Documentation for Administrators

12.0.74 - 01/19/2025

Updated on

Finance

FOCUS-47072- feat(accounts-payable): show linked purchase order number in invoice batch

With this system improvement, Purchase Orders linked to P-Card Purchase Requests will have a clickable link in the PO# column of P-Card Invoice Batches.

FOCUS-47047- feat(accounts-payable): split PO negative budget permission into p-card and non-p-card

This system enhancement separates the permissions for purchase order negative budgets into two distinct categories: "negative budget - all others" and "negative budget p-card."

See Setup > Profiles > Purchasing/Accounts Payable for more information. Note: This change has been applied to Purchase Requests/Orders and Internal Purchase Requests/Orders.

FOCUS-47017- feat(accounts-payable): add Minority field to Vendors

This system enhancement introduces a new "Minorities" dropdown menu in the Current Contact tab of the Vendor/Customer screen. When null, the Contacts table will display "No" in the Minorities column. To enable, navigate to Setup>Settings>Accounts Payable > Minority section, add minority selections to be displayed in the dropdown.

FOCUS-46980- feat(ledger): Speed Improvement for the Manual Journal Page

This system improvement is a speed improvement for the dropdown menu when creating a manual journal draft.

FOCUS-46972- Update Vendor Payment Type

This system enhancement modifies the name of the E-pay dropdown within the payment method section in Purchasing/Accounts Payable > Accounts Payable > Vendor/Customers > Current Contact tab. The new designation will be "Vendor Payment Type."

FOCUS-46966- Inventory Completion Percentage

In this system enhancement, when a facility does not have inventory, the completion percentage column will indicate "No assets" on the Fixed Assets > Inventory > Take Inventory.

FOCUS-46956- Cashout Report Add Date to Signature Line

This system enhancement adds a date signed field to the cash out report.

FOCUS-46703- Budgeting/General Ledger> Budget Maintenance> Edit Draft --- Freeze top portion of screen

This system enhancement locks the first section of the budget maintenance screen, which includes the revision and amendment details.

FOCUS-44815- Integrate with Amazon Punchout

This system enhancement introduces new functionality to the purchasing accounts payable module of Focus, enabling integration with Amazon Punchout. A new system setting has been incorporated into the accounts payable tab within the setup settings, allowing for the inclusion of punchout in the purchase order numbering. Additionally, a profile permission has been implemented, granting users the capability to submit Amazon Punchout type for purchase requests.

Payroll

FOCUS-47075- 2025 403b/457b IRS Limits Added

This system improvement adds the IRS Age Limits to Payroll > Maintenance > Maintenance by Calendar Year > Retirement Deferral Limits Tab.

FOCUS-47018- Add mass delete to adjustments

This system enhancement introduces a mass delete button in the Payroll > Pay Runs > Run Payroll > Adjustments tab of the run payroll screen.

FOCUS-46960- Employee Agreement Multiple Jobs (duplicate agreements created)

This system improvement introduces a checkbox in Human Resources > Staff > Employment Agreement Maintenance. The checkbox is labeled "Generate Agreements per User-Supplement" and is positioned within the View/Create Agreements tab. When checked, the same agreement will be sent twice to employees who have both a job and a supplement. If unchecked, those employees will receive only one agreement.

FOCUS-46873- Bay - Job Postings - Include Position Infor for All Jobs When Posting Multiple Positions

This system enhancement enables applicants to view information for all jobs attached to a job posting with multiple positions.

SIS

FOCUS-47192- Pull Grades for Report Cards: Resolve Course Numbers to Include when Pulling for Multiple Schools

This update resolves an issue in the Pull Grades for Report Cards feature. Previously, when pulling grades for selected schools and using the Course Numbers to Include option, grades for other unintended courses were being pulled in some schools. With this update, grades are now correctly pulled only for the specified courses, ensuring accurate results.

