PowerSchool Provisioning Guide (Enterprise)

This article is for existing Schoology users who use PowerSchool to provision users, courses, and sections into Schoology. You can read this page in its entirety, or use the links outlined below to jump to specific steps in the process.

PowerSchool Integration Overview

Schoology has developed a Student Information System (SIS) integration platform that enables Schoology to integrate with any SIS that provides a web services API. The integration provides a seamless method for keeping Schoology populated with users, courses, school, and enrollment data. It also provides the ability for Schoology to transfer grade and assignment data into PowerSchool.

This section addresses the following questions:

• What information is transferred from PowerSchool to Schoology?
• What information is transferred from Schoology to PowerSchool?
• How often is information updated between the systems?
• What is required to implement the PowerSchool App in Schoology?
• What are the limitations to the PowerSchool integration?

Information Transferred from PowerSchool to Schoology

Schoology pulls the following information from PowerSchool:

• School building information
• Users (staff and student accounts)
• Grading periods/terms

• Courses, Sections, and Enrollments

  

  All of the information listed above is managed in PowerSchool and changes and updates transfer seamlessly to Schoology. However, it is important to note that to keep a consistent data model, any changes or updates made in Schoology do not transfer to PowerSchool.

  You can add additional courses and users in Schoology that are not in PowerSchool without affecting your PowerSchool instance. This option is helpful if you want to do cross-school enrollments or if you have guest instructors, or if you have advisors that are not in PowerSchool.

Information Transferred from Schoology to PowerSchool

Schoology pushes the following information to PowerSchool:

• Grade items (Assignments & Assessments)

• Grade updates (changes to grades)

  

  Graded items created and updated in PowerSchool do not transfer to Schoology to establish a master data source for all information. Schoology is the master for changes to grade data, while PowerSchool remains the master for school, user, course, and enrollment data. To provide a consistent data model for your school, all grade changes should be managed from Schoology.

As a district, you may determine the frequency of updates between the two systems.

The following options are available:

• Manual - The System Admin must manually sync the PowerSchool app in Schoology.
• Scheduled - You can set the frequency of the automated sync of information from PowerSchool to Schoology. Select Daily unless otherwise instructed by your Schoology representative.

Required to Implement the PowerSchool App in Schoology

• The district needs to be operating version 8.1 or higher of PowerSchool (Required)
• The district needs to have SSL (Secure Socket Layer) Certificate with PowerSchool (Required)

• The district should have Active Directory synced with PowerSchool (optional, but highly encouraged)

Limitations to the PowerSchool Integration

• PowerSchool does not support the transfer of parent information via their API. This means that parents have to be configured from within Schoology. Schoology works closely with the district to understand how best to create parent accounts and maintain associations with students.
• The PowerSchool Attendance App has to be installed to transfer attendance from Schoology. Schoology works closely with the district to explain the best approaches for handling this issue.
• Grades pushed to PowerSchool from Schoology do not contain Schoology grading scales and custom categories because PowerSchool does not yet provide APIs that supports this workflow.
• In cases where there are multiple gradebooks in a single PowerSchool course, Schoology does not update a particular gradebook within a course.
• When a user account in PowerSchool is associated with multiple buildings at your organization, PowerSchool will create two separate user accounts on Schoology. We recommend linking the two accounts together in Schoology.

PowerSchool Integration Instructions

Before you install the PowerSchool app into your school or organization, make sure you have the following items completed:

1. Upgrade your PowerSchool instance to version 8.1 or higher.
2. Enable or implement SSL (Secure Socket Layer) Certificate with PowerSchool by contacting your PowerSchool representative.
3. If you have teachers that are teaching in multiple buildings in PowerSchool, make sure that you consolidate those accounts in PowerSchool.
4. If you are planning to bring student emails into Schoology, ensure you import student emails via the Data Import Manager in PowerSchool SIS before running a sync to Schoology.
5. If you're planning on using LDAP or Remote Authentication, or Google SSO, make sure your directory or database is synced with PowerSchool (optional, but highly recommended).
6. Before installing the PowerSchool app in Schoology, make sure that you've rolled over PowerSchool to the upcoming school year.

Install the Schoology Plugin in PowerSchool

Once you have fulfilled the General Requirements above, you're ready to begin using the Schoology PowerSchool app. Use these steps to set up the integration between your PowerSchool instance and your district's Schoology account.

If your organization is running an older version of PowerSchool (before 21.4), review this article on plugin configuration..

Steps to take in Schoology

1. Log in to your Schoology System Admin account.
2. Click the tile icon in the header of Schoology and click App Center.
3. Find the PowerSchool App and install it in your school.

Steps to take in PowerSchool

1. Log in to PowerSchool as an Admin.
2. Under Setup on the left menu, click System.
3. Scroll down and click System Settings.

