UPDATED 10/5/2022
General Questions:
Q. What if our school is not accepting permits?
A. All schools must still must verify, process, and approve (or "hold" or discard) applications regularly (at least once per week). Understand that you are not approving a permit to allow a student to come to your school, but only approving that fact that a parent/guardian has applied for a permit, and the student is now eligible for a permit. If the applicant ends up on a Waitlist for the entire year because you are not accepting permits at this time, that's okay.
Q. What if our parents don’t have access to a computer?
A. Some schools have computer workstations for parents to online enroll and do permits. The program is "mobile friendly", too, and can be done on a phone.
Q. I forgot my password. What do I do?
A. Click the “I Forgot My Password” link on the login page.
Q. I have a parent who insists that their “situation” warrants a permit above all the others. Can I have the District approve this?
A. “The District” will refer the parent back to the school. We do not override any school decisions.
Q. How long do we give parents to accept or reject an offer for a permit (seat)?
A. That is up to the school administrator. When the lottery is completed, the email for that timeframe says the deadline is January 15th. We recommend just a week to two weeks for the other enrollment periods after the lottery.
Q. I made a change to the screen (approved, seated, etc.) and it's not showing the update immediately. What happened?
A. Most likely the browser needs to be refreshed. Try an F5 for a PC and Command R (or Command-Option-R) for a Mac.
General Application Questions:
Q. My parent says they never got a confirmation email when they submitted their application. Do you know why, or where it might be?
A. It might have ended up in their SPAM or Junk folder. The email is from PowerSchool and not from Jordan District.
Q. I am receiving program permit applications such as DLI and ALPs. What do I do?
A. Only applications of students living outside a school boundary (and not part of a program) should be in the School Choice permit system, although there are exceptions for siblings of DLI and ALPS. Program permits are assigned by the District department over that program. Communicate the difference between DLI or ALPS programs vs. boundary permits to the applicant, and discard the application if needed. Refer applicants to the Teaching and Learning Department for more information about our DLI and ALPS programs. Some parents will apply to a program school for a regular permit while they wait for the District to accept them into the program. If you award this kind of permit, you are required to keep the student on regular permit for the duration whether they get accepted to the program or not.
Q. How do I deny a permit application?
A. There are no automated “denial” emails. You will need to communicate with parents the way you always have, and then discard the record. It is best to communicate with the parents before you discard the record. If a mass results email is sent, the parents may be notified that their application has been removed. Best practice: Discard (deny) the application while it is in the Submission Workspace. Once it goes to the School Choice Workspace, it gets a bit complicated. There you will have to remove the application from the list, and then go back to the Submission Workspace and discard the record. PLEASE ADD A NOTE TO THE APPLICATION BEFORE YOU DISCARD IT.
Submission Workspace Questions:
Q. Can I edit the address or student information?
A. Some edits done in the Submission Workspace do follow through to the School Choice Workspace, although many fields cannot be edited, such as the school choices and grade levels. If there is a pencil with a red circle and slash; cannot edit.
Q. Can I recover a discarded record?
A. Yes, just make sure your View is set to “Discarded” to find the record. Once you find the record, put a check in the box next to it, go to “Tasks” and “recover” the record.
Q. I cannot find an application in Submission Workspace; perhaps I discarded it? How do I find it?
A. Use the filters. As a note, PowerSchool saves the previously used filter every time you log in. If you previously searched for duplicate records, the next time you log in, you may be on the same filtered search, duplicate records. Discarded records will not show under “All Submissions”. They are filtered separately under “Discarded”.
Verifying Fields and Approving Applications:
Q. This application is obviously for a program permit (DLI, ALPS, Special Ed, etc.) What should I do?
A. Only non-program applications go through the PowerSchool permit program. If the request is obviously for a program, contact the applicant and explain that program permits are approved through the district, and to contact the appropriate department. Then, discard the application.
Q. Do I really have to "answer" (verify) every single line on this application? There's a bunch!
A. Only if a field has the word "Verified" next to it, and the answer is blank. During the lottery, the blank fields require "yes or no" answers. Beginning January 1, answers can all be "N/A". We recommend that you also look at the reason the applicant is applying during the lottery. Did the right fields "open up" to allow an answer that is pertinent to their reason?
Q. Why is it so important to put something in the "Student Number" field? What if I don't know the Student ID, or there isn't one?
A. The application won't upload to Skyward without something in the Student ID field. Make it a practice to open Skyward while you're approving applications. Go to the 000-District Entity, and look up numbers there. Use the Advanced Search, if necessary. You would be surprised how many "out of district" and Pre-K students we have student numbers for. Give it a try. If you truly cannot find a student number, enter 999 to populate the field (that way we know that you looked for one).
