Everything ArcAngel does
One system for a school's records, grades, attendance, paperwork, communication and money, whether the school is one family at a kitchen table or a campus of five hundred. Every module on this page is included in every plan. The few optional add-ons are marked.
Built around the kind of school you are
When you create your school you choose its type. ArcAngel switches on the modules that kind of school usually needs, uses the titles it uses, and puts you on the plan that fits. You can switch any module on or off yourself, whenever you like, and nothing is deleted when you switch one off.
For one family
You're the principal, the teacher and the parent. One login gives you a Teaching view and a Parent view. Hours and days are counted toward your state's rules from what you log, transcripts come from the grades you keep, and the school-sized systems stay out of your way until you want one.
Titles: Parent-Educator, Tutor
$4 a month for the whole family.
For families who teach together
A shared roster, admissions, forms, groups for clubs and park days, visitor sign-in, a health office and drill log, and billing each family. A class taught at the co-op can carry onto each family's own transcript.
Titles: Director, Teaching Parent, Member Parent
$25 a month + $1 per family.
For a small school
Admissions, family billing and financial aid, staff records, substitutes and rooms, together with the homeschool compliance tools that families in a pod often still rely on.
Title: Director
Co-op pricing: $25 a month + $1 per family.
For campus days and home days
A bell schedule for the days on campus, assignments with start and due dates for the days at home, and one family view of both. Diploma credit tracking, state reporting, athletics, behavior records and accreditation start switched on.
Title: Head of School
$1.50 per active student a month ($75 minimum).
For a school without a building
Admissions, the school-wide roster, family billing, staff records, state reporting and accreditation, without building-only modules like the health office or drill log.
Title: Director
$1.50 per active student a month ($75 minimum).
For a campus
Admissions and re-enrollment, tuition and financial aid, school lunches, the health office, behavior, athletics, rooms, substitutes, accreditation and state reporting, all switched on from the start.
Title: Head of School
$1.50 per active student a month ($75 minimum).
For a public school
Admissions, school lunches, bus routes, the health office, behavior, athletics, rooms, substitutes, accreditation and state reporting, switched on from the start. Lunches can run the federal free and reduced-price meal program, from direct certification to the monthly claim.
Title: Principal
$1.50 per active student a month ($75 minimum).
For everything in between
Tutoring centers, enrichment programs, anything that doesn't fit a box. Start neutral and switch on exactly the modules you want.
For students and families
What a student or parent sees after signing in. A parent sees their own children and nobody else's, and a student sees only their own record.
Students
One dashboard for the school day
- What's due, and what's missing: work from every class on one screen, so nothing turns up as a surprise
- Grades as they're posted: semester grades and credits, plus a live report card at any time
- Official report cards: shown on the dashboard the day the school releases them
- A calendar that follows them: classes, events and holidays, with a private feed for Google, Apple or Outlook calendars
- Messages with teachers: always about the student, always seen by their parents, and never with other students
- Reading log and Mark done: where the school turns them on, students log their own books and flag finished work
Parents & guardians
Every child, every school, one login
- Every child on one screen: GPA, missing work, attendance rate, hours and progress toward graduation
- Hours attended next to hours planned: you see what has actually been taught, not only what's on the schedule
- Forms signed online: permission slips, intake forms and handbook sign-offs, with reminders until they're done
- Pay online: invoices, payment plans, receipts and lunch balances, paid through Stripe's secure checkout
- Told the same day: a child sent home from the health office, a missed dose, an injury report, a missed afternoon bus. The notice says little; the details are behind your sign-in
- What your state offers homeschoolers: public school sports and classes, dual enrollment, funding and accepted tests, listed only where checked against the state's own source
- Re-enrollment in a click: answer "returning" or "not returning" for each child from a banner
People with more than one role
A teacher who's also a parent, a director who's also a member
- One account across every school you belong to, with Switch school in the menu
- One view at a time: a Staff view and a Parent view. In the Parent view, staff powers are switched off, not just hidden, so the account is safe to leave open on a family device
- Your password to switch, every time, and every switch is recorded
For teachers
The day-to-day work, without typing anything twice.