4. Click Plugin Management Configuration.

5. Find the pre-installed Schoology SIS Adapter V2 plugin from the list and click the Enable/Disable checkbox.
6. Click Enable on the popup to proceed with the installation.
7. Click the new enabled Schoology SIS Adapter V2 plugin.
8. Click Data Provider Configuration.
   
9. Temporarily copy the Client ID and Client Secret.

Steps to take in Schoology

1. Navigate to the PowerSchool SIS Admin app in Schoology and paste the ID from PowerSchool into the Consumer Key field.
2. Paste the Secret from PowerSchool into the Consumer Secret field.
3. Copy and paste the PowerSchool URL into the PowerSchool Domain field in Schoology.
4. Click Save API Credentials to verify the connection to the new plugin.

Once the plugin for version 21.4 is installed, you will no longer need to update the plugin for future versions. The latest plugin version will automatically be installed on your PowerSchool server.

If you encounter an error when saving the API credentials, try these troubleshooting tips:

1. Make sure there are no spaces before or after the Domain, Key, and Secret entries.
2. Double-check that you've entered the PowerSchool domain URL accurately and, if appropriate, make sure to include the appropriate https:// or http:// before the domain.
3. Check that you have enabled SSL in the Global Server Settings of your PowerSchool instance:

• In PowerSchool, go to System>System Settings>Global Server Settings.

• Make sure that Secure Server SSL is enabled and saved.

  

  If an error persists after taking these steps, contact Schoology with your Domain, Consumer Key, and Consumer Secret.

PowerSchool App Configuration

Once you've completed the steps in General Requirements and installed the Schoology Plug-In, you can start setting up your PowerSchool app in your Schoology System Admin account. Start with the Configuration tab along the top, and work from left to right.

You need to set up the Configuration, Schools, and Terms tabs before you can start syncing Users, Courses, and Sections from PowerSchool to Schoology.

Use this guide to set up the following tabs in the Schoology PowerSchool App:

• Configuration
• Schools
• Terms

PowerSchool Sync Timing Options

Use PowerSchool Sync Timing Options to:

• Choose whether the sync between PowerSchool and Schoology is manual or scheduled.

• Manual - The Acting User must manually sync the PowerSchool app in Schoology.

• Scheduled - This setting provisions user, courses, sections, and enrollments from PowerSchool into Schoology. You may also navigate to the respective tabs in the app and manually sync users, courses, or sections and enrollments at any time. Select Scheduled (Daily) unless otherwise instructed by your Schoology representative.

  

  The date and time scheduled for the sync is the time your data will be added to the queue, not the time the sync will be completed. For example, if you select 12 am - 3 am, that job gets queued at 12 am, and then executes once the jobs get to the top of the queue.

Click Save Sync Options to save your settings. You can also change the settings at any time by re-saving the sync options.

Changing the time of your scheduled sync or initiating a manual sync resets the window of time until the next sync. For example, pushing a manual sync of Users at 2 pm on Monday causes the scheduled sync to wait 24 hours after the manual sync plus the time to the configured scheduled sync (e.g. 12a-3a). Therefore, the next scheduled sync of all data would occur on Wednesday after 12 am. This one-day grace period prevents any issues with overlapping syncs of the same provisioning data.

PowerSchool Assignment Options

Use the Assignment Options to select a default grading category to map graded items from Schoology to the PowerSchool gradebook. If nothing is selected, all assignments will go into PowerSchool in the TEST category.

Currently, PowerSchool only enables the selection of a single grading category:

• Homework
• Quiz
• Test
• Project

However, teachers can map to the remaining default categories from the PowerSchool Teacher app.

Click Save Assignment Options to move on to the next area of the app.

Schoology Acting User

To make any changes to the PowerSchool app, you must be the Acting User for the app and a Schoology System Administrator associated with the organization's main building. A message is displayed in the Schoology Acting User area.

If you don't see this message, click the button to make yourself the Acting User for your account.

Schools

Map your schools in PowerSchool to your schools in Schoology on the Schools tab. You may also automatically create new Schoology schools based on your PowerSchool schools.

In the Map Schools area, PowerSchool schools are in the left column and Schoology schools are in the right.

1. If you already have buildings in Schoology, you can create a one-to-one mapping between the PowerSchool building and the Schoology building.
2. If you do not want additional buildings in Schoology, you can map your PowerSchool buildings into a single Schoology building.
3. If you don't have any school buildings in Schoology and want to automatically create them from your PowerSchool buildings, select Create New Building in the drop-down list in the Schoology column.
4. You do not have to map all PowerSchool buildings to Schoology. Unmapped buildings and their users, courses, and enrollments are not provisioned in Schoology.
5. Click Save Changes to create or update the school mappings.

Terms

After you've completed setting up the Configuration and Schools tabs, you're ready to map your PowerSchool Terms to your Schoology Grading Periods.

