SchoolStatus Acquires Operoo; Accelerates Vision to Build World’s Leading Unified K-12 Analytics, Communications, and Workflow Platform

RIDGELAND, Miss., Oct. 27, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — SchoolStatus, a leading provider of an education communications platform designed to improve student outcomes through data and parent engagement, announced today the acquisition of Operoo, a privately-held, Australia-based company that provides one of the most widely-used cloud-based solutions for online school forms, medical data, and trip management.

SchoolStatus will acquire Operoo in its entirety, fully incorporating Operoo’s operations, technology, and team into SchoolStatus, including 27 employees and over a thousand customers in Australia, Europe, and North America. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Operoo enables thousands of schools, clubs, and associations around the world to automate, manage, and track operational tasks from a single cloud-based platform. The company offers digital workflows for a range of routine processes – which are often manual, disconnected and paper-based – including distributing and collecting parental consent, payments, medical and emergency information, student registration, staff onboarding, policy management, incident reporting, activity and group management, paperless school trips, and more. …Read More

As Schools Look to Tackle the Stressors Educators Face this School Year they are Turning to Aperture Education’s EdSERT Program

Charlotte N.C. (Oct. 29, 2021) — Social and emotional learning (SEL) is a significant focus for schools this year, yet too often teachers don’t have enough opportunities for SEL training or to reflect on their own SEL skills. To address this, more and more schools are turning to the SEL professional development program, EdSERT, by Aperture Education.

EdSERT, short for Educator Social-Emotional Reflection and Training, helps educators enhance their own social and emotional skills and improve their SEL teaching practices. Aperture has reported a significant increase in customers using the program this year including:

The Memphis Teacher Residency (MTR) which is using EdSERT in its teacher preparation program to better equip educators to teach SEL in the classroom.…Read More

4 simple steps to help students build resilience and confidence

We’ve all heard the expression “we’re in the same boat”–however, I heartily agree with those who are brave enough to argue no–we are all in different boats in the same storm. I’d extend that metaphor for the gradual return to in-person instruction.

During each school day, students and teachers are in the same boat. It is up to teachers to build the best boat for all their student passengers, while remaining aware that every individual brings different baggage when they come aboard.

The 2021-22 school year started with children who come with a whole gamut of effects from a variety of stressors, including the pandemic, social unrest, and polarization. To provide support, school leaders are prioritizing social-emotional learning (SEL) and trauma-informed education–with a particular focus on student well-being, as evidenced by myriad articles, webinars, and resources centered around mindfulness and stress management.…Read More

As schools share best practices, equity can emerge from the pandemic

Another school year is underway, and many of you may be feeling an overwhelming sense of déjà vu. Pandemic preparedness, mask mandates, quarantines–it’s starting to sound a lot like where we were last fall. But, luckily, it’s not.

Our public schools are not where they were at the start of the last school year. In fact, in terms of investment in new teaching and learning capabilities and student supports, we are currently leaps ahead of where we were in fall 2019, too–a not-so-distant past. Pushed by the pandemic, school systems and learners acquired new skills at a rapid pace. If we help them learn from each other and keep building upon these innovations, we will be in a new and better place this time next year.

This is the lesson of our recent white paper, “Launching Forward: Leveraging Pandemic Innovations to Advance School Systems.” In our research, we looked across U.S. school systems and found that through the hardship has come considerable growth. We didn’t want those lessons learned and innovations made to be lost; we didn’t want the hardship to be for naught.…Read More

5 ways bullying changed during the pandemic

Throughout my career as a school counselor, I’ve worked with students in a variety of educational settings. This includes alternative and charter schools, traditional brick-and-mortar settings, and online school.

Even though they’re all different, I’ve witnessed similar bullying behavior and trends in each of them.

Here are five ways bullying has changed during the pandemic–and one way it’s stayed the same:…Read More

How social and emotional competence leads to educational equity

Educational equity is achieved by equipping students with tools to overcome some of the pre-existing barriers that impede their ability to succeed in school and thrive. Although educational equity was a priority in many school districts prior to the events of the past year and a half, talks surrounding the initiative have amped up–of the 10 largest school districts in the United States, eight now identify equity as part of their mission statements or core values.

Achieving educational equity requires multiple strategies and initiatives because the sources of inequity are so numerous and varied. One of the most important strategies is the promotion of students’ social and emotional competence (SEC).

First, we must understand how equity is defined. Recently, Jagers, Rivas-Drake, and Borowski asserted that educational equity “means that every student has access to the resources and educational rigor they need” (2018, p.1). Similarly, the Center for Public Education stated that, “equity is achieved when all students receive the resources they need so they graduate prepared for success after high school” (2016, p. 1). Both definitions make clear that the focus of educational equity efforts needs to be on the individual student. Equity is achieved when every (Jagers et. al) or all (CPE) students can benefit from education.…Read More

Using the rule of threes for a technology strategy

As the new school year starts amid fresh uncertainty, educators are grappling with how to navigate what I’ve come to call the “And Era.” The And Era is not about going only remote or returning to purely in-person experiences, but adopting the best of both. While many schools are bringing kids back into classrooms this year, the spread of the Delta variant and other factors out of their control mean they must again be prepared to support a mix of virtual and in-person learning.