Grading
- A weighted gradebook grid: type scores straight in; each saves as you leave the box and the grade updates
- Your class, your scale: percentage, letter, pass/fail, standards-based, or no grading at all
- Missing work, listed: everything past due and not turned in, with a link to enter the grade
- Nothing counted as zero for you: if missing work should be a zero, you enter it
Attendance & hours
- One pass per class: everyone starts present, so you change only the exceptions
- Hours per subject: the calendar homeschools and co-ops use, filled by clicking or dragging across days
- Honest totals: a day nobody marked is never counted as taught
Planning
- Lesson plans & syllabus: units and dated lessons, readable by families once you publish them
- Assignments from the plan: turn a lesson into graded work in one click instead of typing it again
- Next year in one step: copy a whole plan to another class and every date shifts with it
- Start dates: post work ahead; families are told when it opens
Families & colleagues
- Announcements to a class you teach or to one family
- Two-way messages about a student, answered from the app or, where the school offers it, by replying to the email
- Notes kept for staff, or shared with the family or student
- Report cards: generate the live one, or send it to the family
- Out sick? Report it with plans for the sub. Whoever covers sees your plans, never your reason
For administrators and directors
Everything behind the front office, in one place, set up your way.
Students & enrollment
- The whole roster: custom fields, documents, emergency contacts with who may pick up, and an enrollment history that can't be edited
- Admissions: a public application page that needs no account, a pipeline with a waitlist and interviews, then enroll and invite the parent in one step
- Re-enrollment: families confirm each child; you preview, then move the whole school up a grade
- Forms & e-signatures: a form builder with typed signatures, file uploads, conditional questions and multi-step approval
Reports & documents
- Ready-made reports: enrollment, attendance, grades, GPA distribution, graduation by cohort, demographics, form completion and tuition, on screen or as a spreadsheet
- Build your own: pick the columns and filters, save it, run it next term. A column someone isn't allowed to see is never shown to them
- Official report cards: drafted, reviewed, released together. A correction is reissued, and the family is told
- Transcripts: printed from the record, in your branding
People & permissions
- Roles for every job: principal, registrar, counselor, teacher, assistant, nurse, coach, bus driver, cafeteria staff and more, plus a view-only observer
- Co-equal administrators: more than one principal or director, each with full authority
- Field by field: decide who sees gender, ethnicity, photos and contact details, and who may edit a student's legal identity
- Staff records: licenses, certifications and background checks, with whatever lapses next at the top of the list
Your school, your way
- Your branding: your logo and colors in the app, the family portal, and on report cards and transcripts, at every price
- Modules: switch any part of the system on or off. Switching one off hides it and deletes nothing
- Dashboards: each person arranges their own, and you can set the school's starting layout
- Handbook: policies, procedures and FAQs, each for the audience you choose
- Automations Beta: rules that notice absences, low grades, overdue forms and unpaid tuition, and notify the right people. Every run is logged
Grades, transcripts and compliance
The records a homeschool is most often told it can't produce itself, generated from what you already keep.
Transcripts
- Grades 9–12 by year, cumulative GPA, credits, test scores, volunteer hours and a signature line, with optional attendance and hours pages
- A check before you print: a missing credit or grade is flagged before it reaches a college
- Credits your way: earned by completing a course, or by hours of instruction
- No stored Social Security numbers: one can be printed on a transcript, and it is never saved
Report cards
- Live report cards, available to families at any time and marked unofficial
- Official report cards, reviewed before release. Once released they can't be quietly changed or deleted
- Private staff notes never print on either
State compliance
- Adopt your state's requirements, or write your own
- Counted from your records: hours and days from attendance, credits from courses
- Met, partly met, not yet: know in February, not June
- Sourced: each state links to its official source and shows whether each requirement has been checked. Starting points, not legal advice, so every one is editable
- Optional, and reported nowhere: it's for you
Diplomas & credits
- Diploma pathways: name each route to a diploma and see which one a student is on track for, and what's still short
- Subject credits: "four of mathematics" measured against the courses a student has actually earned credit in
- "What if we moved?": compare this year against another state's requirements
Co-op classes on a family transcript
When a family and their co-op both use ArcAngel, the parent can link their child's co-op classes. The grades carry onto the homeschool's own transcript and GPA, with the co-op's grading scale, read-only because the co-op does the grading.
Records kept, not lost
- Archived, never destroyed: when a student has been gone longer than your retention window (5 years unless you change it), their files move to encrypted storage, checked before the original is removed
- Legal holds keep a student's records in place
- Retrieve any file or a whole bundle, with every retrieval logged
Communication
Every message is in the app, for everyone, at no extra charge. Email, browser alerts and chat pings are extra ways to hear about it, and each person chooses which.
