3 Benefits of K-12 Online Form Builders for School Districts

New Jersey’s Hamilton Township School District needed an online K-12 form builder to create a sign-out and tracking form, for 1:1 devices, that parents could sign electronically. Without a way to capture that information online, the district would have to create, print, and distribute paper-based forms, taking extra time and leading to potential inaccuracies.

By choosing PowerSchool Ecollect Forms for their online school form builder, Hamilton Township can now verify ahead of time that a parent has signed the agreement before they arrive to pick up their device. It makes the process smooth, accurate, and secure.

“We’ve started to transition all of our permission slips to Ecollect Forms, and the response has been incredible,” says Chris Guerrera, Information Systems Manager at Hamilton Township School District. “Multiple people can check the status of completed forms, which helps tremendously as we attempt to track down all of the parents who still need to fill out the forms.“

Here are the top three benefits of a digital, online form builder—along with ways K-12 districts are seeing results with PowerSchool Ecollect Forms.

As we’ve learned during the COVID-19 pandemic, school districts need the ability to adapt to new challenges. That means being able to customize edtech products to meet your unique needs. An online form builder can help you gain full control over your data collection by allowing you to tailor the form with your own fields. Top online form builders offer unlimited form-building, editing, and sharing capabilities.  

Missouri’s South Callaway R-II School District needed an online form builder to reduce paper and become more efficient, according to Stephanie Stambaugh, a Technology Support Specialist at the district. “Creating a form is super easy,“ she says. “You can add or change something with ease.“  

Ecollect Forms is embedded right within PowerSchool SIS, which makes it simple to access and use. A district administrator who’s already logged into PowerSchool can simply click a button to start building a new form or to access form templates for multiple uses. It’s all within a workflow they know and are comfortable with. Similarly, families have access via the parent portal they’re already familiar with, improving engagement which is critical to getting the data teachers and administrators need.  

PowerSchool Ecollect Forms lets you build from provided template forms or create custom forms from scratch for everything from transportation requests and e-learning consent forms to device tracking, permission slips, and parent-teacher conferences. One example is a template wellness survey that can help with back-to-school planning as schools re-open to check in to see how students are doing.  

“Forms (in PowerSchool Ecollect Forms) are generally very easy to create. We have created internal forms for our student support programs to help track data better,“ says Eric Miletich, Database Administrator at Montana’s Kalispell Public Schools.

Jerome Ohnui, a Data Specialist at Michigan’s Troy School District, gives another example of data accessibility. “We’ve used Ecollect Forms to ask families during each survey window whether they want to remain virtual or come in-seat,“ he explains. “The data is then used to fuel several business intelligence reports (particularly through Microsoft Power BI) to aid administration in capacity planning and reporting to the Board of Education. We’ve gotten our staff accustomed to being able to quickly survey families by just creating another form.“

By moving forms online, districts can see welcome cost savings by eliminating paper, printing, and mailing. It also frees up administrators from excessive paperwork and manual data entry, including the need to decipher handwriting from filled-in paper forms.

With access to a robust form template library covering all areas of district operations, gathering information can become a simpler process. Starting with pre-existing templates saves time while providing ideas for new form options.
“We save our families excess time by not repeating data that we have already, like name, address, and birthdate,“ says Jerome. “Digital forms can be completed anytime, anywhere, as opposed to preparing paper forms, remembering to send them back to school, and no real way to guarantee that they’ve been received at all.“

Before implementing PowerSchool Ecollect Forms, Wellington Catholic School Board in Ontario struggled with extra work for their front-office staff to collect and input form data.

“Now (with Ecollect Forms) it’s a reduction in secretary coverage for data entry, a big reduction in overtime, a huge cutback in paper and toner for printers, and it’s even a cutback in having our technicians drive to the schools to fix things like paper jams or replace printers. It really ties into so many things around the reduction of costs,“ says Dallas Schlitt, Client Services Supervisor.

Accurate data is critical for things like graduation requirements, permissions and agreements, behavior referrals, and more within the district. When your administrators are tasked with deciphering parent handwriting from filled-in forms, it not only takes more time, but can also lead to inaccurate information that flows throughout your system.

“(Before PowerSchool Ecollect Forms), data accuracy was a problem, with our staff having to decipher penmanship and go back multiple times to ensure accuracy,” says Dallas. “Now, because the fields are consistent with the fields in PowerSchool SIS, there’s nothing being missed because we can make important data–required fields.“

“Handwriting legibility was always a problem, as was interpreting input from families whose native language isn’t English,” adds Jerome. “We’ve come to rely on online forms almost exclusively, to the point where we can effectively show that it’s no longer feasible to require paper forms.“

Additional benefits of data flowing directly into PowerSchool SIS include improved security and reporting. With paper-based forms, some of the security risks include potential theft of personably identifiable information (PII), damage caused to stored files, or lost forms when moving from location to location. With school and district forms in a secure, electronic format, you can eliminate those risks.

Data captured with Ecollect Forms is easy to access and report on. You can tie any fields directly to SIS fields so that data is accessible within PowerSchool SIS. An example is when you create a field trip permission form that parents fill out. Instead of tracking down permission slips and potentially losing one, they’re accessible right within PowerSchool SIS for teachers and administrators.

“During COVID-19, the reporting feature was what made it possible to keep track of form completion. Not worrying about parents having to come in person made it easier for the school secretaries,“ says Chris.

Direct SIS integration improves reporting with simple one-click reports pulled from the system. It’s simple to search and generate custom reports to monitor the progress of administrators’ workflows, form submission, and more.

Choosing an Online Form Builder for Your District Needs

For schools looking for an efficient and secure way to gather data from students and parents, an online form builder can make it easier. Even more beneficial is to choose one that integrates with your student information system to improve data accuracy, reporting, and more.

A reliable, secure online form builder can provide the flexibility to customize forms for your unique needs, capture critical information easily, cut costs and save time, and improve data security and accuracy.

“We’re using less paper, getting forms filled out quicker and collected sooner, and the information goes directly into PowerSchool,” says Stephanie.