After you create your schools, they are listed in the Terms tab of the PowerSchool app.

1. If you already have grading periods in Schoology, you can create a one-to-one mapping between the PowerSchool terms to the Schoology grading periods. Make sure you're mapping to the correct school year.
2. After you create grading periods in Schoology, if you would like to map a single PowerSchool term to multiple Schoology grading periods, click Add to the right of the Schoology term and select the same term in both drop-down menus.

• For example, if you have a course that runs an entire semester, you may want the instructor's gradebook in Schoology to be divided into two quarters rather than one full semester.

• If you don't have any grading periods in Schoology and want to automatically create them from your PowerSchool terms, select Create new grading period in the drop-down menu in the Schoology column. This creates grading periods with the name of the term in PowerSchool, as well as with the start date and end date of the term.
  • After selecting Create new grading period click Save Changes, then Refresh Data. The newly created grading periods will auto-populate in the drop-drop-down menu and you can proceed in mapping the terms.
• If a term is not mapped to Schoology, course sections associated with the term in PowerSchool are not provisioned in Schoology.

• Once you've mapped the terms for each of the school buildings, click Save Changes.

  

  If you ever need to adjust your grading period dates, do this on both the Schoology and PowerSchool applications. In Schoology, you can do this from School Management: Grade Settings. Once you've adjusted your grading period's dates, click Refresh Data near the upper-right corner of the Terms tab in PowerSchool and make sure that you've mapped your terms to the correct grading period, which also displays the correct date. Make sure to save your changes after updating. Adjusting grading period dates does not affect assignments.

  After setting up your Configuration, Schools, and Terms tabs, contact your Schoology representative before proceeding with the rest of the PowerSchool integration. Your Schoology representative can provide additional guidance and instructions to ensure seamless integration. You can work with your Schoology representative to use the Data Prep tool to ensure a successful integration.

PowerSchool App Sync

After you have completed the Configuration steps above, and after you have worked with your Schoology representative to review the SIS data you have prepared, you can start the sync process using the steps below. This begins the process of provisioning your Schoology account with Users, Courses, and Enrollments from PowerSchool.

Users

Set Up Parent Roles 

Parent role sync will sync parent roles in PowerSchool SIS to parent roles in Schoology and create the child associations automatically. To successfully sync parents to Schoology, parent accounts must have guardian status, web access enabled, and a username that does not include an @ symbol in SIS. 

1. Open PowerSchool SIS to add custom roles to be synced to Schoology.
2. In Schoology, navigate to the PowerSchool SIS Configuration app and click the Users tab to review the list of roles to be mapped.
   1. If parents do not exist in Schoology or parents have already been synced to Schoology through the PowerSchool SIS App, map the Parent PowerSchool SIS role to the Parent Schoology role and continue to Sync Users.
   2. If parents exist in Schoology but were not synced through the PowerSchool SIS App: 
      1. Follow the steps for Data Prep. 
      2. After Data Prep is complete, map the PowerSchool SIS roles to the Schoology Roles and continue to Sync Users.
3. Map PowerSchool SIS roles to Schoology Roles.

Set Up Custom Roles

1. From the PowerSchool SIS app within Schoology, click Save Credentials on the Configuration screen. This will trigger the Schoology Primary Role checkbox to display in PowerSchool SIS' User Access Roles to create a custom Schoology role.
2. Open PowerSchool SIS to add custom roles to be synced to Schoology. 
3. In Schoology, navigate to the PowerSchool SIS Configuration app and click Refresh Data in the Users tab to display the new roles.
4. Map PowerSchool SIS roles to Schoology Roles and continue to Sync Users.

Sync Users

To sync users from PowerSchool to Schoology, you must select the role to which the account will be mapped.

1. From the school name, select the checkbox.

2. Map the Student, Staff, and any additional roles you may need to their respective roles in Schoology.

   

   Use Custom Settings to ensure teacher emails are included in the sync.

3. Once you've mapped the roles for each of the school buildings, click Sync Users to begin your first User sync with PowerSchool. This button also enables you to manually sync users at any time.

   

   • User roles sourced from PowerSchool SIS will display with the label User Access Role or Security Group based on its origin.
   • Once users are created in Schoology by the sync, any updates to their account information must be made in PowerSchool. However, user accounts cannot be deleted in Schoology by deleting the account in PowerSchool. If a user leaves your organization, you will need to remove their account in both systems.
   • If you do not want to provision certain roles into Schoology, you can select Do Not Sync.
   • Passwords are not included in the sync. Schoology auto-generates passwords for all users created from the sync. You can view and export passwords in Manage Users. These passwords can be used for login for any organization not using Single Sign-On. If required, school-issued passwords can be imported via a manual User Import.

