There are two scenarios to consider for this task - multi-section courses and singletons. For instance, this fall, I am teaching one section of AP Computer Science (period C), two sections of Intro CS: Processing (periods D & E) and a single Independent Study class.
Notice that the classes I am showing here are followed by the course number and section (e.g., 804.1), which means that these are the classes imported by Veracross. By now, you may also have classes you created in PSL manually, too. I want to link up the classes I made manually to the rosters in these imported classes. The process is different for the two cases:
Singletons:
(New - 2017) If you wish, you can just start working with a singleton class, adding material as you wish. Alternately, if you have created a page for the class already (or if you just copied a singleton class from last year), you can merge the students from the veracross-generated class with the page you made, if you wish.
In this case, I'm going to merge the Independent Study class I created manually with with the imported Veracross one. This is pretty quick and painless:
Open the class you created, in this case, I called it "NAND 2 Tetris."
Go to the "Manage Class" button in the upper-right corner, and select "Merge Classes" from the popup menu that appears.
In the window that appears, select the year and imported class from which I want to grab the students.
Then click "Merge." The class (with my title, NAND 2 Tetris) now has the students in it, and if my roster changes in Veracross, this will be reflected in the PSLPSL page.
Multi-section:
This process is a bit more involved, but the result is very powerful. I am going to create "sections" in the class I created manually, and link each section to one of the imported Veracross classes. This will allow me to have one PSL class that manages all the sections. At the same time, I have the information about each section that lets me make some content specific to each section, if I desire.
I start by going into the manually created class, and select "Edit Roster."
In the window that appears, click on "Create Sections."
(I know it's tempting to click that other button. Don't do it!)You'll be asked if you really want to do this. Say "Ok."
The next window that appears will look like this. (I have enhanced the shading, which is very subtle on the website. Notice that "Section A" is highlighted at left, so the content to the right of it is referring to Section A. If "Section B" were selected, the material at right would refer to it. You can see this shading pretty easily from some angles on your laptop screen, but sometimes it gets washed out when you look straight on.)
Click on the blue "edit" button and change the name of each section to something temporary, like a name. (Something other than a single letter.) Click on the second section and give this a different name. If you have more than two sections of the same course, click on "+ Add Section" and repeat. For computer science, I am using the traditional "Foo" and "Bar."
Now with "Foo" selected, I am going to select "Import Students."
In the window that appears, you want to find the imported class from Veracross that you wish to link to this one. I suggest that you turn on the "Only list my classes" checkbox and type part of the course title to help limit all the choices. You can also select just this year from the "All" popup. Click "Search."
When you see your classes, click on the "+ Import" button next to the section you wish to import. (I'll import the first one for "Foo" and the second one for "Bar" later.)
You'll be asked if you want to "Link" the sections or "one time import." The "link" section is already selected, and it's the one you want. (This is what will let PSL reflect any changes in your class roster when they are made in Veracross.) Click "Continue."
You'll see the list of students for this section - click "Import Students."
This will return you to the "Edit Roster" screen, but now you'll see students! Right above the list of students you'll see "Section Foo" in a popup next to a link icon. You can use this popup later to switch between viewing sections.
Click on "Manage Sections," select the next section ("Bar"), and Import the students for that section.
When you have imported all your students, go back to "Manage Sections" and rename your sections to the period letters (D & E). This way you can make sure you get the right names with the right sections.
Now you can close the "Edit Roster" window. You're done!
Benefits of Sections (optional)
Once you have created sections in a class, you can make assignments, discussions and pages be section-dependent. That is, you can make a page be visible only to one section.
This would be helpful if you have something (e.g., a fire drill) that causes your classes to get out of synch, and you want to do an enrichment/sponge activity. Alternately, when you make a discussion block, you can set the discussion to be one that allows students to see only what the other students in their section have written. Or an assignment could have different due dates because of blocks.
To make a page be visible only to certain sections, click "Manage Page" → "Page Settings" for that page.
When you are creating blocks for Assignments or Discussions, if you have sections in your class, then section-specific options will be some of your choices.
