The files are ready and available to bring student information directly into EasyGrade Pro for each of your classes. The import process will take you 10 minutes total and result in all student names, ID numbers, gender, grade level, Counselor of record, email, parent email, and a password for EasyGrade Pro web-posted grade reports for all of your students. It may sound complicated (and parts are), but it is a once-a- year time-saver. Please send an email, instant message, or drop by my office in the Beta Lab if you have any questions or need any help.
Please note that students are still changing their schedules, and any schedule change made after today will need to be made manually, by you, to your Gradebook. The changes will be made automatically to the information stored in Schoolmaster.
When you are ready to import student information into EasyGrade Pro, there are three general steps. I've tried to lay the steps out as clearly as possible below, but if you'd rather a video to walk you through the process, you can try this:
[If you'd like that video in a smaller, separate window, right-click on the link and choose "Open Link in New Window" (or whatever your particular browser happens to call the function).]
First, you'll need to know the Course ID numbers for your Year-long and Fall classes; ignore your Spring classes for the time being. To find these Course IDs, use Schoolmaster, and under File go to Staff. Select your own name and click "Okay" to see the courses that you are teaching. I would write the IDs down along with each course name and period.
Second, you'll need to download to your desktop the import files. Open the Academics shared folder and then open the "EGP Import Spring 2009" folder. Inside that folder, scroll down the list to your last name and drag to your desktop the files for the classes that you are teaching this semester/ year. (Again, I would ignore the Spring semester classes at this point.)
Third, open the EasyGrade Pro program. You should be prompted to create a new gradebook as below.
Create a new filename and save location, and click "Save"
Select "Import Classes" as above, and and then "Easy Import" of Students as below; click "Next"
Type in the name and period of your first class, select Term 1, and click "OK" The next screen will look a little different to everybody, but all we're trying to do is select the import file on your desktop for your first class; we had dragged this file from the Academics shared folder in step 1.
Next, we need to tell EasyGrade Pro what each element in the database is. This is a one-time operation. Starting with this blank window, we'll move through to the completed window:
Type Zeus in the text field, then in the right-half of the window, use the drop-down menu to identify each of the elements in the left-side of the window. For example, the first thing we see is the student's last name, so use the drop-down menu to select "Last Name"; the next field is the student's first name, so use the right-hand drop-down menu to select "First Name". Two oddities are: using Student Custom 1 for the student's grade level, and using Student Custom 2 for the Counselor of Record. Note also that Email 2 is the main parent's email.
When you are finished, it should look like this:
After clicking Next, you'll see a Preview. The fields should look reasonable; under first name should be the student's first name, etc. If all looks well, click "Import Selected Records" and then "OK".
For your next classes, it is far easier - we are past the complicated parts. Instead of using "Easy Import of Students" like we did last time, select the "Other" tab and choose "Zeus" as your import format:
Continue through the next steps as you had the first time. Type the name and period of your class, select Term 1, and click "OK"
Select the file on your desktop for this class that you are currently importing and "Open". This time around, instead of having to use the drop-down menus to identify parts of the database, you should already be at the Preview screen:
Rinse, lather, and repeat for your remaining classes.
Again, if you have any difficulties, please see me. I'll be as available as possible throughout the day. Many thanks to Mike, Tom, and Jamie for making all of this possible.