By default, Student usernames in Schoology are provisioned with their PowerSchool Students.Student_WebID, and Teacher usernames are provisioned with their Teachers.TeacherLoginID in PowerSchool. However, you can use the Customize mapping preferences option under Custom Settings to customize the field brought into Schoology from PowerSchool.

Passwords are not included in the sync. Schoology auto-generates passwords for all users created from the sync. You can view and export passwords in Manage Users. These passwords can be used for login for any organization not using Single Sign-On. If required, school-issued passwords can be imported via a manual User Import.

Courses

To provision Schoology with the courses in your PowerSchool instance, select the school(s) for which you'd like courses provisioned. Then click Sync Courses to bring PowerSchool courses into Schoology.

Once courses are created in Schoology by the sync, any updates to course information must be made in PowerSchool. However, courses cannot be deleted in Schoology by deleting the course in PowerSchool; you will need to delete the course in both systems.

Sections

To provision Schoology with the sections and enrollments in your PowerSchool instance, select the school(s) for which you'd like sections provisioned. Then click Sync Sections/Enrollments to bring in PowerSchool sections and enrollments into Schoology.

By default, section names in Schoology are provisioned with the Sections.Section_Number in PowerSchool. However, you can use the Custom Mapping option to provide the section name with the PowerSchool expression instead.

Only lead teachers will sync to a section from the API/SIS integration. Co-teachers must be manually added to a section and promoted to a section admin in Schoology. 

Logs

Use the Logs tab to view the progress of your latest sync with PowerSchool. Logs also enable you to detect any errors occurring during the sync.

Additional Information

Custom Field Mapping for PowerSchool Integration

When Schoology synchronizes data from PowerSchool, Schoology automatically pulls information from certain fields in PowerSchool to populate fields in Schoology. For instance, when provisioning user accounts, Schoology's Username field uses information from the PowerSchool Student Web ID or Teacher Username field by default.

Similarly, when provisioning courses, Schoology's Section Name field uses the word "Section" and the PowerSchool Section Number.

To provide more flexibility in provisioning user and course information, we also provide the ability to customize which fields populate the Username and Section Name within Schoology. The table below describes the customization options for mapping for each of these fields.

Custom Field Mapping for Users

Schoology provides the ability to choose from a list of PowerSchool fields for Students and Staff that are imported from PowerSchool. The options for each field are described in the Custom Field Mapping Definitions below. To create a custom mapping for your school's integration:

1. Click Users from the top menu of the PowerSchool app, and click Custom Settings to the right.
2. Select the checkbox for Customize mapping preferences to enable custom mapping.

3. Per the field listings below, choose the desired mapping fields.
   
   

   

   It is highly recommended to select Sync teacher emails from PowerSchool into Schoology to ensure teacher emails are included in the User sync. This will overwrite any existing teacher emails in Schoology.

4. When you are finished, click Save Custom Settings.

Custom Field Mapping for Course Sections

Schoology provides the ability to choose from a list of PowerSchool fields for Sections that are imported from PowerSchool. The options for each field are described in the Custom Field Mapping Definitions below. To create a custom mapping for your school's integration:

1. Click Section in the PowerSchool app,
2. Click Custom Mapping
3. Check the box labeled Customize mapping preferences to enable the custom mapping.
4. Choose your desired mapping fields.
5. When you are finished, click Save Field Mapping. On the next Section synchronization, your Section Name fields will be updated.

Custom Field Mapping Definitions

Users and Students

• Choosing the field denoted with "--" means that Schoology will not import a username for this user. Note that unless email addresses are populated, user creation will fail.
• Students.DCID: The Student DCID field is the same number that appears in the Unique ID column in Schoology. For students, this number has a "1_" prepended.
• Students.Student_Number: This field refers to the student number in PowerSchool for the given Student Record.
• Students.Student_Web_ID: This field refers to the student Web ID (For example, their PowerSchool login username) for the given Student Record.

Staff

• Choosing the field denoted with "--" means that Schoology will not import a username for this user. Note that unless email addresses are populated, user creation will fail.
• Teachers.DCID: The Teacher DCID field is the same number that appears in the Unique ID column in Schoology. For teachers, this number has a "2_" prepended.
• Teachers.TeacherNumber: This field refers to the teacher number inside PowerSchool for the given Teacher Record.
• Teachers.TeacherLoginId: This field refers to the Teacher Login ID (For example, their PowerSchool login username) for the given Teacher Record. If a Teacher Record has both a Teacher Username and an Admin Username, the Teacher Username will be used.

Sections

Section Title

• Sections.SectionNumber: This field refers to the PowerSchool Section Number. For readability, Schoology will prepend the word "Section" before this number. For instance, if PowerSchool has a section with several 14, Schoology will create it as "Section 14."
• Sections.Expression: This field refers to the PowerSchool Section Expression Field. For instance, if you have a Section in the course English 101, with the Section Expression of 3(A), Schoology will display English 101: 3(A).