AfterSchool21 (AS21) keeps parents and out-of-school-time (OST) program staff safe while preserving the accuracy of attendance records with new user-friendly, mobile drop-off/sign-in and sign-out functionality.
AS21 is the most customizable and advanced after-school program data management software available. Twelve State Departments of Education and hundreds of grant-funded or parent-pay programs across the United States have trusted AfterSchool21 for 25 + years to simplify reporting on after-school outcomes for grant-funded and parent-pay programs alike.
The Spring 2021 release is based on customer feedback during the pandemic and provides several key innovations to support safety and data-driven analysis of programmatic outcomes.
Contactless Student Attendance
A core component of the pick-up and drop-off routine is the “sign-in” and “sign-out” process, which can be the most dangerous for a program's staff because it involves frequent face-to-face interactions. To minimize the possibility of COVID-19 spread, many centers temporarily only allow children into the building or severely limit the number of people in the building at any given time.
AS21 helps mitigate in-person transmission of COVID-19 without slowing down pick-up and drop-off operations by offering two options for mobile attendance tracking:
- Parents can use their smartphone, come to the building entrance and scan a QR code to start the drop-off or pick-up process
- Centers can use a mobile device of their own and pass it to a parent outside the building to complete the check-in or check-out of care process
With mobile and contactless sign-in/sign-out, centers can:
- Track the arrival time and signature time for all pick-ups and drop-offs
- Alert staff to pick-up restrictions
- Provide the site with the name and signature of the person picking up or dropping off a participant
- Securely store an image of the signature provided
- Instantly create attendance logs for participants when they are dropped off or picked up (if attendance not already put in by program staff)
- Charge accurate late pick-up fees by automatically creating fees if a student is signed out after the scheduled end time of the program (for fee-based sites)
- Ensure the person picking up the child is an approved contact
- Automatically store the name of the person who completes the pick-up
- Provide pick-up identify information easily in participant's attendance report
Dashboard Charts
State and program administrators will spend less time analyzing their data with 12 new dashboard charts. The new admin dashboard visually displays key metrics. Users can use these charts to explore the data for quick insights without exporting and filtering:
- Review site-by-site data like average daily or weekly attendance from easy-to-read charts
- Access any chart from a single screen
- Switch to previous years for easy comparison
- Click into detailed reports associated with each dashboard chart
- Apply quick filters to the data to view more specific details
- Customize your dashboard by adding or removing charts
Contact a team member to learn more about these feature improvements and how AS21 can help after-school program centers reach program goals while making reporting requirements less onerous.