FOCUS-47132- Post Final Grades: Allow Teachers to Post Exam Grades when System Preference 'Disable the ability for teachers to post grades that differ from gradebook' Enabled

This update resolves an issue with the Post Final Grades feature in the Teacher Portal. Previously, teachers were unable to post exam grades if the System Preference "Disable the ability for teachers to post grades that differ from gradebook" was enabled. With this update, teachers can now successfully post exam grades, regardless of this setting, ensuring proper functionality.

FOCUS-47112- Profiles: Remove View Permissions for Address Fields

This update modifies the profile structure for Address Fields by removing the View permission. With this change, Edit will remain as the sole permission available, simplifying the permissions structure for Address Fields.

See Profiles > Students tab for more information.

FOCUS-47094- Online Application/Re-Enrollment: Improve Take Photo Overlay in File Upload Fields

This update improves the behavior of the "Take Photo" option in the upload field within the online application. Previously, the camera interface would appear at the bottom of the page, which could be confusing for users, especially on longer pages. With this update, the camera interface now appears as an overlay, ensuring better visibility and a more intuitive user experience.

FOCUS-47010- Graduation Requirements: Ensure Save Button Turns Red After Modification

This update improves the behavior of the Graduation Requirements feature by addressing the functionality of the Save button. Previously, the Save button would not turn red when a change was made to a text field. With this update, the Save button now turns red whenever any adjustment is made on the screen, ensuring consistent and standardized functionality.

FOCUS-47003- Gradebook Reports: Ensure Student Photos Display in Blank Gradebook Report

This update resolves an issue where student images were not populating on the Blank Gradebook Report. With this fix, student images now display as expected.

FOCUS-46959- Graduation Requirements Report: Improve Display of Failed Grades

This update resolves an issue in the Graduation Requirements Report when the System Preference "Show Failed Courses on Grad Requirements Report" is enabled. Previously, failing grades were incorrectly filtered out if passing grades existed in certain cases. With this update, when the system preference is enabled, failed course grades will now correctly appear under the Elective Requirement subject for students without a specified graduation subject or if the requirement subject has already been satisfied by other grades. This ensures accurate and consistent reporting of failed courses.

FOCUS-46958- Communication Platform: Message Sent Confirmation

This update enhances the Communication Platform by adding a confirmation popup that appears after sending a message. This popup notifies users that their message was sent successfully, eliminating the need to wait for the Sent box to load and improving the overall user experience.

FOCUS-46946- Grades: Improve Student Grade Summary & Gradebook when Student Transferring Within Combined Sections

This update resolves issues in the Student Grade Summary and Gradebook views that occurred when a student was transferred between classes in the same section group:

  • In the Student Grade Summary, clicking on the Gradebook link for an inactive course incorrectly redirected the user to the Gradebook of the new (active) course.
  • In the Gradebook view, manually switching back to the old course after being redirected to the new course resulted in an error message: "The requested assignment could not be found. You may not have access to this assignment, or it does not exist."

These issues were caused by the initial "selected" Gradebook value including multiple courses from the same section group. This update ensures that the selected course period in the Gradebook matches the course period specified in the URL, resolving the redirection and error issues.

FOCUS-46939- Advanced Reports: Resolve Filter Applied to Saved Reports

This update resolves an issue in Advanced Reports where an erroneous filter message stating "Periods 0 or more periods between" would appear when running certain filters. With this update, the issue has been corrected, and the error message no longer appears, ensuring accurate and seamless filtering in Advanced Reports.

FOCUS-46924- Gradebook Reports: Remove Points Possible in Progress Reports for Proficiency Gradebooks

This update modifies teacher-generated Progress Reports from Gradebook Reports when the proficiency Gradebook is enabled. Previously, the reports included the points possible value. With this update, the points possible value is no longer displayed, aligning the reports with proficiency-based grading practices.

