HELPFUL HINTS FOR GRADE REPORTING ~Our goal is to provide flexibility with accountability for all teachers of HomeLife Academy. ~ Topics include: Who Must Report Grades Logging In Set Up New School Year Report Grades/Attendance Optional Features EZ Form Credits for High School We See the Same Thing You See Paper Grades Forms How Do I Start? GRADE REPORTING TIME COMES TWICE PER YEAR! Well, it's ALMOST that time of the year again, time for grade reporting. But don't panic! Jan. 15th and June 15th are just a target dates. We are here to make it as smooth and painless as possible. We have included some helpful tips below. If you do not see the answer to your question please take a look at the FAQ from our website. Click here for Questions. HELPFUL HINTS    WHO MUST REPORT GRADES All HLA families who were enrolled prior to November 15th should report mid-year grades and attendance. If you enrolled after Nov. 15th, and transferring in from another school, you may wait until the June 15th target date to report year-end grades. NOTE: Starting in 2010, the most recent semester's grades and all those preceding will be required in order to re-enroll for the following school year. LOGGING IN The Member Login at the top of www.homelifeacademy.com IS NOW for grade reporting AS WELL AS other updates. It is for editing basic information, re-registration, and payments. It is also the place to submit a request for a number of things through the Request Manager. ~NOTE: EMAIL ADDRESS MUST BE THE SAME IN BOTH HSRO AND HomeLife Academy.~ Once you login make sure your email address is the same in the Family Information of HLA's Member Login and your grade reporting account with HomeSchool Reporting Online. This is the way the two accounts link together for easier navigation. If you forgot your password, you may enter your email address in the password reminder field. If you are not receiving a response from HSRO, it's possible you entered an email address the system does not recognize, or that the email response went straight to your junk mail/spam box. If you are still having trouble, please email records@homelifeacademy.com and we will be glad to help you. Additional tips for logging in: Passwords: Your username is your primarily email address. If you need to change your email address, you may do so through the member login. No Capitals: Never use capitals when entering your email or password. Be sure your Caps lock is turned off on your keyboard. AOL: If you have trouble and have AOL or Compuserve, try using Internet Explorer or Firefox to login. Please don't hesitate to contact us if you still have trouble. SET UP NEW SCHOOL YEAR If you have not already done so, please set up a NEW school year. When you enter your grades, please make sure that you are entering them under the correct school year. Please see the bottom of this email for more information on setting up a school year. REPORT GRADES/ATTENDANCE Be sure to select the current school year when reporting grades. Click Add Grade under the appropriate student for each subject. Credits are ONLY for high school students. Attendance may be estimated. Place a Y for days "attendance" and "N" for days off. You may keep attendance in HSRO or in your own personal teacher records. OPTIONAL FEATURES INCLUDE: Portfolio - Enter extra curricular activities here. Credits - Credits are only for High School level (more below). Lesson Plans - If you don't already have a place to enter your lesson plans, you can take advantage of this! Test Scores - Enter achievement test scores, as well as ACT/SAT scores! Transcript/Report Card - After entering your grades, you can print off your student's report card. Hours Spent -- This is something that other schools use, and is not necessary for our purposes. Textbook - You can enter the specific name of your textbook here. College, Honors, Advanced Placement -- This is an optional new feature using a weighted GPA scale. It is STILL under construction. You may use it but be aware the final GPA may change at a later date depending on state research being done and system changes to HSRO. PLEASE DO NOT USE: Consolidation - The consolidation button is used by other schools that use HSRO's services. It is not necessary for our purposes. Edit -- Please do not use this feature to enter your new grades. You can only use this feature to edit previous grades. Delete: Please DO NOT delete any previous grades, school years, or any student information (even if that student is no longer enrolled with HLA). EZ FORM IS FOR END OF YEAR The EZ FORM IS FOR SEMESTER 2 GRADES (or Quarter 2-4grades) -- If you entered first semester grades (or first-third quarters) the EZ FORM allows you to simply add the grades in for the final semester or quarter. Just click "EZ FORM" under you student's name and you will see fields for entering grades. So be sure to EDIT each grade after using the EZ FORM and enter the appropriate credit amount. CREDITS ARE ONLY FOR HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS Credit value for each course is only needed for High School. For more information on High School credits and planning click here. Any previous high school credits from your former school should be entered into HSRO. If not, please contact the Records department, and we will enter them for you. WE SEE THE SAME THING YOU SEE Once you report grades we see the same thing you do. There is nothing else to do but click save. You can log back in anytime as a FAMILY and we can log in anytime as a SCHOOL. Our side of things has a few additional features, like an official transcript, but they are basically the same. Call or write anytime if you have question and we can simply login to our School HSRO account, pull up your grades, and quickly answer your questions. As a school administrator this is the best resource for record keeping that I have found. Our school is incredibly organized thanks to HSRO! AS ALWAYS, YOU ARE WELCOME TO MAIL IN GRADE FORMS If you are having computer problems or would simply prefer to mail in your grades, paper grade forms are available. Either use a friend's computer or library computer to download a grade form from our web site, or call us and we will mail you as many as you need. Once a paper grade form is received in our office, our staff enters the grades into your account and sends you an email letting you know they are available for viewing.   