully, this article's media suggestions and insights give you, whether you're an educator, administrator, parents, guardian, or student a little bit more agency over your life and the choices you can make to improve it. If we listen to the lessons of those who have come before us and commit to taking care of our mental and physical wellbeing we'll all come out of this better than we started. Just keep paddling.
For many high school students, summer break brings the potential for exciting new opportunities: relaxing, preparing for the new school year, and in this case, even interning at Aeries! We were pleased to work with Tustin Unified School District in Orange County, California to bring aboard three interns to our Sales & Marketing Division this summer.
This exciting new program allowed us to gain valuable insight and knowledge from such an important stakeholder group while providing students with a dynamic workspace for hands-on learning. Alongside Sonia Cassatt, Director of Sales, and Natasha Perera, Marketing & Communications Manager, the internship team dove into the foundation of sales, marketing, branding, advertising, research, communications, social media, and so much more.
Let’s turn it over to Rikesh, Yiqi, and Zack to hear from them about their biggest takeaways.
A workplace can be a classroom… but everyone is a teacher
During this internship, it was fascinating to learn so much about the Sales & Marketing Division and its role within a company. Creating and sharing ideas was enjoyable, but what intrigued us the most was sharing ideas with staff. As direct customers, we had the opportunity to engage with several different departments. We freely expressed our thoughts on what we loved about Aeries, and areas could be enhanced. Getting another point of view from end users was beneficial for the employees and us interns. It felt refreshing to feel like we had knowledge to share.
Coffee is key, for several reasons
A perk to working at Aeries is the fancy espresso machine offered in the breakroom. Besides the great morning pick-me-up, it’s where we gathered, fueled up, and engaged in lively conversations, sharing ideas with others outside of Sales & Marketing. These candid conversations allowed us to connect with Aeries employees and share ideas about the company as a whole. The trusty coffee machine became an integral part of our workplace culture, uniting us and fueling both our bodies and our camaraderie.
Family Matters
The very first day we interned with Aeries, we learned about Jerry Lloyd’s impact on the student data industry. We met numerous times with President Brent Lloyd, who spoke about the ways he upholds his grandfather’s legacy. The Lloyds have created an environment where employees – and even us interns – feel like part of the Aeries family. The empowering culture at Aeries stems from their genuine passion for educators and students.
We discover something new everyday
The best part of the workflow during our internship at Aeries was how much fluidity there was to what we learned. One day would focus on campaigns and the next it could be preparing for a day of filming and preparing story boards. Each week would build on the last with the knowledge we learned each day. Interning at Aeries allowed for so much learning, but also each day was new and exciting preventing any type of burnout.
Growing is out of your comfort zone
Some of us weren’t sure if we wanted to do an internship this summer because it felt daunting. It was the first time we had made a resume and participated in an interviewing process. However, even when the internship had some new types or projects that were awkward, scary, or uncomfortable, we all learned how to accomplish them together. As the saying goes, “If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.” We learned to push ourselves out of our comfort zones, and will continue to have this mindset in the future. The staff leading the program really had a commitment to growth and fostered an environment of comfort and empowerment.
Creations have an impact
It was clear that we weren’t brought in to the team to fetch someone coffee or to file random papers. We were challenged to be creative and design ideas that would actually be used. The three of us were all chosen because we had different strengths and interests, but could all work on a team together. It was exhilarating to tap into our creativity and analytical skills by creating unique posts, campaigns, and evaluating their effectiveness. Each intern brought a unique perspective to the table, resulting in a dynamic and fun learning experience. Plus, we get to see our impact out in the ‘real world’!
Sales is about the big things…but also the little things
Building strong relationships, meeting customers’ needs, providing exceptional service, differentiating from competitors, maintaining attention to detail, and driving continual improvement all contribute to successful sales. It’s important to think about the human connections we make. These little things can all go a long way, so it’s important to pay attention and notice the details!
Marketing is more than images and colors
Marketing involves strategic planning, market research, branding, strong communication, customer relationship management, sales support and so much more. As interns, we dove into marketing strategies and learned about the technicalities involved in creating effective marketing materials, such as the number of fonts to use. Whether it’s the area you want to market to, your message you want to convey, or the social media platform, we all learned something new and experienced first hand how to build out a marketing campaign from beginning to end.
In conclusion, our experience as interns in the Sales and Marketing Division at Aeries was nothing short of remarkable. We gained experience in the professional sector and learned so much. Each day brought fresh and rewarding experiences. So, whether you are a student or a business, participating in an internship is a once-in-a-lifetime experience you don’t want to miss!
A special thanks to College & Career Coordinator, Alita Salazar, and Work-Based Learning Technician Pashia Escoto at Tustin Unified School District for their efforts in making this partnership a success! For questions about this internship program, please contact Natasha Perera at natashap@aeries.com.
We are thrilled to introduce our new in-product Aeries Resource Hub! You can now access all of the resources we provide to support your use of Aeries in one centralized place. This hub brings you an easy-to-use, easy-to-navigate toolkit to optimize your experience, regardless of your role.
Let’s explore five powerful ways you can leverage this resource center to help you start the new school year ready for success:
Engage and Network: Discover Events and Workshops You can quickly find our calendar of upcoming events where you will find details of upcoming “Good Morning, Aeries!” webinars, workshops designed for specific job roles. Plus, access the registration details to join us virtually or in person at one of this year’s AeriesCon events. We can’t wait for our 50th conference event and celebrate the the Golden Tradition of AeriesCon!
Are you interested in custom training and consulting services? The Resource Center can also connect you to our Training Team!