FOCUS-46923- Grades: If Co-Teacher Posts Grades, the Primary Teacher will be Removed from Teacher Completion

This update improves the behavior of the Grades Teacher Completion report. Previously, if grades were posted by a Co-Teacher, the Primary Teacher of the section would still appear on the report. With this update, if all grades for a section are posted, regardless of whether they were submitted by the Primary Teacher or the Co-Teacher, the teacher of record will no longer appear on the Grades Teacher Completion report. This enhancement provides administrators with a clearer and more accurate view of teachers who still need to post grades.

FOCUS-46901- Attendance: Improve Hours ADA Total in Average Daily Attendance Report

This update improves the Average Daily Attendance Report - By Teacher by resolving a calculation issue with the Hours ADA Total. The report now calculates the Hours ADA Total accurately, ensuring reliable and correct data.

FOCUS-46892- Scheduling: Improvements to Request Reports Surrounding Alternate Requests

This update introduces a new "Include Alternative" option in the Print Requests by Student module, enabling users to include alternative course requests in their search results. Additionally, the Scheduling Request Reports have been enhanced by making the "# of Alternate Requests" a clickable hyperlink, which navigates users to a list of students who have selected that course as an alternative request.

The update also resolves two issues:

  1. The Print Requests by Course report no longer displays a blank screen when run for a course added as an alternative.
  2. The Print Requests by Students report now accurately populates alternative course requests.

These enhancements improve functionality, usability, and accuracy in managing and reporting course requests.

FOCUS-46877- Transcript: Resolve Test History Options Save Settings

This update resolves an issue with Transcripts where unselecting various "Test History Include on Transcripts" options and clicking "Save Settings" did not properly save those changes to the template. With this update, the settings now save correctly, ensuring template configurations are applied as intended.

FOCUS-46861- Communication Platform: Improve Printing Letters When CK Editor is Used

This update enhances the Communication Platform by improving the printing of emails composed with the CK Editor. The update ensures that the font size remains consistent and better matches what is displayed in the editor, providing a more accurate printout of the email content.

FOCUS-46801- Discipline: New Referrals Navigation Tools

This update introduces improvements to the Discipline module, specifically for navigating student referrals. Previously, when accessing a student's referrals from Student Info and using the Referrals submenu, navigation arrows to move between that student's referrals were not available. With this update, users can now move forward and backward between a student's referrals using the new navigation arrows. The existing arrows in the top left remain independent, allowing users to navigate between students as before.

FOCUS-46728- Student Breakdown: Resolve 'Breakdown Further?' Selection Filtering Issue

This update resolves an issue on the Student Breakdown page where selecting "Breakdown Further?" caused inconsistent data in the "list" view, with the last row being a duplicate of another row in the table. The problem was caused by variables being passed by reference and not properly cleared for subsequent operations. With this update, variables are now cleared correctly, ensuring accurate and consistent data is displayed.

FOCUS-46554- Online Application: Prevent Auto Fill on Student Applications

This update improves the Online Application by disabling auto-filling for text fields. This change prevents issues where incorrect student names or other information could be automatically populated, ensuring accuracy in critical fields and reducing errors during the application process.

FOCUS-46486- Communication Platform: Ensure Unread Messages are Readable

This update improves the Communication Platform by addressing an issue where messages were sent without an associated communication_queue record. This caused alerts for unread messages to appear, even though no unread messages were visible. With this update, messages without a communication_queue record will no longer contribute to the unread count, ensuring accurate message alerts.

FOCUS-46250- Attendance Calendars: Enable Copying of Existing Calendar Data to Other Calendars

This update introduces an exciting new feature to the Attendance Calendars functionality, adding a "Copy From Another Calendar" tab on the Edit Calendar page. This feature allows users with calendar edit permissions for all schools in the district to copy data from another calendar within their district.

Users can select a source calendar from the 'Copy From' dropdown, which lists all calendars in the district except the current one. The Options dropdown provides choices to copy Rotation Days and Bell Schedules. If the 'Advanced Rotation' system preference is not set or is set to 'Weekday Rotation,' only Bell Schedules can be copied.

