New Teams feature will help teachers chat with parents and guardians

Teachers will be able to easily chat with parents and guardians of students with an upcoming feature for Microsoft Teams.

What you need to know

• A new feature for Microsoft Teams will allow teachers to connect with parents and guardians.
• The feature works with School Data Sync, which gathers data from a school's Student Information System.
• Working with School Data Sync reduces the time required to find information for parents and guardians of students.

An upcoming feature for Microsoft Teams will help teachers connect with parents and guardians of students. An entry on the Microsoft 365 roadmap states that "Parent connection in Teams for Education" is in development. The feature could arrive as soon as October 2021, but that date could change.

Parent connection in Microsoft Teams for Education utilizes automated systems that keep contact details up to date.

Here's Microsoft's description of the feature:

With Parent connection in Teams for Education, educators can easily connect and engage with the parents and guardians of their class using Teams chat. All parent and guardian data is provisioned using School Data Sync, saving educators and IT staff valuable time.

Support for School Data Sync (SDS) should make it easier for teachers to get in touch with parents and guardians. SDS is a free service in Office 365 for Education that gathers information from a school's Student Information System (SIS). A Microsoft support document explains how SDS helps import and sync data automatically with Office 365.

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Microsoft Teams is a valuable tool for educators and students in virtual classrooms and in hybrid learning environments. Soon, it will have a feature to help teachers connect with the parents and guardians of students.