Release 23.11.0.0 - November 2023

Added a new feature to allow substitutes the ability to get additional instructions for their job and be more prepared. This feature can allow the substitutes to message Location Administrators or absent employees (based on how the district has configured the feature) to get further information about the job like time to report, lesson plans, prior preparedness before reporting, confirmation about location/room number, and so on, which would help substitutes feel confident about their upcoming assignments. (This feature is on the new substitute/employee web - in future it would be expanded to the substitute/employee mobile app as well).

The feature can be enabled by navigating to the menu path: select Parameters, choose General, and then select Substitute additional instructions on the jobs. All the parameters are default disabled:

1. Enable Substitute additional instructions on the job: Main feature flag to enable the feature. When the radio button is set to Yes, the feature will be enabled. This will allow the substitutes to see the Additional Instructions button within their job details on Active/Finished jobs. On clicking the Additional Instructions button, a communication window will open for Substitute to send a message to the Location Administrators, if they need more information about the job.

2. Enable employee feature to receive substitute instructions messages: The District can allow the absent employee to get the substitute messages. This is particularly useful when the absences are created in advance. If the radio button is set to Yes, then as soon as a Substitute sends a message from their additional instructions communication window, employees will get an email and a new message will be shown on their absence list. Employees can respond to the substitute message by opening the communication window from their absence details. If the District chooses not to allow substitute message going to employees, the substitute message email will go the Location Administrators (having menu access permission to this new feature) and they can respond to substitute message by going to job details. As soon as there is a response to the Substitute’s message (from the employee or Admin), the Substitute will get notified by email, and also new message will be shown on the job.

3. Show employee email on substitute job detail: If the district wants to allow employee email to be shown to Substitutes, so that Substitutes can contact the employee over email, this parameter can be set to Yes.

4. Allow employee to turn off showing their email on job details: If the District wants to employees to decide if they want their email to be shown to substitute on the job, this can be set to Yes. The employee will then view a checkbox during their absence creation, asking if they want to show their email to substitutes.

Changed minor wordings to the substitute specification email to stress that it is only about the job specification, and they need to accept the job.

Enhanced the P1 import for the Gender field to support the value N as non-binary.

Added a note on the vacancy creation page for Admins when they are creating vacancies for locations with variable daily schedules. If the substitute times need to be exactly similar to the location times, then the times can be left blank, and it will be automatically shown on the confirmation page. If there is a need to have different timings than the location times, then the Modify Times button can be used.

Enhanced job filters to show the locations within the location groups within the Location filter in the new substitute web, so that the substitute can filter the jobs for a specific location if required.