This lesson will guide you through Google authentication setup for users/staff. By enabling Google SSO use with DnA, your users will use their district-managed, Google accounts to authenticate with DnA.
Setting Up Google SSO - Overview
- Please let your users know about potential loss in service.
- To gain access to Google SSO, all usernames in DnA must be changed to Google account emails.
- For example, John Smith has username in DnA is jsmith. Before enabling Google SSO, his username must be changed from jsmith to jsmith@illuminatedistrict.net.
- After updating your usernames, please notify support at dnasupport@illuminateed.com. Please provide a date and time to turn it on.
- Please inform your users of this change and anticipate any issues.
Enabling Google SSO will be a global change per Instance. So, if Google SSO is enabled, all sites will see the button; however, until the username is switched to the username@domain, they may continue to use the Illuminate log-in page.
Notify Your Users
Please note the following details:
- Enabling Google SSO moves the responsibility of managing account information, such as passwords and usernames, from Illuminate's servers/services to Google's services. Please be ready to transfer this responsibility and inform users after completing your request.
- If there are accounts that are shared, you may want to enable Bypass Remote Authentication for the account. For example, the Test Admin is shared by multiple users and is often set to Bypass Remote Authentication.
- During this time, your users will experience inconsistency in service, potentially locking them out of their accounts until Google SSO is enabled. Please plan around this and inform your users.
Follow-up by informing your users regarding possible loss of service during this time. You may use the following template to inform users:
"Dear staff and faculty,
Our District is currently migrating to Google SSO authentication for DnA's services. This means, during the next few days until the anticipated date of service, {insert_date_here}, you may experience some loss of connection. While we hope to minimize the lost of service during this time, please be aware of this possible change in access.
If you have additional questions or concerns, please provide a reply to this email. If you have several urgent tasks during this expected time period, please contact us with the details so we can attempt to plan around your situation.
Sincerely,
Your System Admin"
After enabling Google SSO, passwords are managed by the District Administrator in charge of the Google SSO. Please inform your users this and set this expectation.
Automating Google Accounts
Your District data analyst will need to work with our Data Team/Help Desk to complete this step.
If you are using our complimentary Aeries Extract tool or any of our PowerSchool Scripts, you will want to get in touch with the Data Team member who configured them and let them know your request.
If you are writing your own scripts or tools, you will want to change your logic to pull email information into the users.txt file. Please note, this is not the responsibility of Illuminate Education if you are using your own scripts/tools.
Contact Support
After running step 2a or 2b, please update your ticket informing the Support Agent. Update the ticket with a Date or Date+Time for enabling Google SSO.
Inform your users of the change in authentication policy. We recommend providing processes and procedures for forgotten accounts or lost passwords if you users do not regularly use Google SSO. Here is a possible template for you to use:
"Dear staff and faculty,
DnA's services will be using Google SSO on {insert_date_here} and this point forward. This means you will see a red "Google SSO" button in the log in page. Please use this to redirect you to the Google SSO sign-in page. From there you will use your Google SSO credentials.
If you are unsure of your account, please follow the following steps:
{insert_steps_here}
If you have forgotten your password, please follow the following steps:
{insert_steps_here}
If you run into any errors, please provide the error and verify the steps-taken to reproduce the error and let our District Help Desk know.
Sincerely,
Your System Admin"
Next Steps
To learn how to login using Google SSO, visit Log In with Google SSO.