Release 23.9.0.0 - October 2023

Interventions

An Interventions module is introduced in Unified Insights featuring two new dashboards.

Intervention Overview

The Intervention Overview dashboard offers a range of categorizations for logged interventions. It contains the following metrics:

• Metric “How many active interventions are there for each type and level?” provides a detailed distribution of active interventions categorized by type and level.

• A heatmap metric named “How many students are being served in each level of support?” helps users determine how students are distributed across intervention tiers and provides categorization based on the type of intervention.

• Metric “How many active interventions are there for each type and subtype?” helps users gain insight into the distribution of active interventions categorized by type and subtype.

• Metric “How many interventions have been completed for each type and subtype?” helps users gain insight into the distribution of created interventions based on types and subtypes.

Intervention List

The Intervention List dashboard contains the following metrics:

• Metric block “Active Interventions” displays the total number of interventions that are in an active state, based on the filters applied to the dashboard.

• Metric block “Interventions in Planning” displays the total number of interventions in a saved state that have not yet been started, based on the filters applied to the dashboard.

• Metric block “Completed Interventions” displays the total number of completed interventions based on the filters applied to the dashboard.

• Metric “Intervention List” provides detailed information about individual interventions.

Data Filters

A new set of data filters is included in the Intervention dashboards to filter by intervention level, type, subtype, funding, and withdrawal reasons. The filters allow users to refine the dashboard metrics to gain specific intervention insights.

Drill to Intervention List

Users can right-click metric elements on the Intervention Overview dashboard and navigate to a detailed intervention list with a more granular view at the intervention level.

Student Intervention List (Classroom)

Within the Classroom module, metric “Student Intervention List” on the Interventions dashboard provides detailed information about a teacher’s student interventions. The list can be filtered by intervention level, type, and subtype.

Note: The previous version of MTSS allowed you to complete interventions even if students were an in “Enroll” status. Although this bug has been rectified, if older interventions exist where the intervention was completed without marking every student as Complete/Withdrawn, you will see blank values against the students with “Enroll” Status in the Student Drill List.

Student Datawall

A new Student Datawall dashboard has been added under Essentials, Students. The dashboard compiles student demographics, scores, attendance, and behavior records into navigable columns.

The layout allows for data filtering and data export to Microsoft Excel for further analysis.

The Student Datawall table allows prompt access to student information, enabling decision-making and tailored support approaches.

Users can select students based on the filters applied or by selecting the appropriate checkboxes and add them to an intervention or group. Groups are managed similar to the Student List table.

District Configuration

Added new District Configuration options for customer-defined Course Subject and Action Type mapping along with the pre-defined values in the combo-field:

• Utility Apps, District Configuration, Academics, Course Subjects

• Utility Apps, District Configuration, Behavior, Action Type

Application

New flag to use home language

Customers can now read the student’s home language as the student’s language instead of the primary language through the Unified Insights backend configuration.

Application

Updated PDF export file

When exporting metric data to a PDF document, the title, subtitle, and page footer are now displayed in the exported file.

Behavior

Updated Behavior mapping

Customers can now send incident data configured as ProblemBehavior within the SIS behavior log entry. Through Unified Insights, they can enable a back-end flag named “LogEntriesOption1_with_ProblemBehavior” to include the ProblemBehavior incident data in metrics.

Classroom, Assessments

Updated metric labels and titles

"This Year" and "Last Year” labels on metric “Who gained, stuck, and slid between ELA testing years?” on the Gainers, Stickers, and Sliders dashboard were replaced with school year labels. In addition, metric titles and subtitles were updated to maintain consistency across Essentials and Classroom dashboards.

Classroom, My Students

New benchmark metrics

The following metrics were added to the My Students Overview dashboard:

• “How are students performing on the ELA benchmark assessment?”

• “How are students performing on the Math benchmark assessment?”

Demographics

Updated state-specific query (AL)

The state-specific query logic has been updated for Alabama (AL) under the AWS environment for the following fields:

• ELL

• IEP

• Gifted

• Home Language

• Homeless

• Plan 504

• Title 1

• Unaccompanied Youth

Demographics

Updated state-specific query (VA)

The query logic for Virginia (VA) has been updated for the below fields for AWS and Azure environments:

• ELL

• IEP

• Gifted

• Homeless

• Migrant

• Plan 504

• Title1

Demographics

Updated state-specific query (VT)

The query logic for Vermont (VT) has been updated for the below fields with S_VT_REN_X table to pull the historical data for both Azure and AWS:

• Homeless

• Plan504

• SWD/ IEP

• Title1

• UnAccYouth

Developer Tools

Improved performance and navigation

To improve initial load time, the Developer Tools default page now displays the site’s About details rather than render a dashboard.

