Anonymous wrote:I have just been emailing .pdf doctor's notes to an admin at my kids' school. Is that no longer allowed?

Not anymore. It has to be through the Aspen system.

I have just been emailing .pdf doctor's notes to an admin at my kids' school. Is that no longer allowed?

On the website, the form isn’t available.

Anonymous wrote:Want to know the even more hilarious part of this new system? I’m a dcps parent and teacher. The school I teach at had no idea about it. I showed the email to my principal and she was like HUH???

DCPS for the win. Sighhhhh.

I am OP of this thread and I suspected this was the case. I haven't asked our admin about it yet but we are one of the schools with a functional absence report system and I'm annoyed.

We used to be at a school with an absolutely terrible absence report system though. You were supposed to send excuse notes via email to the registrar, which we always did, with a doctors note attached if necessary. These would get marked as excused absences about 50% of the time. It was really frustrating. So I do get why they might want to create a centralized system since I think a lot of schools struggle with this. But the goal should be to provide a functional system to all schools, not to just force even schools who have sorted it out to have non-functional, confusing system no one understands.

Sounds like an unsafe way to submit personal info.

Our school had a very functional system for reporting absences and is now switching to whatever the hell this is and I'm .. not optimistic.

Want to know the even more hilarious part of this new system? I’m a dcps parent and teacher. The school I teach at had no idea about it. I showed the email to my principal and she was like HUH???

DCPS for the win. Sighhhhh.

The fact that it is not an app and they call it an app is frustrating to no end.

Is there any guidance or information about whether they are also planning to use this system for late arrival / early dismissal for doctor’s appointments? Surely that is also part of attendance, right?

Ok folks I've figured this out, so here's my PSA:

Aspen GO is not an app, it's a mobile-friendly version of the Aspen website. You can access it via a mobile device here: https://aspen.dcps.dc.gov/aspen-login/go

Then you use your usual Aspen credentials to log-in. There are links if you have forgotten your credentials.

Once you have access, here are the instructions for submitting an excuse note within the system: https://dcps.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dcps/page_content/attachments/Submitting%20an%20Excuse%20Note%20in%20Aspen%20GO%20%28Parent%20Portal%29.pdf

(This link was buried on the DCPS site amidst a long list of other attendance-related PDFs, you should not feel bad if you didn't see it!)

But anyway, none of this matters because if you follow the directions in the PDF, they tell you to go to "To Re-enroll student and other forms. Totally non-intuitive since most people finished re-enrollment months ago and I would not have expected the excuse notes to be categorized under "and other forms" because I would assume this just refers to enrollment-related forms, not attendance-related forms. I would expect an attendance-related form to be available in the menu item labeled "Attendance." But of course, it's not.

But in any case, they have not yet updated the system, at least for my kids, because even when I followed the directions I still didn't get an option for excuse notes. So I guess we'll see if/when that gets fixed.

Also the mobile site is slow to load even though the whole point of a mobile version is to have a slimmed down version that is easy to load and navigate on a phone.

Do better, DCPS. For once.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That email is so long and such an ineffective piece of communication.

Yes and it's also incorrect. The letter says parents and guardians "are welcome" to submit excuse notes via Aspen. But if you follow the link to the new policy on the DCPS page, it says "Any previously existing online systems that your school may have used in the past will be disabled prior to the start of the school year." So you aren't welcome to use Aspen -- you *must* use it in order to get absences excused. Yet even though both Ferebee's email and the page it links to claims that they are providing instructions for doing so, I can't find any instructions for it anywhere yet.

It is so frustrating to watch the school district screw up BASIC stuff like this over and over when you work or have worked in communications or administration. The letter shouldn't have come from Ferebee and shouldn't have been in casual "hey fam back to school is such an exciting time" language -- it should just be an official form email from DCPS and the instructions for submitting excuse notes via Aspen should just be in the email itself, along with links and instructions (that actually work and go where they are supposed to) for downloading the Aspen GO app and where to report issues or problems.

This stuff isn't even hard.

Ferebee sucks as a manager. He may be a nice person, a good educator, a smart guy? I don't know. But he's not a good leader for a large organization.

He does not trust schools to handle anything, so he centralizes more and more. And yet the centralized version of whatever it is is worse than what the schools were doing.

If he were a capable and confident leader, he would centralize only as much as necessary, hire good principals, and set in place just enough policy to be able to allow the good principals to shine. But everything gets harder, more bureacratic, and less effective instead.

Anonymous wrote:That email is so long and such an ineffective piece of communication.

Yes and it's also incorrect. The letter says parents and guardians "are welcome" to submit excuse notes via Aspen. But if you follow the link to the new policy on the DCPS page, it says "Any previously existing online systems that your school may have used in the past will be disabled prior to the start of the school year." So you aren't welcome to use Aspen -- you *must* use it in order to get absences excused. Yet even though both Ferebee's email and the page it links to claims that they are providing instructions for doing so, I can't find any instructions for it anywhere yet.

It is so frustrating to watch the school district screw up BASIC stuff like this over and over when you work or have worked in communications or administration. The letter shouldn't have come from Ferebee and shouldn't have been in casual "hey fam back to school is such an exciting time" language -- it should just be an official form email from DCPS and the instructions for submitting excuse notes via Aspen should just be in the email itself, along with links and instructions (that actually work and go where they are supposed to) for downloading the Aspen GO app and where to report issues or problems.

This stuff isn't even hard.

That email is so long and such an ineffective piece of communication.

Ugh! If it helps, search for "Follett Aspen" in App Store (probably similar for Android). I can't see the link to submit absence request but maybe it's being rolled out?

Hi just got this email from the district, which I actually welcome because our school has a terrible system for reporting excused absences (essentially no system and it's a crapshoot as to whether absences get marked as excused or not even when you have a doctor's note.

It says you can submit them through Aspen GO, which I've never used before, but of course the link that is supposed to be to instructions on how to submit excuses for absences don't actually do that because it's DCPS and they are incompetent. Hopefully once I download Aspen GO it will be fairly easy to figure out.

Imagine planning and announcing this change (good) and then failing to do even the most basic prep to ensure the information is where it's supposed to be.

Anyway, here's Ferebee's email:

Dear DC Public Schools (DCPS) Families,

There is something special about the first day of school. Whether it is a Pre-K scholar stepping into a classroom for the first time or a senior preparing for graduation, the beginning of the school year is an exciting moment across our district.

A new school year is also a time to implement new strategies and approaches to help students and families succeed. For School Year 2025-2026, DCPS is launching a new, districtwide excuse note submission process to better streamline attendance across our 117 school communities.

Parents and caregivers are encouraged to submit excuse notes through Aspen GO—a mobile friendly version of Aspen Parent Portal, and the same platform that school enrollment and reenrollment is completed on. Please visit the DCPS Attendance webpage for guidance on how to submit an excuse note.

Thank you for your collaboration to ensure that this school year is centered around the success of our students. I look forward to another year of joyful learning experiences.

In partnership,

Lewis D. Ferebee, Ed.D.  

Chancellor, DC Public Schools