Edit a user

When cloud sync is paused

Over the summer your school's cloud sync pauses, and a banner at the top of the page says Cloud sync is paused until …. Anything you change is saved in Realsmart now and reaches Google or Microsoft when sync resumes — see Cloud sync is paused. Two things on this page work differently while it's on:

• Send to … now — the button in the banner names the platforms it reaches, for example Send to Google Workspace now. It pushes just this person through the pause, and it only appears if you can run syncs. Switch on Include their groups first if they need their groups straight away; it's off every time. You're asked to confirm, and the message afterwards says what was sent.
• Sync now on the Details tab doesn't push anything. It tells you the user hasn't been sent and that the account syncs automatically when the pause ends.

Details tab

The Details tab shows and lets you update the user's core information.

Fields:

• Role — Admin, Mentor, Learner, Observer, Governor, or Ofsted. See User roles. Changing it also adds the person to that role's group (mentors, learners, and so on), which is what puts them in the matching group in Google or Entra. They stay in their old role's group as well — remove them from it on the Memberships tab if they shouldn't be there. (A suspended person isn't added to a group.)

• Title — optional (Mr, Mrs, Dr, etc.)

• First name and Surname

• Username — unique within the school; cannot contain spaces. At a school that syncs to Google or Microsoft 365 the username is also the person's account address there, so changing it here renames their account — the same account, so their files, email and classes come with them, and mail to the old address still arrives. Before anything is saved, the new name is checked against Google and Microsoft 365 as well as realsmart: if another account, an extra address (alias) or a group already uses it, you're told who has it and nothing is saved until you free it there. The change usually finishes within a minute. See Rename a user.

• UPN (pupils) / Staff code (everyone else) — the id your MIS knows this person by, held in the same field for both; the label follows the Role dropdown. You can edit it. For an account you created by hand it is the only place the value exists, so this is where a typo gets fixed, and getting it right is what stops the MIS creating a second account for the same person. For a user your MIS already owns, an edit here lasts only until the next sync overwrites it — correct it in the MIS instead. The caption under the field tells you which of those two you are looking at. If your school replaces staff codes with MIS IDs, the caption says so.

  Two people in one school cannot share a UPN / staff code, so changing it to one someone else already has is rejected — the sync has no way to tell them apart. Members who already share one are left alone: you can still edit their name, role or status without being stopped, and the check only applies when you actually change the code itself.

• Status — Active, Suspended, Locked, or Deleted. See User statuses. ("Pending suspension" isn't one of the choices here — it's a flag ADAdmin raises automatically, not something you set on this dropdown; see that doc.) Saving a user as Suspended also takes them out of all their groups.

• Protected (exclude from sync deletion) — tick to switch off Smartsync for this person. The nightly MIS import then leaves their details and group memberships alone, and the sync never suspends them for dropping out of your MIS. It doesn't change their status or stop them signing in. Use it for accounts the MIS doesn't manage. A padlock appears by their name on the Users list. See User statuses.

• Website admin — staff roles only (not admins, who have it anyway, or learners). Tick to let this person sign in to your school's website as an administrator without making them an admin here; at a trust, every school website in the trust. Changing their role to one that can't carry it clears the tick. See Let someone manage the school website.

• Google display name — only shown when your school syncs to Google. Changes how this one person's name appears in Gmail, Classroom and the other Google apps — for example Mr Smith, or first name only — without changing your school-wide Display name setting. See Change how one person's name shows in Google.

From your MIS

Below the editable fields, a From your MIS panel shows what your MIS holds for this person. Every field in it is read-only — correct it in the MIS and it updates here on the next sync.

