Remember strategizing over the exact moment to present your parents with your report card?  When grades weren’t up to par, was it better to hand-deliver the document to mom while she was entertaining guests, or share the news with dad while he was at the office (and conveniently out of arm’s reach)?

In any case, report card time in my family was occasionally a stress point in my relationship with my two working parents. They had little time to check in with my instructors during the course of the semester and they0 likely had been receiving only vague information from me about the status of my grades.

Today’s parents have the opportunity to stay much more involved in their child’s day-to-day progress through the use of online student information systems employed by local school districts and private schools.  Systems such as PowerSchool or Infinite Campus allow teachers to enter assignments, grades, and attendance information that parents can access to monitor their child’s performance.  The school may also utilize the tool to send messages or status updates directly to parents.

Anne Burkey monitors her daughters’ school progress on one such tool.  She says keeping an eye on her older daughter, Lily, helped ease the transition from elementary school to junior high, and the resulting change from communicating with one teacher to several.

“It can be hard to talk about specifics about one child with a junior high school teacher who has 75 students, as opposed to an elementary school teacher who has 25,” Burkey says.  At the same time, Burkey says she worries about her ability to properly relinquish control of her daughter’s school performance as she matures.  She wants Lily to take on that responsibility.

“It (PowerSchool) is a wonderful tool,” she says, “but it’s also a curse.  You can very easily become a helicopter parent.”

Burkey has taught Lily to be responsible for monitoring her own grades, and tries to restrict herself to reviewing only the weekly status updates she receives.  If Burkey sees a problem brewing, such as a late assignment or a substandard grade, she’ll discuss it with her daughter.

Burkey says she is also working on helping both her girls prioritize elective activities that they may find more entertaining than core assignments.  She also hopes to help her daughters, whom she says easily earn good grades without much work, form the study habits that will be crucial for success in college.

Burkey says she is starting to work with her younger daughter, who entered the fourth grade in September, to track her own grades online.  She says Kaede is interested in sports and will likely need to one day balance study and practice time to maintain her grades.

Boise mom Trish Miller has found online student information systems helpful in noticing trends or missing assignments that she could bring attention to or call a teacher about.  She says her older daughter, junior high student Hailey, monitors her own grades and assignments on her iPod Touch.   Hailey is motivated by the thought of keeping her grades high enough to increase her eligibility for college scholarships and to comply with athletic requirements.

Miller’s younger daughter, Hanna, is learning to be accountable for her work as well.  The family talks weekly about the reports Miller receives online and she says it helps Hanna to recognize that she’s going to have to answer for bad grades or missing assignments on a regular basis and take steps to correct potential problems before they come to Miller’s attention.

Both Miller and Burkey are divorced mothers and praise the potential of student information systems to help parents who are separated keep up to date with their children’s school performance.

At the elementary level, it has been my experience that not all teachers utilize student information systems.  One who does says it has been helpful to have one more method of communication with parents.

Kimberly Amburn teaches fifth grade in the Boise School District.  She can see which parents log into the student information system, how often, and when.  She says about a third of the parents of her students access the system regularly, another third access it occasionally, and the rest rely on student-teacher conferences or other methods of communication.  Amburn says it’s helpful to have multiple vehicles for communicating with parents according to their needs.

She also says the tool has helped parents check in to report possible mistakes in her grading. One mom brought an error to her attention—she had typed in a 10-point quiz as being worth 100 points.

“This mom checked in regularly and worried that she might be bugging me,” Amburn said.  “I told her ‘your checking helps ensure that everything is accurate.’ ”

On the downside: Amburn said that it can be a struggle to update the system daily or even weekly, because of the volume of data that must be entered.

“In math, we record fifty grades in a semester, between quizzes, tests, and other assignments,” Amburn said.  “Trying to keep current can be a challenge.”

Amburn also maintains a website for her classroom with information about coming events, curriculum notes, and additional links with activities that correspond with the assignments her students are doing in class.  She also emails a weekly newsletter to parents.  She says while parents appreciate the heads-up on assignments that are coming due, and other information, her goal is to foster good communication that will help students be more accountable.

“Ultimately, it’s the students’ responsibility to get the work done and in on time,” she said, “but it’s great when parents and teachers can collaborate on that message and track whether it’s getting through.”

Beth Markley is a freelance writer and consultant for nonprofit organizations.  She and her husband live in Boise with their two boys.