Parent Evenings

Remote Parental Consultations - using an MS Teams Video Meeting

There are a variety of options available to create remote parental consultation sessions using Office365. There is not necessarily a right or wrong way of organising such events but schools should ensure that whatever method they select, the sessions offered are secure and private. A single open session where staff admit parents at a particular time is not appropriate as all parents potentially have access to all appointments and are only identified by a guest ID that they choose.

The main video below outlines our suggested approach using the teacher's Outlook Calendar to invite parents to a virtual meeting via an MS Teams video call. It does require some time to setup and wherever possible, a limited trial run would be helpful to staff. The second video shows how to check that your calendar time zone is set correctly - if it isn't, your parents may receive invitations with the wrong times on them.

Setting up Consultation Appointments

This video shows the process from the teacher's perspective and from the perspective of the parent including the invitation they will receive and how to join the meeting.

Outlook Calendar

Setting the Time Zone in Outlook

If the incorrect time zone has been set in an Outlook calendar, any invitations sent from that account will show the wrong time. The same applies if the wrong time zone is set in the recipient's calendar. Before you send out invitations, check that your time zone is correctly set.

Outlook Calendar

Remote Parental Consultations - using a Google Meet (available to WeLearn365+ subscribers only)

As with Office365, there are a variety of options available to create remote parental consultation sessions using G Suite for Education. There is not necessarily a right or wrong way of organising such events but schools should ensure that whatever method they select, the sessions offered are secure and private. A single open session where staff admit parents at a particular time is not appropriate as all parents potentially have access to all appointments and are only identified by a guest ID that they choose.

The video below outlines our suggested approach using the teacher's Google Calendar to invite parents to virtual meetings via Google Meet. It does require some time to setup and wherever possible, a limited trial run would be helpful to staff.

G Suite Virtual Parents Evening.mp4

Setting up Consultation Appointments

This video shows the process from the teacher's perspective and from the perspective of the parent including the invitation they will receive and how to join the meeting.

Google Calendar

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