That means focusing on what they can control–developing and deploying a strong technology strategy that will give them the agility to combine varying degrees of in-person and remote elements into a seamless learning experience. The heart of that strategy should center around three interdependent components: hardware, software, and the network.

While the stakes are enormous, the American Rescue Plan (ARP) and its $130 billion in new K-12 funding offers great hope that schools will be able to secure the technology, expertise- and resources they need to build an educational infrastructure for the next generation. Given the possibility that many students will spend one-fourth of their learning journey under these trying circumstances, making best use of those funds to implement a thoughtful technology strategy is more important than ever.…Read More

3 strategies to support students during science instruction

While the start of the 2021 school year may not be as crazy as the beginning of the 2020 school year, it would be a mistake to pretend it is just like the Fall of 2019 or earlier.  As COVID-19 continues to linger across the country, educators are again demonstrating the “can do” attitude and the spirit of innovation they exhibited at the height of the pandemic.

However, the rise of the Delta variant and other complicating social and political factors have brought us to a new phase in the pandemic that will require a new level of flexibility from classroom teachers. 

In conversations with science educators across the country, I’ve identified three specific strategies science teachers are using to meet the needs of students in today’s uncertain environment.  Those strategies are:…Read More

What teachers and parents should know about ransomware

In the face of continued uncertainty related to the pandemic, families like mine prepared for a return to school that still looked a little bit more like normal this year. For many parents, teachers and caregivers who struggled through a year of remote learning, with all of its online homework assignments and Zoom classes, this has been a major relief.

In my case, and admittedly more so for my superhero wife, last year involved the all-but-impossible task of wrangling 6- and 8-year-old children in front of a screen two to three times a day and somehow keeping them there through bathroom break requests and hunger pangs that only conveniently cropped up during online learning sessions.

It also meant enforcing dedicated “asynchronous learning” time for children who desperately need synchronous learning routines alongside their friends to conform to normal classroom behavior (i.e. “If my friends are paying attention, maybe I should too”). Now throw in the added complication that our children’s school had no way of restricting access to apps or websites such as YouTube on their school-issued devices, and the parenting intensity meter just about redlines.    …Read More

5 workable scenarios for flexible pandemic learning

We all thought and hoped we were out of the COVID woods, but the rise of the Delta variant left school districts, parents, and teachers rethinking their back-to-school plans. The first wave of the coronavirus left children fairly unscathed, but this new variant is something different.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Delta variant is more than twice as contagious as previous variants and current evidence suggests it might cause more severe illness in unvaccinated people. This is particularly worrisome for parents and educators because children under 12 have not yet been allowed to be vaccinated.

During the first shutdown, schools learned a lot about how to effectively deploy remote and hybrid learning set-ups. According to the Center for American Progress, in the 20-21 school year, 74 percent of the 100 largest school districts in the U.S. chose remote learning only as their back-to-school instructional model. This impacted more than 9 million students.…Read More

How administrators can address mental health and physical safety this fall

With the academic year underway, K-12 schools have resumed in-person learning. However, there is growing concern amongst parents, students, teachers, and faculty that reopenings come with a variety of safety and health risks. Threats of public violence, mental health concerns, uncertainty around the Delta variant, and more all stand in the way of educators having a successful school year.

A recent survey found that 57 percent of respondents are “extremely or very concerned” that a post-pandemic crisis could affect their safety or the safety of a loved one in a school environment. When combined with the knowledge that students are under significant mental health stress and that many younger learners are still unvaccinated, administrators should think carefully about how best to ensure a safe return to classrooms. 

The key lies in putting tools, strategies, and policies in place today that ease concerns and minimize risk. By taking the proper steps, schools can focus on creating healthy learning environments for students rather than worrying about the safety challenges at hand.…Read More

iTutor’s Virtual Quarantine Classroom Offers Educational Lifeline for COVID-Affected South Carolina and New York Students

As many as 2,000 students on any given day this school year in Richland Two (South Carolina) and other school districts, and, in partnership with PNW BOCES, across the state of New York — required to quarantine at home because of COVID-related concerns — have been able to continue their studies uninterrupted, thanks to iTutor and its new Virtual Quarantine Classroom service featuring live, online, instruction provided by state-certified teachers.

In the Richland Two School District, Columbia, SC, iTutor is serving all 24 elementary schools, providing group classes in ELA and Math for eight hours each week throughout the school year. Students begin receiving academic support within 24 hours of starting their quarantine at home.

“iTutor’s Virtual Quarantine Classroom has been an important partner in ensuring that students continue to receive premier learning experiences even when they must be away from school due to the pandemic,” said Richland Two Superintendent Dr. Baron R. Davis.…Read More