How do I start entering grades? The last step of registration allowed you to pre-register for HomeSchoolReportingOnline (HSRO). If you did not click that button to pre-register it is not difficult to register with HSRO now. HSRO is a separate site that our site links to for all our record keeping needs. We are so grateful to HSRO for its instant online grade reporting services. Below are the steps for getting started on the Grade reporting side of things. Just give us a call if you need help. Once you do it the first time and get the hang of it it's easy from there on! 1. SIGN UP (NOTE: If you are already HAVE AN HSRO ACCOUNT, have set up your school year, and/or added students, please skip to the appropriate step below.) First, go to http://www.homeschoolreporting.com (HSRO) and click SIGN UP at the top of the page and enter your information. Ignore the information about a 30 trial and $20 a year. HSRO serves individual homeschoolers as well as schools. Your registration fee for HSRO is included in the fees you paid to HomeLife Academy. After you click SIGN UP you'll be taken to a simple, one-page form. Red asterisks * indicate mandatory fields. Be sure to choose HomeLife Academy as your Umbrella/Cover school. Skip the HSLDA Discount Code, Umbrella / Cover Account #, and Hours in Attendance Day. Those fields are used by other schools. Once you click SAVE you will be sent a password by email. Check your email and proceed to step two. 2. MEMBER LOGON Now you are ready to LOGON. Before you can submit grades you must first go to member login of HLA. Your username is your primary email address. Your password was emailed to you when you went through SIGN UP on HomeSchoolReportingOnline or finished the HLA registration process. If you do not remember your password for HSRO just enter your email address and click "Remind Me." Then check your email for your password. Once you are logged in you are ready to setup your school year. 3. SETUP SCHOOL YEAR Once you LOGON the first step is to set up your school year. If you have not set up your school year here are the steps. (1) Click Setup School Year at the top of the page. (2) Under "Existing School Year(s)" click Add Record. (3) Follow the instructions to enter beginning and ending dates for your semesters or quarters (use quarters if you teach year-around). NOTE: Estimating the dates is permitted. Remember my favorite quote: "Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire." -William Butler Yeats. If the fires are lit you will find that your students will easily exceed 180 days of education per year. (4) Click SAVE SEMESTERS. 4. ADD STUDENTS Once your school year is setup the next step is to click Add Student. Add all your students who are registered with HomeLife Academy. You do not need to re-enter existing student's information. This only pertains to newly enrolled students. 5. ADD GRADE (REPORT GRADES) Final step is to Report Grades and Attendance. Click "Add Grade" to enter the Subjects and Grades. (Note: Listing the "Textbook" and "Hours Spent" is optional. And listing the "Credits" is only required for High School.) Repeat this step for each subject and for each student. See above hints. 6. ATTENDANCE You are not required to keep detailed daily attendance records. However, we do ask that you record total days of attendance. There is a feature in homeschoolreporting.com that allows you to enter days of attendance by placing a "Y" for yes and an "N" for no for each day of the school year. Currently there is not a programming option for you to just enter the total days of attendance without entering a "Y" for each day. However, it's easy to enter "Y", Tab, "Y", Tab, "Y", Tab, etc. until your days equal the desired amount. If you do not keep up with the entries for each day, that is ok. You may go back and estimate. The important thing is that the total days of attendance number at the bottom be at least 180 days at the end of the school year. If your student missed days due to sickness you may record fewer days. However, it is up to you whether to repeat the school year. For information about attendance click here. 7. PORTFOLIO The Portfolio features are optional. We're happy that HSRO makes them available, however, because it's a great place to enter activities as you see fit. It's up to each teacher to decide how (and if) to use the Portfolio. We recommend the Portfolios more for High School than anything else, because many colleges and universities are impressed with a list of extra curricular activities that a student accomplished in grades 9-12. Sometimes the list (sort of like a resume) of activities, clubs, field trips, special projects, accomplishments, etc. can tip the scales in your favor. It's a great addition to the High School Transcript. And all we have to do is print it and send it with the transcript when you get ready to start enrolling in colleges. Our goal is to provide flexibility with accountability for all teachers of HomeLife Academy. If you have questions or suggestions, please contact records@homelifeacademy.com. Thank you. CLICK HERE FOR MORE GRADE REPORTING QUESTIONS     Contact Information email: records@homelifeacademy.com phone: 888-560-0774