1. Make sure your contact information is up-to-date in your Aeries Parent Portal Account .
   • Use one email address per parent in the Parent Portal Contacts screen to avoid creating multiple accounts.
   • Enter the same contact information (email and phone numbers) for all of your students in the Contacts screen in your Aeries Parent Portal Account.
   • ParentSquare syncs nightly with Parent Portal. All updates take 24 hours.
2. Once your information is up-to-date in Aeries Parent Portal, you should receive ParentSquare messages (voice, email, text) from the district and your child(ren)’s school.
3. If your contact information is up-to-date in Parent Portal, and you are still not receiving ParentSquare messages, email pio_department@ggusd.us or call (714) 663-6503.
4. Activate your ParentSquare account from the email or text message sent by ParentSquare. If you do not have an activation email or text you can visit parentsquare.com/signin and enter your email or cell phone in the Sign-up. An activation email will be sent to you.
5. Download the ParentSquare App (see How to Download the ParentSquare App) or login in at parentsquare.com using your email address or phone number on file with your student’s school. (Please see How to Activate your ParentSquare Account Below)
6. If you have forgotten your password – see How to Reset Your Password.
7. If you have multiple children but are unable to see them all in your account, please follow the instructions on Missing a child/Missing a school in ParentSquare.

Activating your ParentSquare account allows you to change your language or notification preferences, respond to surveys and forms, and engage with your child(ren)’s teacher(s). If you do not activate your account, you will still receive ParentSquare notifications (voicemail, email, text).

1. You should have received an email or text with a link to activate your account.
2. If you did not receive the activation email, visit ParentSquare.com , select log-in, enter your email address, and if it matches your email address in Parent Portal, you will be prompted to “Activate your Account.”

Downloading the ParentSquare app on your mobile phone allows you to view ParentSquare posts and alerts directly on your mobile phone.  Follow these simple steps to download the mobile app.

1. Download the ParentSquare or Garden Grove USD app from the app store on IOS or Android.
2. Check your email or text for the activation link.
3. Sign-in and you’re all set.

If you have never activated your ParentSquare account, you can do it directly from the mobile app. Once you download the app, follow these instructions:

1. Open the app, enter your email or cell phone number (as it appears in Aeries ParentPortal).
   • If it matches, you will be prompted to create a password and you will be sent a registration code to activate your account.
   • If it does not match what is in ParentPortal, select “Request Access” and an email will be sent to your school principal who will approve your access.

Users should be able to see all of their children and schools in one ParentSquare account. If you are missing a child/school:

1. Ensure you have the same email and phone number on file for all children and all schools in your Aries Parent Portal .
2. The day after the change is made, you should be able to log out and log back in to ParentSquare to see your updated information.

Pure Contact is a new feature designed to help you view, confirm or suggest corrections to your contact information in ParentSquare. If you are both a staff member and parent, you can now combine ParentSquare accounts. The goal of the feature is to ensure Garden Grove Unified School District has accurate and up-to-date contact information for all of our parents, students and staff who receive communication through ParentSquare.

ParentSquare users are asked to verify their contacts to ensure communication is sent to the right user. Users will be prompted to verify their contact information at login, including:

• Verify their email/phone - confirmation code is sent
• Edit their email/phone - correction is verified
• Confirm their children

Verify in Web Browser

1. Log in to your main ParentSquare account.
2. If you have unverified contact information, you will see one or more contact cards under, Action Required: Confirm Your Account Information. Click:
   • Confirm Email or Phone: A verification code will be sent to the email or phone number. Enter verification code into ParentSquare to confirm.
   • Edit Email or Phone: Correct your email and/or phone number. A verification code will be sent to your corrected email or phone number. Enter verification code into ParentSquare to confirm.
   • Skip For Now: You will be able to verify or correct your contact information the next time you sign in. (You'll continue to receive notifications.)
3. Confirm Child(ren): Select Confirm or Not My Child for each child.

4. Click Yes, this is me or This is Not Me.

   

5. If you clicked Skip For Now on any information on a contact card, you will not see the choice, "Yes, This is Me", and must select Skip For Now or This is Not Me.

   
6. Your school is notified of corrections in order to update their student information system (SIS). After school updates information, it will show in your account. Depending on your school’s settings, you may see the corrected email or phone number immediately in your account or the following day.

Verify in Mobile App

1. Log in to your main ParentSquare account.

2. If you have unverified contact information, you will see one or more contact cards with "Action Required", "Confirm Your Account Info." Tap arrow to right of Email and Phone to confirm or edit each one.

   

3. Select Confirm, Edit or Skip For Now. Repeat for phone number.

   
   • Verify Email or Phone: tap Confirm. A verification code is sent to the email or phone number. Enter verification code into ParentSquare to confirm.
   • Correction to Email or Phone: tap Edit: Enter correct email and/or phone number. A verification code is sent to your corrected email or phone number. Enter verification code into ParentSquare to confirm.
   • Skip For Now: You will be able to verify or correct your contact information at a later time. (You'll continue to receive notifications.)
4. Confirm Child(ren): Select Confirm or Not My Child.
5. Tap Yes, this is me or This is Not Me.
6. Your school is notified of corrections in order to update their student information system (SIS). After school updates information, it will show in your account. Depending on your school’s settings, you may see the corrected email or phone number immediately in your account.

