Welcome! If this is your family’s first year studying with an STAA Study Guide, and especially if you are beginning with Science Literacy or Art Appreciation, the path from your planning appointment to your student’s first weekly quiz is shorter than it looks. There are four steps: submit the Course Registration form, order your study guides, order your books, and complete the account activation form with your student. Then come and see us, either at an orientation seminar or in a private meeting, so we can walk through that spiral-bound guide together.

Begin with the Course Registration Form

After the annual Course of Study Planning appointment, print the Course Registration form from the end of each student’s Academic Packet, mark “yes” beside every course the student will actually study, and then sign, date, and submit it. Those marks carry more weight than most families expect: they are what tell your advisor which course pages to open on the Student Zone and which weekly quizzes to activate for your student. A course left blank is read as a course your family decided against, so a quick look down the list before you sign will save a round of emails later.

Upload the signed forms through the Course Registration Form upload page, or mail them to the address printed at the top of the form.

Step 1: Order Your Study Guides

The STAA Study Guides are printed on demand, so they typically take five to fifteen days to reach you. Order early, and the guides will be in your hands before the Preparatory Weeks begin. You will find them in the STAA online shop, sorted by cycle, with each semester’s guide listed alongside the individual subject booklets. While you wait for the printed copy to arrive, member families may read the same guides online on the Student Zone.

Step 2: Order Your Books

Each student’s Academic Packet contains a Book Order Worksheet near the end, listing the recommended books by supplier. Order by ISBN wherever you can, since editions differ in pagination and translation, and the study guide assignments are keyed to the edition we list. A few substitutions and swaps are always welcome; simply mention them to your advisor.

Step 3: Complete the Activation Form with Your Student

When you have a quiet half hour, sit down beside your student and complete the Student Behavior Policy and Academic Integrity Agreement together. It is submitted once per student, per school year, and it opens for the new year on August 1. There is a link to it on the sign-in page at www.staafamily.com.

Completing it together is intentional. Reading the behavior and academic integrity policies side by side gives you both a chance to talk about what honest, careful scholarship looks like before the first assignment is written. Activation is not automatic: your advisor reviews each submission personally and then opens the student’s Student Zone access. During August, accounts are updated on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays; from September through July, they are updated on Fridays.

Where the Weekly Quizzes Live

Every course has its own page on the Student Zone, one page for each study guide. Your student signs in with his or her own username and password, opens the course page, and finds the weekly quiz named exactly the way it appears in the printed study guide. Full directions, along with the rules for taking a quiz, are in How Do I Find My Online Quizzes on the STAA Student Zone?

Step 4: Let Us Walk You Through It

A printed study guide, a stack of new books, and an unfamiliar website can feel like a great deal at once, so please do not sort it out alone. The High School Orientation Seminar is a group meeting over Zoom that welcomes new students to the Student Zone and shows them how to use their study guides. It is offered as a courtesy to enrolled families: there is no charge, and attending does not use an appointment credit from your enrollment package. Attend as soon as your guides and books have arrived, so the tour matches the materials in your hands.

If your family would rather have a private introduction, you and your student are welcome to schedule a meeting with the high school advisor instead. She can talk through the study guide, open the weekly quizzes, and share her screen to show you the features of the Student Zone. A forty-five-minute meeting leaves room for your own questions as they surface.

The first few weeks are always a tangled web of new books, new course plans, and new web resources, and no family is expected to have it all sorted on the first day. Take the steps one at a time, and bring your questions to a seminar, to your course’s Q&A forum, or to your advisor. We are glad to help you find your way.

Resources and Related Reading