Elevate Your Skills: Enroll in Aeries Academy Online Courses Whether you’re new to Aeries, or an advanced user, Aeries Academy courses are tailored to help keep you on top of your A-Game…Aeries Game, that is! Enrollees can sharpen their skills and earn mastery certificates to show schools they’re ready to use Aeries to its fullest potential in a new job role, all at no cost. Use the links from the Resource Hub to browse the catalog of Aeries Academy courses or to jump right to your courses if you are already enrolled!
Navigate with Ease: Access Documentation Effortlessly The Aeries Knowledge Base provides documentation that goes far beyond the basics. Dive into our curated collection of articles, FAQs, sample queries, and more to find answers to your questions about using Aeries features. Or, take your exploration further to learn all about new-to-you product features and functionalities that can unlock new ways to support your team’s efforts towards everything from data management best practices, to supporting the success of all students.
Stay Updated: Embrace the Latest Product Updates The Aeries Product team works tirelessly to deliver an ever-evolving, innovative SIS platform by regularly releasing product updates and enhancements. Use the link to “Latest Updates” from the Resource Hub to review the details of what is new in Aeries. We think you’ll be excited about the things we’ve been working on!
Connect With Us: Stay up-to-date on everything Aeries! We want to hear from you, and hope you would like to hear from us! Use the Resource Hub to join us at My Aeries and on social media stay informed about the latest product developments, success stories and celebrations, and upcoming events. By coming together using these resources, you can join the thriving community of Aeries educators that are driven by innovation and student success.
The release of the new Aeries Resource Hub marks a milestone in our commitment to providing exceptional support to our valued users. By consolidating our wealth of resources in one menu that can be easily accessed from within the product, we aim to empower every Aeries customer with an easy-to-use toolkit to optimize their Aeries experience. It’s time to embark on a journey of growth, learning, and productivity. The possibilities are endless, and we’re excited to share this new feature with you!
The new school year has arrived. Just like the start of the calendar year, the new school year brings opportunities to build on the past, joy in potential new beginnings, and anticipation of what the future will bring.
Our employees here at Aeries (or as we like to call them, Eagles) have a unified goal of empowering our users. In June, we officially brought aboard our brand-new VP of Product & Engineering, Jason Strong. Jason joined Lara Clickner (Customer Experience), Jim Mallory (IT/Operations), and Jennifer Knighton (Sales & Marketing), officially rounding out our Executive Leadership Team. These dedicated leaders not only embody our company values, but also understand the importance of working together to bring our company vision and mission to fruition.
Our passion, expertise, and experience are evident throughout our entire organization. From our Junior Developers to our Support Analysts, to our IT Coordinators to our Account Managers, all 127 of our employees work diligently to provide the best product, support, and resources possible. Their collective efforts can be seen in so many ways, such as new reports in response to legislation changes, or our brand new, in-product Aeries Resource Hub.
Whether you connect with our team face-to-face at a User Group Meeting, or virtually through a Support Ticket, their impact and dedication to their craft is clear. As you head into the new year, rest assured that each of us here at Aeries is continuing to build – and expand – the best SIS on the market. In fact, we look forward to seeing you virtually at AeriesCon this fall and sharing more about our foundational beliefs and how they influence our product development efforts. Tailored with your needs in mind, these enhancements will continue to improve the way you do your job.
On behalf of all of us here at Aeries, we thank you for being a part of this journey. May the year ahead be the best one yet!
Aeries has grown immensely along its journey. In fact, much of our founder, Jerry D Lloyd Sr.’s, work was pivotal and instrumental in moving the student information industry forward. From the first use of student photographs in an SIS to the first plain paper scanning of attendance and grades to the first mapping of student addresses, it’s hard to think of an SIS today without these features. In fact, Aeries’ legacy of innovations is evident across our industry, even today.
So, how does a company continue to grow and stay ahead of the game? We pride ourselves in what makes our company different from others, and that starts with our employees who exemplify our core values. We also adhere to a set of fundamental beliefs that drive us to create a product that empowers users and promotes student success. Enter: Aeries Guiding Principles.
Our president, Brent Lloyd, introduced our Guiding Principles during his opening remarks at AeriesCon earlier this year. From Compliance to Partnerships, these principles help us stay true to our customers, our mission, and our vision. They lead our decision-making processes when it comes to new features, integrations, and ways to best support our end users.
When we want to launch a new feature, When we want to enhance our system, When we want to add a new integration to our list, When we want to collaborate with like-minded EdTech partners… Our guiding principles are what help us keep what matters most at the forefront of our decisions.
As we enter a new stage and transition into NextGen, remember: we are still Aeries, and these principles have always, and will always, hold true.
With NextGen, we’ve re-evaluated our path forward and realigned our plans with our Guiding Principles. For example, we’re living out our principle of Customer Centricity. Rather than building an entirely new SIS and introducing a complete transition for each of our customers, we have decided instead to modernize our code by feature or feature-set, resulting in as little disruption as possible. And we’re emphasizing our commitment to Innovation with this Feature-Based Modernization approach, which allows us to introduce exciting new technologies that are fully cloud-native and bring unprecedented functionality to our users
As Brent says, “The fundamental tenants of Aeries’ legacy are the driving factors that guide my leadership and our continued growth today. We remain dedicated to bringing forth the best innovations in the tech world to educators – the same way our founder did. With the ongoing involvement and feedback of our stakeholders along the way, we are confident these Guiding Principles will continue to drive student success!”
Over the next few months, we’ll be taking a deep dive into each of the principles, with a look at how they’re guiding our transformation into the next generation of Aeries, starting with our virtual AeriesCon session on Innovation, with our new VP of Product and Engineering, Jason Strong. We can’t wait for you to be a part of this journey, so be sure to register for Fall AeriesCon today!