• MIS ID — this user's record id in your MIS.
• Sync ID — the id your MIS feed actually matches this person on. Which one that is, is a setting per school and per user type: it may be their UPN / staff code, their MIS ID, or their Wonde ID, so the caption names the one in use. This is the field to check when someone is being duplicated or missed by the sync. (When it is the UPN / staff code, that field is the editable one on the form above.)
• Job title — the job title as it exists in your MIS. Staff only.
• Staff type — Teaching staff or Non-teaching staff. Staff only. If your school uses Settings → Teaching staff to decide which job titles count as teaching, the panel says the value came from those rules. When you change the rules, this user keeps their current staff type until their next sync — the panel warns you when a change is due.
• Subjects — the subjects this staff member is attached to in your MIS, teaching attachments first. Staff only. If subjects sync is off for the school, or the subjects sync hasn't run yet, the panel says so instead of showing an empty list. All subjects opens the full subjects view (admins with sync settings access).

Save changes

Select Save changes after editing any field. A message confirms User updated., and while cloud sync is paused it adds when the change will be sent. Cancel takes you back to the Users list.

The Profile picture card above the fields is the exception: a picture is saved as soon as it uploads, so there's no button to press. Choose a JPG, PNG or WebP image (up to 8MB) and wait for Saving… to finish, or select Remove to go back to the user's initials.

Account actions on the Details tab

• Sync now — pushes an on-demand sync for THIS user to whichever cloud platforms the school has turned on (Google Workspace and/or Microsoft Entra). This is the same push that happens automatically whenever you save changes, reset a password, or restore/delete the user — the button just lets you trigger it on demand (for example, to confirm a stuck sync without changing anything else). A message says which platform(s) were queued, for example Queued a sync to Google & Microsoft Entra. If the school has Active Directory or Apple School Manager on instead, those still sync on their own schedule — there is no instant push for them, so the button is greyed out with an explanation when neither Google nor Entra sync is on. While cloud sync is paused it refuses, as described above.
• Password & 2FA — opens the Security tab, where every password, two-factor and login-time control lives.
• Restore user — visible only when the user is deleted, and only until the 20:00 weekday clean-up. Delete user — needs Delete users & groups; it marks them Deleted and removes them from the connected platforms. Both are explained, with what to check after a restore, in Delete or restore a user.

Security tab

Everything about how this person signs in is on the Security tab: their Password (reset it to the school default, set a specific one, or ask them to change it), Two-factor authentication, the Disable password change switch and their Login window. Each switch saves the moment you change it, and every change is recorded in the audit trail. Three cues in the header (Default password, Must change password and 2FA on / 2FA not set up) jump straight to it.

Each card is explained in Edit a user — Security tab:

• Password
• Two-factor authentication
• Password change
• Login window

Memberships tab

Shows the groups this user belongs to — the heading reads Group memberships with the number in brackets — and lets you add more.

• Add to a group… search box at the top — start typing a group name, then select it from the results. The user is added straight away. If they're already in it you see that instead.
• Remove (×) next to a group — removes the user from that group
• Remove all — removes the user from every group at once (with confirmation). Locked memberships go too; the nightly MIS import puts back the groups your MIS still sends for them, unless they're Protected.

A membership you add by hand is locked: it is kept even if the MIS stops sending it, and it shows a Locked badge in the list.

You can also add people to a group from the group edit page, or with Add to group from the Users list when you have several to do at once.

If cloud sync is paused for the school, the change is saved in Realsmart now and sent to the connected platforms when sync resumes.

Classroom badges

When Google Classroom is switched on for the school, each group linked to a Classroom course carries a badge for whether this person is actually on that course, in the role the sync expects: In classroom, Wrong role, Not expected, Missing, Not checked or Unavailable. It reads synced data, not a live check, and only direct memberships get one. What each badge means is in Classroom badges on a user's group memberships.

Guardians tab

Lists the parents and guardians linked to this person, with their name and email. Each one has a Classroom checkbox: ticked means that guardian is approved to be invited to Google Classroom the next time you press Provision to Google — the same setting as Approved for Classroom on the Classroom parents page. You can't add or change guardian details here — they come from your MIS.