Two-way messages
- Always about one student, and that student's parents always see it
- No student-to-student messages, and no private staff-to-student threads
- Safeguarding review: the principal can read any conversation but can't write in it, and each opening is logged
- Encrypted when stored, kept for the time your school sets (at least a year), then archived rather than erased
Announcements & newsletters
- The right audience: the whole school, a grade, a class, a club or team, families of students absent today, or families with unpaid tuition
- Newsletters: draft, schedule or send now
- Templates with the school name, date and sender filled in
- Each family once, however many of their children are in the group
Notifications
- In the app, always
- By email, until a person turns it off
- Browser alerts on the devices a person turns them on for
- Chat alerts in Slack, Microsoft Teams or Google Chat, at no charge. The ping says who and which school; the message and any student's name stay in ArcAngel
- Calendar feed for Google, Apple or Outlook
Emergency notices
- A banner on every page for everyone, staff, one department, parents or students
- Critical notices can't be dismissed
- Never held back: an emailed copy ignores the daily sending limit
Optional add-ons
- Personal digest emails Add-on: a weekly, fortnightly or monthly round-up of what's new. It never shows a grade, an amount of money, or a message's text
- Messages by email Add-on: messages arrive in full and people answer by replying, with nobody's email address shown to anyone
- Extended message retention Add-on: keep messages in the live inbox for up to five years instead of one
Not available yet: text messages (SMS). Notices go out in the app, by email, by browser alert and by chat alert today.
Running the building
The modules a school with a building and a staff needs. Each one is off until it's useful to you, and on by default for the school types that usually use it.
Health office
- Visits: teachers see that a student is at the health office, never why
- Medication record: every dose given, refused or missed, who gave it and who witnessed it. Entries are corrected, never erased
- Injury reports and screenings, with families told the same day
Emergency planning
- An emergency operations plan on the federal guide's outline, with an owner and review date for every section
- A live roll of every student, staff member and visitor during an incident, counting who hasn't been found
- Reunification: a child is released only to an adult on their list, and a recorded custody restriction blocks a release
- An emergency packet staff save to their phones that opens with no signal
Drills & visitors
- Drill log: every drill and how long the building took to clear, against the number your state requires, printed for the fire marshal
- Visitor log: a front-desk sign-in with a self-serve kiosk, and everyone signed in is on the roll if an incident starts
Rooms, cover & buses
- Rooms: two classes can't be put in one room at the same time, and bookings can wait for approval
- Substitutes: the office sees which classes need cover; an outside sub sees only the classes they're covering, on that day, and never grades
- Transportation: routes, stops and riders. The afternoon run can't be finished while a child is still marked on the bus
School lunches
- Menus with allergens, pre-orders before your cut-off, and a serving line that finds a child by name and photo
- Allergy flags on the day's lists against what each child is getting
- Meal accounts as a ledger every balance traces back to, with monthly statements
- Free and reduced-price meals under the National School Lunch Program: direct certification, applications, verification and the monthly claim
- A cashier never sees a balance, and the software never refuses a child a meal
Behavior, athletics & accreditation
- Behavior & discipline: staff write up what they saw; the principal or counselor decides. Suspensions come with a written notice and a family's right to ask for a review
- Athletics: teams, schedules, results, physicals with expiry reminders, and eligibility the athletic director decides. Coaches never see grades
- Accreditation: run a self-study with standards, writers and evidence drawn from records ArcAngel already keeps, and a read-only login for the visiting team
State reporting
- Course codes: SCED and state codes on every class, with a report of what's missing
- Average daily attendance and membership, by month and grade, rounded so a figure is never overstated
- Truancy and chronic absence: your state's steps, with each one staff take recorded. Nothing is sent automatically
- Reports download as spreadsheets for you to file; ArcAngel doesn't submit anything to your state
Tuition, aid and payments
For co-ops and schools that charge families. It starts switched off for a family homeschool, which has nobody to bill.
Family billing
- Paid into your own Stripe account: ArcAngel never holds your money
- Invoices, payment plans and receipts, with automatic reminders before an installment is due
- Pay links a family can open without signing in
- Cash and check recorded alongside, always fee-free
Scholarships & financial aid
- Funds with budgets: need-based aid, named scholarships, sibling and staff discounts
- Every dollar traced: each award appears on the invoice as its own line
- No income figures kept: families can ask to be considered, without uploading tax documents
What a payment costs
ArcAngel's fee is a small flat amount per online payment, never a percentage of tuition and never on cash or check. Your school can absorb it or, where your state allows, pass it on. Stripe's own card fee is separate and is set by Stripe.
Privacy and security
These protections are built in, the same at every school, and most can't be switched off.
Where FERPA applies, ArcAngel acts as a school official under your school's direction. The details are in our Privacy Policy, Children's Privacy notice and School Data Addendum.