Q. Can you explain the “Employee” field?
A. Students who have a parent or guardian who works for that particular school choice, (or Jordan School District, if special approval is obtained), may have priority when applying for a permit.
Q. Can you help me with priorities?
A. A detailed explanation for the priorities can be found in the document called, "School Choice Permit Procedures". There is also a breakdown of priorities by school level document on the Planning and Enrollment website under "Resources", called "School Choice Priorities and Their Meanings". Priorities are only considered during the lottery. When you answer a "Verify" field with a "Yes" or "No", PowerSchool uses those answers to assign the application a priority that will be used during the lottery to award a place on the waitlist. The priority assigned can be found at the top each individual application, or on the record itself in Submission Workspace main menu.
Q. I cannot get the green “Approval button” to appear on this application. What am I missing?
A. Glance down the opened application. Is there a "blank" next to any of the questions (fields)? Is the word "Verified" showing in the field? Make sure any field that has the word “Verified” in the field, is filled in with a value. During the lottery, answer "Yes" or "No". Beginning January 1, you may use "N/A" to populate the blank/verify fields.
Also, is the record polished? Or is there a duplicate record to be resolved? Was the record locked for Administrative Approval? These are a few reasons you cannot approve it.
Q. Can a parent/guardian see the notes?
A. The applicant cannot see the notes.
School Choice Workspace Waitlist Questions:
Q. A student appeared on my waitlist who I do not have an application for. Where did it come from?
A. Most likely, you are a second or third choice school. At the end of the record in the Waitlist or Seated list, there is a number with another number in parenthesis. The first number is what choice school you are. The number in the parenthesis is the priority PowerSchool gave the application. During the early enrollment period (after the lottery until the 1st week in February), students MUST be seated in numerical order on the Waitlist even if you are the second or third choice school. After the first week in February, students are place according to staffing ratios.
If you have seats available, you should offer them in the order they show on the Waitlist. You can always call the applicant and explain that you will be offering them a seat, and if they accept, they are removed from all the other waitlists; they may want to wait for their first-choice school. (They are also told they will be removed from all other lists in the individual email you send when they are offered the seat.)
Q. I want to see the full permit application for a student on my waitlist who I don’t have an application for. How do I do this?
A. You’ll need to contact the first-choice school and have them send you a copy of the application, or call Planning and Enrollment for assistance. It is possible, though, to see the school choice schools and other important information in the School Choice Workspace (BEFORE you click the link to your school.) In the section labeled “Students”, click “All”. Use the filters to find the student, (make sure your screen is opened to full-screen) and you will be able to see information such as the 1st, 2nd and 3rd choice schools, where the student placed on each Waitlist, if the student was put on a Removed List, and even if a school made an offer for a seat. Email communication may also be viewed here.
School Choice Workspace Seated List Questions:
Q. How long do I allow an offered seat to remain on the Seated List, before I remove it and offer the seat to someone else?
A. It's up to your school administrator. Once the lottery is complete, the lottery email says that applicants have until January 15. After that we recommend just a week or two. The results emails suggests 2 weeks.
Q. I hit the "Accept" checkmark for the applicant (or by accident). What happens now?
A. When the "Accept" button is clicked (or an applicant accepts the seat via email), the student is removed from all other Waitlists and Seated lists. This cannot be reversed. The applicant must start the entire process over by re-applying. There is a record's audit that can track what happened, if needed.
Emails and Communication Questions:
Q. Yikes! Mass emails make me nervous. Do I have to use them?
A. Not at all. There are “single send” message icons next to each student’s record. Planning and Enrollment sends a mass email just after processing, to let the applicant know that their application has been processed and they are now on a Waitlist. Schools should use the individual email to notify a parent that they have been offered a seat, removed from a list, etc.
Q. How can I tell if email communication has taken place?
A. In School Choice Workspace, do not go directly to your school. Under the section “Students”, select the filter that says “Processed”. Once the list of students appears, set the other filters to find a student. Click the folder on the right with the magnifying glass to see the correspondence. If there is no folder, there has been no correspondence with the family.
The Permit Process and Skyward Questions:
Q. The permit approval process has already made it to Skyward, but now the parent does not want the permit. What do I do?
A. If the permit is for the current school year, and the student has a permit in the Skyward School Path tab, use the Revoke Permit Custom Form found in Skyward under the "Customs Forms" menu on the left. If it is for the next school year, you may just manually remove the Reason Code in the School Path tab in Skyward. You will also want to go into PowerSchool, remove the student from the Seated List and discard the record in the Submission Workspace, so you can offer the seat to someone else.
Q. The permit code (Boundary Override Reason Code) never uploaded to the School Path tab in Skyward. What happened?
A. Most likely, either no student number or an inaccurate student number was in the Student ID field in PowerSchool. The birthday must also be the same as in Skyward. If the permit code does not populate the Student Path tab, you may edit the screen.