To maintain data integrity, the feature includes restrictions:

  • Bell Schedules: If a user selects Bell Schedules and then chooses a calendar from another school, or vice versa, an error message will appear, and Bell Schedules will be de-selected. This is because Bell Schedules are specific to each school and cannot be copied across schools.
  • Rotation Days: If a user selects Rotation Days and then chooses a calendar from another school with a different 'Advanced Rotation' system preference, or vice versa, an error message will appear. This restriction ensures that Rotation Days are only copied between calendars with compatible rotation settings.

These enhancements streamline calendar setup while ensuring compatibility and data accuracy within the district.

FOCUS-45362- COE Report: Improve Query and Calculations

This update introduces necessary improvements to the COE Report for postsecondary customers. It resolves issues with the logic for Beginning Enrollment, Students Still Enrolled, and Graduate Completer, ensuring accurate and reliable reporting for these key metrics.

FOCUS-43841- Grades: Improvements to Grading Scale Features

This update introduces significant enhancements to Grading Scales functionality, providing greater flexibility for both teachers and organizations.

A new system preference has been added under Gradebook Configuration called "Show grade scales in the Gradebook." By default, this option will be disabled at the district level, maintaining current functionality. If enabled, teachers will see a new Grade Scale column in their Gradebook. The Grade Scale will default to the scale defined for the section but can be adjusted at the classroom level or by individual student, allowing teachers to tailor grading to the specific needs and levels of students in their class.

Additionally, a new "Use Min/Max Post Percents for Grade Scales" preference has been introduced under the Grading tab. This feature allows organizations to define minimum and maximum posted percentages at the Grading Scale level. If your organization previously used individual Min and Max Posted Percent preferences at the system level, this preference will be enabled by default, and existing values will be migrated to the new Grading Scale columns. This enhancement provides greater flexibility to define Min/Max percent values for specific groups of courses organized by grading scale.

See System Preferences > Default Gradebook Configuration, System Preferences > Gradebook Configuration, System Preferences > Grading, Grading Scales & Comments, and Gradebook for more information.

Grading Scales & Comments

FOCUS-42627- Protected Students: Improvements to Hidden Information

This update enhances the security of sensitive information for students marked as "Protected." Going forward, the birthdate, social security number, and profile photo of Protected Students will be hidden unless the end-user has explicit permissions to view protected student information. This improvement ensures greater privacy and stricter access control for sensitive student data.

FOCUS-47152- Portal Alert Link Bully/Harassment takes 5+ min to render

FOCUS-46865- Fix district report validation utility

SSS

FOCUS-47062- SSS: Resolve Locked(Inactive) Event Unlocking

This update improves the SSS module by resolving an issue that caused users to encounter a "Call to undefined method stdClass::save()" error when attempting to unlock a Locked & Inactive event. With this update, users can now unlock Locked & Inactive events without errors, ensuring smoother functionality.

FOCUS-46968- SSS: Check Access Points Determining Objectives Requirements Improvement

This update improves the SSS module by refining the behavior of the Goals and Objectives step in the IEP Event. Previously, when the "Evaluate Access Points" setting in SSS > General was enabled and custom_791 was set to "Z," the system still required adding two objectives to the goals. With this update, the requirement to add two objectives is removed under these conditions, ensuring the process aligns with the intended configuration.

FOCUS-46682- SSS: Question to 'Publish to Parent Portal' Displayed on Setting Event to Inactive or Active

This update improves the SSS module by refining the behavior of the publication prompt for events marked for the parent portal. Previously, toggling an event between active and inactive would trigger a prompt asking if you want to publish the event. With this update, the prompt no longer appears when switching between active and inactive status but continues to appear when locking the event, ensuring publication decisions are made at the appropriate stage.

Next Article 12.0.67 - Revision - 01/17/2025