Getting started, and leaving if you want to
Create your school and try everything free, with no card. Already using the
ArcAngel desktop app? Import your .school file
and your students, classes, grades and attendance come across in one step.
Spreadsheet import isn't available yet. Whenever you like, export everything
as a re-importable file and plain spreadsheets.
Every module, and where it starts switched on
This list comes straight from the module catalog administrators see inside the app. Any school can switch any of them on or off.
Global
Everyone at the school
Messages
Two-way messages between staff and families about a student — parents always see their child's messages, students can't message each other, and threads stay private to their participants.
On for every school type.
Chat alerts
Let staff and families be pinged in Slack, Microsoft Teams or Google Chat when a message arrives for them. Each person adds their own channel from their notification settings. Alerts say who it's from and link back; the message itself, its subject and any student's name stay in ArcAngel.
Off until a school switches it on. Needs Messages.
Groups & activities
Clubs, teams, and trip parties — a named set of students who aren't a class, with an adult in charge. Message a group or send it a form the same way you would a class.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Online, Private, Public.
Knowledge base / Handbook
A space for your school's policies, procedures, and FAQ — readable by the audiences you choose, editable by staff who have the capability.
On for every school type.
Diploma pathways
Most states offer more than one route to a diploma. Name each one, tag only the requirements that differ, and see which route a student is actually on track for — not just how they score against one list.
On for every school type.
Subject credits for compliance
Are you tracking subject credits? A state's diploma rules usually name credits by subject — four of mathematics, three of science — and this measures each one against the courses a student has actually earned credit in. Separate from the hours and days a state monitors you for, because they answer different questions. On by default for schools that grant a diploma; worth turning on for a homeschool too, since many states require these credits before a homeschool student can earn one. Off, the credit rules are simply not shown — nothing is deleted, and turning it back on restores where every student stood.
On by default for: Hybrid, Online, Private, Public.
Staff records
The employment file behind a login — job title and hire date, licences and certifications with their expiry, and background checks. The expiry list is the point: it says what lapses next, and when.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Online, Private, Public.
Administrative
Principals, directors, and registrars
Admissions
Accept applications, review applicants, and enroll them — the apply → review → enroll pipeline. A single-family homeschool won't need this; a co-op or school that admits will.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Online, Private, Public.
School-wide roster
Whole-school student and staff directories and roster tools, beyond a single class. Also unlocks re-enrollment.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Online, Private, Public.
State comparison
The “how would we fare in another state?” homeschool compliance comparison tool.
On by default for: Homeschool, Microschool.
Visitor log
A front-desk sign-in ledger with a timed self-serve kiosk and printer-friendly sheets. Best for co-ops and schools that host visitors.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Online, Private, Public.
Health office
Visits and the medication record. Check students in and out of the health office — teachers see who's out, never why. Keep the medication record a school has to keep: each student's medications and when they're due, and every dose given, refused or missed — who gave it, when, and who witnessed it. Entries can be corrected but never erased, and families are told the same day when something needs their attention. Co-op and up.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Private, Public.
Drill log
A record of every fire, severe-weather, lockdown and evacuation drill — when, how long the building took to clear, and what to fix — against the number your state requires each year. Prints for the fire marshal. Co-op and up.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Private, Public.
Transportation
Bus routes, their stops and times, and who rides each way. Drivers sign in to a checklist of their own route — who got on, who got off — and an afternoon run can't be finished while a child is still marked on the bus. Families see their child's bus, stop and times, get route notices, and are told if their child wasn't on the afternoon bus. On for public schools.
On by default for: Public.
Substitutes
Teachers report their absences with plans for the sub; the office sees which classes need cover and assigns someone free at that time. Outside substitutes sign in with a role that opens only the classes they're covering, on the day: the class list, safety alerts, the plans, and attendance. Never grades.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Online, Private, Public.
Rooms & facilities
The rooms your school has, which class meets in which, and bookings for everything else — a parent meeting, a club, an assembly. Two classes can't be put in the same room at the same time, and a booking can't take a room that's in use. Any staff member books a free room; rooms you choose wait for approval. Co-op and up.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Private, Public.
Behavior & discipline
Any adult on staff writes up what they saw — handled in class, or referred to the office. The principal or counselor decides the consequence, and the family is told and can read it once one is assigned. Decided incidents are final; later facts are dated addenda. Suspensions come with due process: the student is heard first, the family gets a written notice and can ask for a review, and out-of-school days are excused in attendance. Teachers see what they wrote, not a student's whole history. On for private, public and hybrid schools.
