Any officer whose role can see students
Find a child's family from the roster
The roster answers one question: which family does this child belong to. It is built from the directory, and it holds a first name, a grade and a classroom — and nothing else about a child, on purpose.
When you are done
You can find any child on the roster by name, grade or classroom, and reach the adults in their family.
Who else you need
Nobody else is needed to read the roster. Adding a child is done on the family's own directory row rather than here, so whoever maintains the directory maintains the roster. Whether your role may see it at all is a setting your board controls — see the guide on changing what a role can do.
Know what PTO HQ holds about a child, and what it does not
A child's row carries a first name, a grade, a classroom, and a link to the adults in their family. That is the whole record.
- There is no surname, no contact detail, no photograph, no date of birth, no medical or dietary note, and no free-text notes field. There is no column for any of them, so there is nowhere for one to be typed.
- This is a promise PTO HQ makes publicly on its privacy page, and a test asserts the database schema still keeps it.
- The reason is not squeamishness. The school already holds that data and is regulated on how it holds it; a PTO holding a second copy takes on the same risk with none of the same obligations or defenses.
- If your board needs something PTO HQ does not hold about a child, the answer is to ask the school rather than to record it here.
Find a child
Open Students in the left sidebar.
Type a name, a grade or a classroom into the search box.
One box searches all three, so "Alvarez" finds a classroom and "3" finds a grade.
Switch between By classroom and By grade with the tabs.
By classroom is the view to use when a teacher asks who is in their class. By grade is the one for a year-group mailing.
Add a child to a family
Open Directory and find the family.
Add the child on that family's row, with a first name, a grade and a classroom.
Link the second adult on the family's row if there is one.
A child with no adult on file shows on the roster as having none, which is the signal that the directory row is incomplete rather than that the family has no parent.
- Grades sort in the order a school uses, so K comes before 1 and 2 comes before 10.
- Children sort by first name, then by the first adult's name, because there is no surname to sort on.
Read the counts correctly
The roster counts families rather than adults, so a child with two parents on file counts as one family and not two.
How to check it worked
- The child appears under their classroom and under their grade.
- Searching their first name, their grade or their classroom finds them.
- The row names the adults in their family.
If it did not work
| What you see | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| "No students on the roster yet." | No family in the directory has a child recorded against it. | Add children on the families' own rows in Directory. The roster is a view of the directory and holds nothing of its own. |
| A child shows "No adult on file". | The child's row is not linked to an adult in the directory. | Open the family in Directory and link the adult, or the second adult, on that row. |
| Students is not in the sidebar. | Your role holds the Students permission at No access. | Ask whoever manages your board's permissions to raise it. See the guide on changing what a role can do. |
| You want to record a child's allergy, photo permission or surname. | PTO HQ has no column for any of them and will not be given one. | Ask the school. They already hold it, they are regulated on how they hold it, and a PTO keeping a second copy takes the risk without the protections. |