In addition, the option to direct users to Developer Tools immediately after login has been removed.

District Configuration

Custom data mappings

In addition to the predefined values, users can now add custom data mappings to the following District Configuration settings:

• Academics, Course Subjects

• Incidents, Action Type

To add a mapping, enter the new value in the text-combo field.

Demographics

State-specific food service flag

Customers can now extract a student's F&RL status data from a state-specific field if it is not available at PowerSchool SIS.

Essentials, Academics

New date filter

A multi-select Grading Period filter was added to the following Academics dashboards and their respective detail pages:

• Standard by Grades

• School Standard Progress

• Student Standard Progress

Essentials, Academics

New metric column

The Course Subject column was added to the detail list for the following dashboards and metrics:

• Standards by Grade: “Standards Proficiency by Grade”

• School Standard Progress:

  • “How are students performing on district standards by grade?”

  • “How are students performing on district standards?”

Essentials, Assessment

Selected school year in metric title

The selected year filter is now reflected in the title of subject analysis and distribution charts on the “Subject Analysis” and “Disproportionality" State dashboards.

Essentials, Attendance

New School detail columns

On the Chronic Absences dashboard, columns “# of Students” and “% of Students” were added to the School detail list for the following metrics:

• “Do We Have Students that are Close to Being Chronically Absent?”

• “Which schools have the most chronically absent students?”       

Essentials, Behavior

New data filter

Added a new Date Range data filter to the Incident Analysis dashboard.

Essentials, Enrollment

Updated enrollment withdrawals base

The enrollment withdrawals base was updated for metric “How has our student withdrawals patterns changed year over year?” to consider withdrawals across a five-year span.

Essentials

Risk Analysis

Updated metric logic

The logic for metric “What is the change in action usage by year?” was updated on the following dashboards to include all Action types:

• Essentials, Behavior, Behavior Overview

• Risk Analysis, Trends, Behavior

Essentials / Student Profile, Attendance

New and optimized metrics

The following metrics were added to the Student Profile Attendance Overview dashboard:

• “Attendance Trends by Month”

• “Day of Week Absences”

In addition, queries for the following metrics were optimized to increase performance:

• Essentials, Attendance, Attendance Overview: “Attendance Trends By Month”

• Essentials, Attendance, Attendance Overview: “Period Attendance”

• Student Profile, Attendance Detail: “Attendance Trends By Month”

• Student Profile, Attendance Detail: “Period Attendance”

Risk Analysis, Graduation Probability

Display Risk Standing cards

The Risk Standing cards are now displayed on the Students at Risk dashboard.

Risk Analysis, Graduation Probability

Removed drill options

On the School-wide Risk dashboard, drill links were removed from all grade columns in metric “What is the average graduation probability for each grade and school?”

Risk Analysis, Graduation Probability

Updated metric

Metric “What is the average graduation probability for each grade and school?” on the School-Wide Risk dashboard now displays annual grade level data instead of the current grade.

Student Profile, Academic Detail

Updated Course logic

Some course names and course subjects no longer display as @err in metrics on the Academic Detail page.

Student Profile, Behavior

Duplicate incident listings

Resolved an issue with duplicate incident listings in metric “Discipline Incident History“ on the Behavior Detail dashboard.

Student Profile, Student Readiness Detail

New Student Readiness metric

A new metric named “What are the total credits earned across different Course Subjects?” was added to the Student Readiness Details page on the Student Profile dashboard.

Student Readiness, Credits

Cumulative credit values

All metrics now display cumulative credit values on the Student Credit Progress dashboard.

Student Readiness, Credits

New metrics for fine arts, world language, and other core courses

The following metrics were added to the Student Credit Progress dashboard:

• “What are the total credits earned by grade level for Fine Arts?"

• “What are the total credits earned by grade level for World Language?”

• "What are the total credits earned by grade level for Other?"

Student Readiness, Credits

Updated detail pages

The Detail pages of all metrics on the Student Credit Progress dashboard have been updated as follows:

• The “# OF STUDENTS” and “SUBJECT AREA” columns were removed.

• The “CREDITS EARNED” column was renamed to “[Subject Area] CREDITS EARNED.”

Student Readiness, Post Secondary

Updated sort order

The year is now sorted in ascending order for the following metrics on the College Graduation dashboard:

• “Which high schools are responsible for the most 4-year college graduates?”

• “Which high schools are responsible for the most non-4-year college graduates?”

