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The School Story

3 steps 3 min Updated 4 November 2026

The School Story is a feed of photos and news in the Smart Parents app. Staff post to it from teacher mode in the app — photos are taken and posted from a phone. Here you can switch it on, see everything that has been posted, and take a post down. You need to be an admin who holds Manage Smart Parents.

Before you start

Pupils only appear in photos with consent — see Photo consent for the School Story. Record your school's consent forms before you switch the School Story on.

Steps

Step 1: Switch it on

On Smart Parents → Settings, under Features, set School Story to Yes and select Update settings. If you don't see School Story, it isn't available yet: ask Realsmart support. Smart Parents itself must also be Enabled.

Step 2: See what's been posted

Open Smart Parents in the sidebar and choose the School Story tab (it has no sidebar shortcut of its own). Choose, with the number of posts beside each:

  • This school year — this year's posts. A post shows Parents see it when it's in their feed now. It shows Parents don't see it: every photo is hidden when every photo in it is hidden, because then it isn't shown to them at all. A post can also show Not out yet. While Smart Parents or the School Story is switched off, parents see none of it and the page says so at the top.
  • Archived — posts from before 1 September. They're kept, but parents no longer see them.
  • Taken down — posts removed, with who took each one down and when.

Each post shows who posted it, when, the words, and its photos (10 posts to a page). Under each photo is who's tagged in it.

"Hidden" on a photo means parents can't see it: someone tagged in it doesn't have photo consent (marked no consent), or nobody is tagged and the person posting didn't say it shows no recognisable children ("Nobody tagged, so it's hidden"; a photo marked as showing nobody recognisable says "No children who could be recognised"). The rest of the post still shows, and the post says how many photos are hidden.

Step 3: Take a post down (if you need to)

Select Take down on the post and confirm ("Take this post down?" → Take it down). Parents stop seeing it straight away. It isn't deleted: it moves to Taken down, with your name on it, and a message confirms it ("Post taken down. Parents no longer see it; it's kept under Removed." — "Removed" there means the Taken down button). There's no button here to put a post back.

Good to know

  • New posts come from teacher mode in the Smart Parents app; you can't post from here. Any staff member can post or take a post down from teacher mode, too.
  • If photos don't appear here, you'll still see how many there are and who's in them; open the post in teacher mode to see the pictures. The page says "Photos can't be shown here, only how many there are and who is in them."
  • Consent is checked every time a parent opens the feed, so withdrawing consent hides a photo that was posted earlier.
  • Posts can have up to 10 photos.

If something doesn't work

  • "The School Story isn't set up here yet." The School Story hasn't been set up on the server yet. Ask Realsmart support.
  • "That post isn't showing any more." It was already taken down. Reload the page.
  • Parents can't see a post. Check the badge on it: Not out yet, Archived, or every photo hidden (see no consent under each photo), and check Smart Parents and School Story are both on.
General Acceptable use policy at sign-in General Add and manage your school's own apps General Choose who counts as teaching staff (teaching and non-teaching staff groups) General Choose who sees each app on your school's panel