Tip: Make sure you have updated to the most recent version of the ParentSquare app. More

How to Verify If You 'Skipped for Now'

1. The next time you sign out and then sign in again, you'll be asked to verify your contact information.
2. OR, when you are signed in to ParentSquare, click on your name in the upper right and select My Account. Go to the yellow box, "Missing kids, schools or contact info?" and select Confirm Contact Info.
3. Follow the steps above to confirm.

You can now combine your multiple accounts in ParentSquare. Cases where combining accounts makes sense include:

1. User is a staff member and parent: combine staff account with personal parent account to access both with one login. All emails and phone numbers remain associated.
2. Parents share an email or home phone: their accounts will automatically link if they are listed with shared contact information.
3. User is missing a student or school from their main account: they have a second account for student or school that can be merged.

Use Link on Email Invitation

1. Click link in email, Sign in to Combine Existing Account

   

It's important to keep your ParentSquare app up-to-date to take advantage of new features, enhancements and updates. Even if you have your mobile device set to automatically update apps, occasionally you may want to manually update.

• How to manually update iOS apps in App Store
• How to update Android apps in Google Play Store

Check Version When Logged in to ParentSquare

1. Tap the triple bars in the top left corner.

   

2. For iOS devices: The app version is found on the bottom left. You can also select About > About ParentSquare to view version number.

   

3. For Android devices: Select About > About ParentSquare. The version number will be above Service Agreement.

   

Check Version When Not logged in to ParentSquare

1. The app version is found on the bottom left of the sign in screen for both iOS and Android.

   

Navigate to the What’s New section of ParentSquare to locate the Change Log. In April of 2021, the latest version is:

Android v2.50.2.30130 released
iOS v2.45.9 released

Overview of Notifications

Users can fine-tune their notification settings for posts for each school and district. For General Announcements, you can select Digest, Instant, or choose to turn off notifications altogether (excluding Urgent Alerts and notices.) You can choose to receive email, text, and/or app notifications.

A secondary parent/guardian contact may want to turn off all notifications except for Urgent Alerts (This is particularly useful if their partner parent/guardian manages school-related daily activities).

ParentSquare allows users to customize their notifications by notification type and select their preferred delivery method for each school and district.

You can set the frequency of notifications for posts. The Instant setting will send all post notifications in real time. The Digest setting sends direct messages, alerts, and time-sensitive posts instantly, but sends all non-time-sensitive posts at the end of the day, reducing the number of notifications you receive daily. Note: we recommend the Digest setting.  

Notification types include:

• Urgent Smart Alerts & Notices - urgent alerts, attendance notices, and auto notices marked as critical notices (cannot be disabled).
• General Announcements & Messages - posts, direct messages and reminders.
• School Alerts - smart alerts and other student notices.

Under General Announcements, you can select how often you want to receive notifications for posts. Select Off, Instant or Digest notifications.

• Off: no notifications about posts will be sent to you. Urgent Alerts and Notices will still be sent. School Alerts will still be sent if turned on.
• Instant: you'll receive an email and/or text and/or an app notification every time a notice or message is sent.
• Digest: you'll receive an email and/or text and/or an app notification once a day in the evening with all posts from that day.

The default setting is typically Digest, so that you receive all notices and post messages in one convenient notification once a day. All urgent notifications still come through instantly, and a school can override settings as needed for an urgent message. If you choose Instant notifications, and have multiple children in multiple schools, that can add up to a lot of messages.

Update your Notification Settings (using web browser)

1. From Home, click your name and select Manage Account.
   
2. Click Notification Settings.
3. Choose your preferred Notification Settings for General Announcements & Messages (Off, Instant or Digest) and School Alerts (On or Off). Once you've made selections, future messaging will send based on your preferences.
   
   
   Note: you cannot turn off Urgent Alerts & Notices; this includes attendance notices.
   
   
4. If you have multiple emails or phones listed on your account, set the order of your preferred contacts to receive notifications. Notifications will only be sent to one email and one phone on your account.
   
   
   
   
   Note: the “Choose Best Match” setting will select the most relevant email and phone to send the notification to. Notifications related to the student/parent will go to the personal email/phone, while notifications intended for staff only will always go to the staff email/phone. Posts sent to both staff and parents will default to the parent email/phone. If "Digest" is selected and there is at least one notification in the Digest that includes parents, the digest will be sent to the parent email. 

Update your Notification Setting (using mobile app)

1. From home screen tap the triple bar menu at top left.
2. Select Account and then Notifications.
   
        
   
   
3. Select how you want to be notified at each school.
   - Turn OFF Custom Settings to use the same notification settings for all schools.
   - Turn ON Custom Settings to set different notifications at each school.
4. Toggle on or off to receive Email, Text and/or App Notifications. 
5. Select Instant or Digest for each mode. Note: Digest is recommended – you will receive one notification per day, for all posts, in the evening.
   
         
   
   Note: In order to receive app notifications on your phone, be sure they are enabled in your phone settings.