Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the College Planning topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Counselors demonstrate SchoolLinks college‑planning platform to Pleasant Hill High parents
Summary
Counselors at Pleasant Hill High School demonstrated the SchoolLinks college-and-career platform to parents, explaining how students use it from ninth grade through senior year, how GPA and test scores are uploaded, and how parents can claim linked guardian accounts.
Rebecca Caswell, co‑counselor at Pleasant Hill High School, walked a packed parent audience through SchoolLinks, the district’s college-and-career planning platform, saying the tool is intended to be an ongoing part of students’ high‑school experience rather than a single event. "This is not a one‑and‑done experience," Caswell said as she described onboarding in ninth grade, assessments in sophomore year and intensified junior‑year advisement and college‑rep visits in late winter.
Caswell demonstrated the student landing page and features parents will see if they claim guardian access: a to‑do list (overdue, completed, upcoming), a profile/resume builder for extracurriculars and awards, career assessments tied to Department of Labor data, and a searchable college directory. She said the platform’s admissions scattergrams offer a two‑point snapshot (GPA plus PSAT/SAT/ACT) to help students frame reach, target and likely schools, while cautioning that the graph is only part of the admissions picture.
On data handling, Caswell explained that the school uploads GPA records manually at the start of each academic year and that test scores can appear with a delay because of processing. "The information that’s housed in here is only used by your student — colleges don’t see this stuff," she said, urging parents not to worry when an entry is temporarily missing. She also demonstrated how students can 'heart' schools to build a favorites list and export resume material for applications or summer work.
Parents asked practical questions about parent accounts, scholarship listings and transferring profile details into Common App fields. Caswell said guardians sign up with a claim code (one code per student) and that technology staff will email claim links so families who could not attend can set up accounts at home. She pointed parents to the school’s financial‑aid night led by Dan Robinson for deeper cost and aid discussions and suggested using each college’s net‑price calculator to estimate family costs.
Caswell encouraged parents to work with students on the platform, to attend the junior advisement presentations and college fair sessions scheduled in February–March, and to contact guidance with follow‑up questions. "We’ll walk you through this; the only people who will ever see it are you and me and us," she said, offering handouts and loaner computers for families who wanted hands‑on help after the presentation.
The presentation included a live Q&A; counselors said they will post claim‑code instructions and resources on the high‑school website and distribute them by email to families who want to set up guardian access later.