Usage

Added Risk Analysis run date

The Usage dashboard now displays the latest Risk Analysis prediction run date in YYYY-MM-DD format.

Usage, Performance

Updated District Admin access and ETL run date

District administrators now have access to the Performance dashboard.

In addition, the Usage dashboard now displays the latest dashboard refresh date in YYYY-MM-DD format.

Application

Dashboard load time issue

The dashboard’s initial load time was improved with new display rules and query optimization.

Application

Dashboard navigation issue

The code has been updated to address an issue where mismatched menu paths resulted in the dashboard navigation pane not displaying correctly. Now, the top-level menu appears with lower-level menus when a mid-level menu is not included.

Application

Incorrect rendering of x-axis

Resolved an issue where the chart metric axis dividers were rendering incorrectly after zooming in and out of the metric.

Application

Label rotation Issue

Fixed an issue where a cached width resulted in the rotation of labels for the Highcharts axis.

Application

PDF download version does not match screen layout

When a user removed columns from an HTML table and then printed to PDF, the removed columns were included in the PDF. This issue was corrected, and the PDF now displays the current view of the HTML table.

Application

Updated logo configuration options for the default login page

Login pages can now conditionally be sourced from an internal set of pages that are less exposed to the client, so PowerSchool can make updates without overriding customer settings.

Application

Updated style template

The interactive Box Whisker style template was updated to ensure the border and body of the box and whiskers within the chart inherit the color palette from the subgroup to display the metric to match the subgroup legend.

Application, Palettes

Color picker issue

Fixed an issue with the color selection slider in the Color Palette Chooser application.  Users can now correctly update condition sets without entering HEX color codes.          

Application, Palettes

Color resets to white in Color Palette Chooser

Fixed an issue where adding a new color using the color picker resulted in the previous color being reset to white.

District Configuration, Enrollment

Updated student status to include data from all school years

Updated the District Configuration, Enrollment, Student Status settings to display and update all school years, which previously only displayed current school year values.

District Config, Schools

Updated sort order

School names are now sorted alphabetically on the Schools configuration page.

Essentials, Academics

Updated sort order

The school year is now sorted in ascending order on the following Academics dashboards and metrics:

• Subjects Summary: “Science Pass Rate”

• Core Subjects Summary: “ELA Pass Rate,” “Math Pass Rate,” and “Studies Pass Rate”

Essentials, Attendance

Incorrect student attendance data

Fixed a data warehouse ETL issue that caused incorrect student attendance data on the dashboards.

Essentials, Attendance

Updated metric block

Metric block Year-to-date Attendance on the Attendance Overview dashboard now displays 100% when there is no data present, similar to the other attendance metric blocks.

Essentials, Digital Learning

Updated sort order

On the Staff Activity dashboard, the school year is now sorted in ascending order for metric “Is Staff Logins Decreasing Week Over Week?”

Essentials / Classroom, Attendance

Updated color coding

To maintain consistency, the color coding of Attendance-related Chronic metric blocks was updated across Essentials and Classroom.

Essentials / Classroom, Digital Learning

Incorrect student activity data

Updated the query logic to resolve an issue with data not loading correctly in the Student Activity Data Wall dashboard.

Essentials / Classroom, Digital Learning

Updated sort order

The “# OF LOGINS“ column is now sorted in ascending order on the following metrics:

• Essentials, Digital Learning, Student Outcomes: “Does LMS Participation Affect Student’s Grades?”

• Classroom, Digital Learning, Student Outcomes: “Does LMS Participation Affect Student’s Grades?”

Reporting, Attendance and Behavior

Incorrect grade level

The Attendance and Behavior power grid only displayed the current grade level. The metric now displays the correct student grade level.

Risk Analysis, Proximity to Cut Score

Incorrect cutpoint proximity

The definition for the Cutpoint Proximity column was updated to fix incorrect data on metric “What are students proximity to the nearest graduation probability cutpoint?“

Student Profile

Dynamic y-axis

The y-axis of the following dashboard metrics is now dynamic:

• Overview, “Student Attendance Trend”

• Attendance Detail, “Attendance Trends By Month”

Student Profile, Attendance Detail

Updated sort order

On the Attendance Detail dashboard, the YEAR and DATE columns are now sorted in descending order for metric “Period Absence History.”

Student Readiness, Credits

Updated graduation cohorts

The Credit Progress dashboard now displays all active and enrolled students in the current graduation cohort as well as the prior two and upcoming three graduation cohorts.

Usage

Additional user access

Other user roles, in addition to district administrators, can now access the Usage dashboards.