For teachers, especially those managing multiple classes, determining which families are not engaging - either because they have not received a direct message or they have not responded to messages - can be arduous and time-consuming. This difficulty makes it challenging to effectively recognize and address the obstacles preventing family engagement.
To remove this barrier and make it easier for teachers to ensure they are reaching and engaging with all families, we are introducing new family engagement insights and tracking for teachers as part of the July 2024 update to TalkingPoints for Teachers (web).
FAQs
When will the new family engagement insights for teachers be available?
The new feature will be activated for teachers starting in July 2024.
Who will have access to the family engagement insights?
The new feature will be available for teachers associated with a partner school or district on their TalkingPoints for Teachers (web version) home page. Note: Non-rostered staff will not see this data on their homepage.
What family engagement data is shown and why?
The new section on the teacher home page will surface key information about families that are not being engaged to make it easier to initiate or reinitiate contact.
The family engagement trackers make it easy for teachers to see family engagement data in two areas (see image below).
The first section will show the number of families that have not received an outbound direct message in the last 30 days.
In this case, if any family contact for a student has received a direct message then that student’s family would not be shown as having no direct message.
This data can serve as a good reminder that not every family has heard directly from the teacher. It is an easy-to-use snapshot of which families have only received announcements or no messages at all.
The second tracker will show the number of families that have not responded to an outbound message in the last 30 days.
As noted above, if any family contact for a student has responded to an outbound message then they will not be included in the “not responded” count and list.
This data can surface those families that may need additional attention or confirmation that messages are getting through (phone number is up to date for example)
How does it work?
As shown in the image above, the family engagement data will show on the teacher homepage within TalkingPoints for Teachers.
From each section, the teacher can quickly get to the list of families by selecting the “See List” button.
From the list of families, the teacher can easily select all or some of the families to send a direct message - making it simple to initiate or reinitiate two-way family and teacher engagement.
If all families have received a direct message in the last 30 days, the “see list” button changes to “nice work”.
How are “families” defined for the purpose of determining those who have not responded or those who have not had a direct message?
The data is based on a student, not an individual contact so the tracker is looking at a family as a student profile + all contacts associated with the student. The data is always “if at least one contact received a direct message” or “if at least one contact responded”. For example:
If a student has two contacts--one with an invalid number and one with a valid number--and the teacher sends a direct message to both contacts, that family wouldn't be in the “didn't receive count” even though the invalid number could never get a message.
If a student only has one contact whose phone number is invalid, they would continue to show up as not having received a direct message until the number is changed.