Select Save after ticking or unticking, and you see Guardian settings saved. If the person has none, the tab says No guardians linked to this user.

Logs tab

Shows the user's sync log history, newest first — Google Workspace and Microsoft Entra sync events for this one person, with When, Platform, Action, Entity and Outcome columns. Use All platforms and All outcomes (Success or Errors) to narrow it. If there's nothing, it says No logs for this user. Active Directory and Apple School Manager events aren't shown here — see Sync status and logs.

Loads on demand (the tab is lazy-loaded for performance).

Classroom tab

Appears only when your school provisions Google Classrooms. Lists the Google Classroom courses this person is on — Course, Role (Teacher or Student), State, Owner, the Realsmart Group it belongs to, and how many Assignments it has. It reads synced data, with no live call to Google, so it can lag behind Classroom. It's empty with No classroom courses for this user. when they have no Google account yet or aren't on any course.

Loads on demand.

Calendar tab

Appears only when calendar sync is on. It shows the lessons that should be in the person's timetable calendar (choose This week, Next week, Week 3 or Week 4), what the sync did for them, and — with Check their Google calendar — what Google actually has for the next 7 days. Sync calendar now queues a full re-sync of just this person (confirm first); allow a few minutes, then re-check. See Debug a user's calendar.

Cloud tab — what Google & Entra say

Shows what Google Workspace and/or Microsoft Entra currently report for this person — their organisational unit or administrative units, groups and account status, and for Entra the last sync result and licences. It's read-only and needs no Google or Microsoft login: it opens with what the last sync recorded, and Check live fetches the current picture. The tab only appears when your school syncs to Google or Entra. See See what Google and Entra say about a user.

Launchpad tab

A read-only preview of how this person has arranged their own Launchpad: Pinned, School apps, My links and any Hidden apps, with their tile size, background and what they're allowed to do (Can arrange apps, Can add links, Can hide apps). Reset their layout appears only when they've changed something. See Let people arrange their own Launchpad.

Access tab

Appears only when you edit another admin and hold Manage other admins' access. Choose Full admin access or Reduced admin access, fine-tune the switches and select Save access. You can't change your own access. See Reduced admin access.

Troubleshooting

• "I can't find the user" — check you are in the right school; use the filters to search by username or MIS ID.
• "The edit page won't open in MAT overview" — switch to the user's school first (Switch to a school to edit a user.).
• "This username can't be used yet" — the new username is already used in your Google Workspace or Microsoft 365, by the account, alias or group the message names. Rename or delete that account, remove the alias, or change the group's address in the Google Admin console / Microsoft 365 admin centre, then save again. If the message says we couldn't check, Google or Microsoft didn't answer — wait a minute and save again.
• "Someone else in this school already has that UPN" (or Staff code) — you've typed a code another person already holds. Fix the duplicate first, or leave this field alone.
• "There's no Delete user button, or no password controls on the Security tab" — your admin access doesn't include Delete users & groups or Reset user passwords. Ask a full admin, or have your access changed — see Reduced admin access.
• Deleting, restoring, or "Restored username is already taken" — see Delete or restore a user.
• A password reset, 2FA or login-time switch won't do what you expect — each card's limits are explained in Edit a user — Security tab.
• "Sync now says the user hasn't been sent" — cloud sync is paused for the school. See When cloud sync is paused.
• "There's no Cloud tab" — your school isn't syncing to Google or Microsoft Entra, so there's nothing to show. See See what Google and Entra say about a user.
• "Profile picture: 'That image is over 8MB'" — choose a smaller JPG, PNG or WebP. Pictures must be between 64 and 8,000 pixels on each side.

Related

• Edit a user — Security tab
• See what Google and Entra say about a user
• Delete or restore a user
• Add a user to a group
• Remove a user from a group
• Reset passwords
• Require MFA for staff and students
• User statuses
• User roles explained
• Reset or switch off MFA for one user
• Cloud sync is paused