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aspen ramps up academic accountibility
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Students now have access to all grade information with the expansion of Aspen this month. The site will allow them to login to check all grade and attendance data in the new student portal: this means no more relying on parents to get their password to go on the parent portal.
“It will allow students to access their grades on a regular basis, replacing teachers posting grades on a wall for everyone to see. They will also be able to see their attendance record along with their and activities and the clubs they participate in,” Assistant Principal Michael Sullivan said.
Students were given their password and user ids in homeroom on November 6. If a student missed (or skipped) homeroom they can pick up a user information card in the main office. This card includes the details to access student data on Aspen.
Skipping calculus homework assignments or procrastinating on an important AP Lit paper might be less of an issue with this new system. The entire district converted to the new Aspen system in late August. Compared to Parent Connect, Aspen is an improvement for teens and parents with its easy access to student work on the user-friendly parent portal.
Students may wonder how their parents received the login information, maybe in order to keep it for themselves. Mr. Ralph Chianelli, the business/database/tech. trainer for DHS said, “The logon information was mailed via the U.S. Postal Service to families in Darien who have students in the Darien Public Schools.”
The newfound efficiency that comes with Aspen will not be seen as a boon by slackers who don't want parents to know when they don’t complete their work or their immediate ability to find out a bad quiz grade. It is hard to hide from the transparency of the Aspen parent portal.
Sophomore Ari Balian didn’t have to wait for the student portal to go online early this month. He already logged onto Aspen on his parent’s account every day. Balian doesn’t object to the 24/7 age of Aspen transparency.
“I don’t have a problem with my parents knowing since they are going to find out anyway,” Balian said. “It is really helpful since I can see my grades and know how I’m doing."
But Balian said one aspect students may not like is having their siblings see one another’s grades. “You can also see what your sisters and brothers are doing, which is the only bad thing about it. It gives you the opportunity to make fun of them,” Balian said.
Aspen has many features the previous operating system Parent Connect did not offer. For example, student and parent "portals" allow users the ability to look at grades, due dates and tardy reports. But it takes some time to adjust to the system according to parent Sue Collier who regularly uses Aspen to check her sophomore son Matt’s data. “When people start to get used to it I think it will become a more productive system. But for the time being it is a bit laborious,” Mrs. Collier said.
Aspen uses a selective tab system to group information. Students and adults may have fewer tabs accessible to them than teachers or guidance counselors who control privacy settings.
With Aspen doing such a great job keeping track of attendance and grades, students might start to put more effort into their work. “Now with Aspen it’s easy to keep track of my son’s grades,” parent John Nee said. (Not sure if his son, junior Jon, is as psyched!) This access to easy information is in contrast to Parent Connect, which many found too complex to use.
"My parents never even used Parent Connect," junior Alex Peter said.
With Aspen, progress reports will also be a thing of the past. However, report cards will still be mailed out at the end of each quarter.
The range of data use has been extended for teachers and guidance counselors as well who can now access a students’ complete academic record in the Darien school system.
"Because all of the information on students will be there for teachers to see, we can get a better understanding on the new group of kids coming into the high school each year," DHS Web master Sean Otterspoor said.
Notes on a student, including class behavior, grades, and current schedules will be available to the teacher to peruse the full spectrum of the student’s academic career.
Aspen is not a new program. John Glenn Middle School in Massachusetts has been using it since 2007. The Massachusetts middle school served as the test run case helping to make sure many bugs had been worked out before it made its way to DHS. Aspen is not just some program free to download from a Web site. Aspen X2, one of the versions of Aspen, costs an estimated $6.4 million for five years. Despite the era of belt tightening, DHS decided it was worth the money to purchase this upgrade.
Love it or hate it, Aspen is here to stay. While having tons more features than Parent Connect, it still manages to be user-friendly catering to a users’ specific information needs. The millions of dollars may be well spent if students step up their game in the face of the new transparency the era of Aspen will bring this fall.
