Below you’ll find a selection of recent Compass product updates inspired by feedback from our schools! Highlights include a new birthday flag on rolls, improved sorting options for the Chronicle feed, and an emergency banner designed to help schools quickly share critical information when it matters most. Alongside these features, you’ll also find a range of enhancements aimed at streamlining everyday tasks and improving visibility across Compass.
⭐️ Emergency Notification Banner ⭐️
Compass now includes an emergency notification banner that allows schools to quickly communicate urgent messages to all staff.
Administrators can display a site-wide banner at the top of Compass with custom text and a configurable background colour (defaulting to dark red). The banner appears across every page for staff and can be activated, updated, or cleared instantly from Admin Tools > Emergency Banner, ensuring critical information can be shared quickly when it matters most.
This can be configured by staff in the CompassSponsors role group and those with the NewsFeedAdmin permission.
⭐️ Birthday Flag ⭐️
Teachers can now easily spot when a student is celebrating their birthday while marking the roll! A small cake icon will appear next to a student’s name on any roll and on the student’s profile page when their date of birth matches the current date. Displayed in the flags area alongside existing flags such as medical conditions, this quick visual cue helps teachers acknowledge students’ special days without needing to check additional details.
⭐️ Sort Chronicle Entries by Occurred Date ⭐️
The Chronicle feed on a student’s profile page now includes a sort option, giving staff more flexibility when reviewing entries. You can now choose to sort the feed by Created date or by the Occurred date. This is particularly helpful when entries are backdated, ensuring they can be viewed in the order they actually happened. The sort selector appears at the top of the Chronicle feed within a student’s profile, and will automatically refresh when a different sort option is selected.
⭐️ Colour Coded Timetables by Faculty ⭐️
Timetables and calendar views can now be colour-coded by faculty, making it easier to see which faculty a class belongs to at a glance. Once set, the colours will appear across staff and student calendar views, helping users easily recognise faculties when viewing timetables or schedules. Each faculty can be assigned a colour in the Faculty Manager.
⭐️ Removal of Chronicle Tag Limit ⭐️
Schools can now enable Roll Tags on as many Chronicle templates as needed, with the previous limit of 7 tags removed. This provides greater flexibility to tailor Chronicle tracking and roll marking to suit your school’s unique processes.
⭐️ Bulk Fill Empty Sessions for All Form Groups in Schedule Builder ⭐️
A new “Fill All Empty Sessions” option has been added to the Schedule Builder template editor, making it faster to populate timetable gaps across multiple form groups! Instead of filling empty sessions one form group at a time, you can now assign subjects to all form groups in a single action.
When used, Compass displays a dialogue listing each form group along with the subjects available to that group, allowing you to quickly select which subject should fill their empty sessions. If a form group has only one available subject, it will be automatically pre-selected to speed up the process.
How to use it:
- Open a schedule template in Schedule Builder
- Navigate to the Timetable tab
- Click the “Fill All Empty Sessions” button in the toolbar
- Select the subject you want to fill into the empty sessions for each form group
- Click “Fill” to automatically populate all empty sessions across the timetable
⭐️ Emergency Reports by Campus ⭐️
Schools can now filter the Daily Attendance Summary / Emergency Report by campus when generating the PDF. This allows multi-campus schools to produce campus-specific emergency attendance reports when needed, while still retaining the option to generate a report for all campuses.
⭐️ Photo Sheets Uplift ⭐️
Photo sheets in Compass have been refreshed with a new look, designed to make finding students quicker and easier! Staff can now search by name, sort the photo grid, and filter by form group, all within a clean layout that clearly displays each student’s photo, name, form group, and year level.
⭐️ Self-Service Single Sign-On (SSO) ⭐️
Schools can now configure and manage their own SAML Single Sign-On (SSO) settings directly within Compass. With this update, authorised administrators can update their identity provider (IdP) settings, including endpoints and certificates, through a dedicated configuration page in Compass. This gives schools greater flexibility to manage their authentication setup and make updates when needed.
How to use it:
- Navigate to Administration Tools under the cog icon
- Click ‘SSO SAML Configuration’
- Click “SAML Settings” to enter or update your identity provider (IdP) details, including endpoints and certificates
- Click “Save” to apply your changes
⭐️ Download General Import Templates ⭐️
Importing student data is now easier with the addition of Download Template options on the General Import page! This allows administrators to download a CSV template with the correct column headers already included, helping ensure data is prepared in the expected format before importing. The template also provides a suggested column order, making it easier to work with commonly used fields when preparing your file.
⭐️ Import period structures into Configure Schedules ⭐️
Schools can now import period structures directly using a CSV file, making it much faster to set up or update timetable configurations in bulk. Instead of creating period structures manually, administrators can now prepare a spreadsheet containing structure names, periods, times, and cycle day assignments, then upload it to Compass to create or update structures automatically. The import also supports additional settings such as teaching-time flags, picker visibility, and default structures, helping schools manage complex timetable setups more efficiently.
How to use it:
- Navigate to ‘Configure Schedules’ under Administration Tools
- Go to the ‘Period Structures’ tab
- Click the “Download Template” for the required CSV format and column structure
- Fill out the spreadsheet with the required information
- Click “Import from CSV” and upload the completed CSV file
