School Counselor Resources

Most information about students enrolled in an NSO course is accessible at any time. When you login to your School Counselor Account, you will have access to several helpful reports in your Dashboard.

COURSE REQUESTS: This report is a list of all your students with course requests that need your verification. Click on any student name to view their information, request details, and verify a request. 

REQUESTS WITHOUT GUARDIAN APPROVAL: This report is a list of any students who are still waiting for their guardians to approve their courses. Students must have guardian approval and counselor verification entered prior to being enrolled in a course. 

MY ENROLLED STUDENTS: This quick, at a glance, view shows all your students currently enrolled in an NSO course. You can view student progress, grade, quality of work, and pacing. Click on any student name for more details about their progress or grades.

DROP REQUESTS: This report shows any student who has entered a request to withdraw from an NSO course. You will need to enter your approval (along with their guardian’s approval) before they can be dropped from a course.

A student needs approval and counselor verification (from you) for a course request before they can be enrolled.

While all students may take an online course at any online provider of their choice by law, it is important to verify that the course meets the student’s graduation credit needs. Ensure the start and end dates are correct, and confirm that all information in the request is accurate.

Any student who has a course request needing your school counselor verification will be listed on your Counselor - Course Requests report on the dashboard of your NSO Account. 

Step 1: View and approve the student's course request.

• Click on the student's name to go to their main page. 
• Click on Requested Courses.
• Click on the drop-down menu of all requested courses.
• Select the courses you want to approve.

Step 2: Review the information on the course request.

• Course and Credit: Make sure the course and amount of credit matches what the student needs for graduation. 
• Start and End Dates: NSO teachers have 7 days to submit grades after the course end date. Plan accordingly to meet your school’s deadline for final grades. We provide suggested dates to help guide you.
• Enrollment Type: Verify that the student should take the course for supplemental, credit recovery, or tuition options. You can view the different registration choices offered at NSO to help guide you. 
• Make Changes: Change the student’s account before you verify the request if any of this information is incorrect.

Step 3: Verify the request

• Approve: Once you are sure all the information is correct, you can change your approval to “verified”, enter your initials and then click save. 
• Deny: If the student request is incorrect or doesn’t match what the students need for graduation credits, you can enter “not verified” and save.

If a student is planning to take their full course schedule at NSO, contact us so we can help plan and support their full-time schedule.

You have the ability to track student progress in real time. You can see both a snapshot of all of your students and more detailed information within your NSO account.

View the My Enrolled Students report, on the main page of your account, for a snapshot of all student progress. This shows all students currently enrolled in an NSO course at a glance. You can quickly view student progress, grades, quality of work, and pacing. Click on any student for more details.

From this view click on a student’s name for more details, including:

• Academic Snapshot: A quick glance at how they are doing in their course, including current grade, quality of work, last assignment submitted, and pacing.
• Gradebook: A complete list of assignments, date of submission, and grade earned.
• Communication: View all the communication sent from NSO to the student, including progress emails. 
• Course Requests: Check upcoming course requests and verify requests.

MORE ON PROGRESS & PACING 
 

From the student's main page click View Transcript to view transcripts and final grades. The transcript includes courses the student has taken with NSO, the segment (or section of content), grade, credit earned, start and end dates, and teacher name. You can also create a PDF for your records if needed.

NSO records grades as follows:

• A, B, C, or D Letter Grade: The student has completed enough work for a credit at the grade shown. Students must complete 80% of the course material with a grade of at least 60% to earn credit for a course.
• F Letter Grade: This is given ONLY when students complete enough work to have earned a credit (80% of the course material). However, the student did not earn at least 60% for the quality of the work completed. 
• I(%): The student did not complete at least 80% of the course and did not earn credit. The percentage shows the amount of work completed. For example, if a student completed 20% of the work, they would receive an I20.
• NP: This is given to students who have completed less than 10% of the course by their end date.
• P: A Pass is given to students whose School Counselor has approved a P/NC option.   
• W: Withdrawn, for students who have officially requested and been approved to drop their course. 
• WD:  Withdrawn/Dropped is given to students who have been removed for inactivity (15 school days with no assignment submission)

Students need both your verification and their guardian approval to be dropped from a NSO course.

To verify a drop request:

• View the Drop Requests report on the dashboard of your NSO Account.
• Click on the name of the student to get to the student’s main page.
• Click Drop a Course. Review the course requested to be dropped to make sure you approve of the withdrawal for their school schedule and credit needs. 
• To verify the drop request, add your approval and enter your initials 

Additional course withdrawal information:

• A student can withdraw from a course within 21 days of enrollment and no grade will be entered on their NSO transcript. After 21 days a W is applied to mark it as withdrawn.
• Incompletes are applied when a student completes significant coursework. It is up to your school to decide how to transfer the withdrawal from the NSO course onto your official school transcript.
• All completed student work can typically be transferred if they decide to take the same course again with NSO. This allows students to start where they left off.

MORE ON DROP REQUESTS AND COURSE WITHDRAWALS

It is important for us to have all student IEP or 504 documentation for students when they enroll with NSO. This allows us to collaborate with their case manager by reviewing the information and planning the facilitation of their accommodations on our end. All information remains confidential when using the process outlined.

To upload a student’s full IEP, 3 Year Evaluation, and 504 Plan:

• Click on the student’s name to go to their main page.
• Go to External Files.
• Click Add New File to add the document.
• Click Save.

NSO is a public educational institution, when students and guardians have agreed to take courses with us other schools can send educational records, including IEP and 504 documentation, without additional written consent (Buckley Amendment, Section 99.31).

MORE ABOUT IEP AND 504 SUPPORTS
 

If a student has a particular concern, crisis, or educational need that we should be aware of (such as a hospitalization or death in the family), we are here to collaborate with you on how to best support the student. We are often able to put in place additional support for the student or better understand how to communicate with the student and family with the given information.  NSO can be considered an extension of the student’s school so whatever you would share with teachers and counselors at your school can also be shared with NSO to support students.

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