Year Heads and Attendance Officers play a vital role in managing student wellbeing, attendance, and communication with parents. Whether overseeing a specific year group or the entire school, your tools in the Unique Schools system allow for efficient and secure interactions. This guide outlines your core responsibilities and best practices.
Please contact US via staffsupport@uniqueschools.ie if you need us to provide Year Head or Attendance access.
Your Main Responsibilities
1. Attendance Monitoring & Management
Core Tasks
- Year Heads are typically responsible for monitoring and following up on unexplained absences for students in their assigned year.
- In schools without Year Head-led attendance, an Attendance Officer or a member of the senior leadership team usually manages this process.
Tools You’ll Use
The Attendance Dashboard allows you to:
- View absences and lates
- Search, filter, and manage notes efficiently
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View real-time data across the school
📘 Help Guide on Attendance Overview
2. Sending Personal Notifications (PN)
When to Use
Use Personal Notifications instead of email for:
- Attendance-related communication
- Behaviour alerts
- General updates to parents
PN 2.0 Features
Send to:
- Individual parents
- Class groups
- Year groups
- Custom groups
Parents can reply to your messages in a threaded format similar to email.
You can close off a conversation once it’s resolved.
🔜 PN 2.0 Help Guide will be inserted here once available.
3. Approving Permission To Leave (PTL) Notes
What to Know
Students cannot sign out unless their PTL note is approved.
Approval may be done by (based on school policy):
- Year Heads
- Attendance Officers
- Office staff
4. TUSLA Letters (Absence Thresholds)
Depending on your school’s process, you may be responsible for sending TUSLA Letters at key absence milestones (5/10/15/20 days).
How It Works
- Use the Dashboard to identify students reaching absence thresholds.
- Send bulk Personal Notifications to parents with the relevant notice.
🔜 Link to TUSLA Letter Help Guide to be added here.
5. Managing “Note from Parent” Submissions
Parents can send non-attendance notes such as:
- PE exemption
- Uniform issues
- Minor medical updates
Your Responsibility
- Acknowledge or respond to these notes.
- Check them regularly to ensure parental communication is addressed.
📘 Help Guide on Note from Parent
6. Managing Detention
You may be tasked with setting up and managing student detention.
Detention Tools
- Create and add students to detention sessions.
- Use roll-call functionality to mark attendance.
- Automatically notify parents via bulk Personal Notifications.
7. Creating and Managing Forms
Year Heads often need to collect information from parents.
Why Use Unique Schools Forms
- Keeps communication within the app
- Avoids confusion caused by external tools (Google Forms, Microsoft Forms)
- Supports the goal of a Single Point of Engagement
Use forms for:
- Parental consent
- Policy acknowledgement
- Surveys or questionnaires
Helpful Links
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You have unlimited free online training – book in anytime:
🎓 Book Training Here