Schools

Should Report Cards be E-Mailed?

Board of Education discusses possibility after giving fifth grade teachers the OK to produce reports on the computer.

An interesting discussion arose about the future of report cards during the Scotch Plains-Fanwood Board of Education's recent meeting.

After voting to generate fifth grade report cards electronically this year, board member Betty Anne Woerner questioned if the school district will eventually move toward e-mailing report cards to parents.

Currently, middle and high school teachers input their students' grades into a computer, but then print the report cards for distribution. Elementary school report cards are hand-created. The board voted last week to allow fifth grade teachers to generate their reports on computers as well. Superintendent Margaret Hayes said the district will have better access to student data this way, since information on their achievements and attendance will all be filed into the computer system. The content of the report won't change, just the manner in which they're generated.

But in this technological age, when so much of our correspondence is online, is it only a matter of time before these electronically-generated report cards are sent straight to parents' e-mail inboxes? When asked about this during the meeting, Hayes said there are a number of steps that would have to be taken to do so, namely ensuring that every e-mail on file for parents is correct.

“Some supply e-mails at work, others at home. Though we can get return receipts, there’s no guarantee of who opened it,” she said.

Woerner suggested that the district really start thinking about the legal and security issues that could arise, so that in a year or so they could potentially develop a form that would address them and make it possible for parents to elect to get the reports via e-mail if they so desired.

"It's something we're always looking at," Hayes said in response. "We've heard very clearly the need to reduce the use of paper and to do more things efficiently, and any place we can do that we will."

Hayes noted that they'd eventually like to move the elementary schools from hand-written reports to electronically-produced ones as well, but that it will take longer to do so since they use a different format.

What do you think? Would you like the option to get your child’s report card via e-mail, or do you prefer the hard copy version? Post your thoughts at the bottom of this story.


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