On by default for: Hybrid, Private, Public.
Accreditation
Run a self-study: enter your accreditor's standards, assign each to a writer, draft the narrative, and attach evidence — documents, web links, or live snapshots of records ArcAngel already keeps (the drill log, staff credentials, GPA distribution, graduation rates). The visiting team signs in read-only, and there's a printable packet.
On by default for: Hybrid, Online, Private, Public.
Scholarships & financial aid
Funds with budgets — need-based aid, named scholarships, sibling and staff discounts — and awards to students, as a fixed amount or a percentage of tuition. Each award is applied to tuition invoices as its own line, so every dollar of aid traces to a fund. Families can ask to be considered; no income figures are kept. The principal chooses who else handles aid.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Private. Needs Family billing & tuition.
Emergency planning
Everything around an emergency, not just the alert. Write your emergency operations plan on the federal guide's outline, with an owner and review date for every section. During an incident, every student, staff member and visitor is on one roll with a live count of who hasn't been found. Reunification releases a child only to an adult on their list, and a recorded custody restriction blocks a release outright. Also: go-kits with expiry dates, after-action reviews, and an emergency packet staff save to their phones that opens with no signal. A homeschool gets a family-sized plan.
On by default for: Homeschool, Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Private, Public.
Digital signage
Turn the screens in your halls, lobby and cafeteria into school signs. Design slides on a drag-and-drop grid: your own text and pictures, today's lunch menu, upcoming events and games, bulletins, the clock and the weather, or a deck brought in from PowerPoint. Each screen shows its sign through a private link, or from a file on a thumbdrive. In an emergency incident every screen switches to it within half a minute, in red (amber for a drill), with what to do and never anyone's name.
Off until a school switches it on.
Athletics
Run your own teams: seasons, rosters, coaches, and each team's schedule and results. Sports physicals and other clearances are kept with their expiry, and families are reminded before one runs out. Eligibility is checked against your own rule (GPA, failing classes, attendance, a current physical). A student who falls short is flagged and the athletic director decides; coaches see a status and a one-word reason, never grades. Families see their child's schedule, results and clearances. On for private, public and hybrid schools.
On by default for: Hybrid, Private, Public.
School lunches
Menus with what's in each dish, and meal accounts kept as a ledger every balance can be traced to. Families order ahead before your cut-off, and the serving line finds a child by name and photo. The day's lists flag a child's recorded food allergy against what they're getting. A cashier never sees a balance, and the software never refuses a child a meal. On for private and public schools.
On by default for: Private, Public.
State reporting
What a school reporting to its state needs: SCED and state course codes on every class, with a report of what's missing; average daily attendance and membership; and truancy steps your state sets, with each step staff take recorded. On for public, private, hybrid and online schools.
On by default for: Hybrid, Online, Private, Public.
Family billing & tuition
Collect tuition and fees from families online through your school's own Stripe account — invoices, balances, and receipts. Co-op+.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Online, Private, Public.
Workflow automation Beta
School-configurable rules: when something happens (a student is marked absent, a form goes overdue, a student enrolls, a teacher posts work), automatically notify the right people or create a follow-up.
Off until a school switches it on.
Teachers
Teaching staff
Lesson plans & syllabus
Plan a course once: a readable syllabus, units, and dated lessons. Graded work is generated from the plan instead of typed again, and a whole plan can be copied into next year.
On for every school type.
Bell schedule
Define named periods with times so the daily view shows a real timetable. Best for hybrid or university-model schedules.
On by default for: Co-op, Microschool, Hybrid, Online, Private, Public.
Parents
Parents and guardians
State opportunities
What your state offers homeschool families: playing on a public school's teams or taking its classes (by right, or if the district agrees), labs and libraries, special education services, college classes in high school, funding you can claim, and the tests that meet the assessment rule. Each child's page shows what's open to them now and what opens later. Only entries checked against the state's own source are shown, with the source linked. On for homeschools, co-ops and microschools.
On by default for: Homeschool, Co-op, Microschool.
Reading log — guardian entries
Let parents/guardians add and remove books on their child's reading list.
Off until a school switches it on.
Students
Students
Mark work done
Adds a “Mark done” button so a student can flag an assignment as turned in (Submitted). Teachers still grade it.
Off until a school switches it on.
Reading log — student entries
Let students add and remove books on their own reading list.
Off until a school switches it on.
See it with your own school
Set up in a few minutes. Nothing to install and no card to start.
Questions? Email [email protected]