iParent keeps watch over students

JOEL DAVIDSON/Frontiersman reporter

MAT-SU - The days of sneaking out of class to play hooky without mom or dad ever knowing are coming to an end.

Thanks to an online student information system, which was implemented districtwide this year, the Mat-Su Borough School District can now track each of its nearly 15,000 students on an hourly basis. With the new system, parents and guardians can monitor kids from work or home, throughout the day.

Features of the program include information on daily attendance, tardies, disciplinary infractions, grade reports, immunizations, homework assignments and dozens of additional facts about each student's academic career.

"Parents love the program," said Marie Burton, director of management information services for the school district. "It provides communication from classroom to parent, every day if they want."

Accessing the information occurs online through a system called SchoolMax, a program that was chosen by a committee of staff members from every school in the district.

Parents use the system through a feature called iParent, which allows them to enter their name and password before accessing detailed records about their children. The information is protected by a secure Internet line and continually updated by teachers and school administrators throughout the day.

Keeping watch from a distance

Maximus, the company that provides iParent, is one of America's largest government services companies, providing information technology.

More than 1,400 school districts now use Maximus services, and with faster-paced lifestyles and busy schedules, Burton said iParent is needed now more than ever before.

Many kids spend six hours a day at school and another hour on the bus before coming home. Others remain at school even longer with sports and extracurricular activities.

"We have dual working families and bigger issues in schools," Burton said. "It's a more complicated society, and parents and teachers don't have as much time. This kind of communication makes things easier."

Through the new system, parents can see their child's attendance, discipline and academic histories as well as transcript information that includes class rank and grade-point average.

Sue Allen, who teaches physical education at Wasilla High School, said iParent is mostly a tool that assists parents who are already involved and participating in their child's education. Uninvolved parents generally stay uninvolved, she said.

Real-time information

For generations, teachers have kept attendance and grades in giant spiral-bound notebooks. They contained pages of handwritten information that was usually only disclosed during parent-teacher conferences and at report card time. Each day, teachers stood in front of the class with their grade books, marking absences and tardies before beginning the period.

When the day was done, teachers pored over tests and homework papers, recording every letter grade into those thick volumes.

Teachers still keep track of grades and record information, but now they enter it right into the computer, where parents can see it almost instantly.

"Parents don't have to wait for progress slips three or four weeks into the quarter to see how their kids are doing," Burton said. "Teachers update the information every day and attendance is updated every period, so this is live data."

Working out the kinks and keeping up

to date

As with all new systems, iParent is not without its hang-ups. Funded with $200,000 of state and federal grants, the program was first piloted by Academy Charter School and Wasilla High School in the spring of 2004.

Currently, most schools in the district use the system or plan to by the end of January.

While it provides the convenience of modern technology, it also presents challenges.

Eva Parsons has taught at Wasilla High School for 22 years. She noted that the new system has problems factoring tests and final exams, which are sometimes worth 10 to 20 percent of a student's overall grade.

"There are a few kinks in the program and apparently we will have to do that by hand," she said. "The way we are used to tabulating is not the way the computer works, so this is a little bit of a live-and-learn thing."

Inconvenience also occurs when the Internet server goes down.

"If the computer goes down when you're entering information, things get lost sometimes, and that's why I tell the kids that they still need to keep all their papers," Parsons said. "Sometimes we make mistakes, too, and type in a 10 instead of a 100. That's why I tell kids to keep their notebooks."

Overall, Parsons said teachers generally like the new technology, but she said it can be difficult at times to enter all the information right away.

"I don't know if parents realize how big the pile is that we have to enter," she said, "but overall I think it is workable once everyone gets used to it."

Students feel the watchful eye

Parents, teachers and administrators may enjoy keeping watch over their students with the new technology, but the kids themselves have mixed feelings.

"Children aren't as thrilled with it," Burton said. "A lot of parents find out about it and are excited, but the kids just go, 'Uh oh.'"

Mark Okeson, Wasilla High School's assistant principal, said parents now come in for a conference about their child's behavior and already have a good idea about what's been happening.

"Students aren't always wild about parents having access to their information," Okeson said. "But it's not always easy to rely on young people to give us accurate information."

Okeson said iParent can be used as a motivational tool to get kids headed in the right direction.

"It's a great way for technology to be used in the schools," he said.

Arlin Welch, who is a junior this year, said iParent can be a little disturbing for students because parents can easily see if their kid is late or absent from class.

Sophomore Ayla Brown, however, said iParent is a tool for students as well as parents.

If parents give their kids the access codes, the students can go online and check homework or see how they are doing in other areas.

"It's a good way to see if you're missing anything," Brown said.

Plugging parents in

According to school officials, iParent is still unknown to many parents in the district. Those interested in using the service may contact the principal at their child's school and request an iParent access key. They may also contact district headquarters in Palmer at 761-4042.

Parsons said she thinks the new technology will help certain individuals get more involved with their child's education.

"There's more middle-of-the-road parents who are involved now," she said. "They realize that they can just be sitting at the computer at 10 o'clock at night and check up on their students."

Contact Joel Davidson at joel.davidson@frontiersman.com.