Configure security, portal, flows, and data in Microsoft Return To School

Configure the following areas and components in Microsoft Return To School to ensure it is ready to be used.

Manage users and security roles

To access the apps that were deployed, users in your organization must be assigned appropriate security roles. For information about security roles, go to Security roles in Microsoft Power Platform admin guide.

1. Sign in to the Power Platform admin center.

2. Select your environment by clicking the environment name, and then select See all under Users.

   

3. On the Users page, add users to your environment. More information: Add users to an environment that has a Dataverse database

4. Assign users one or more of the following security roles depending on the access required:

   Security role	Description
   Return to School - Admin	This model-driven app role allows the user to configure the details of a school and manage cases. In addition, this role allows the user to configure school healthcare services, test locations, health and safety plans, appointment bookings, and questionnaires.
   Return to School - Test Admin	For users who will be using the Testing administration hub app to administer tests and record results.
   Return to School - Staff	For users who will be using the Check-in hub app to check in students at a school.

   More information: Assign security roles to users in an environment that has a Dataverse database

   Important

   These security roles are indicative. The roles provide broad access for test and demonstration purposes. Review the roles carefully before moving to a production environment or when importing sensitive data.

Share the canvas app to users

1. Sign in to Power Apps and select the environment where you deployed Return to School.

2. On the left pane, select Apps.

3. Select the Test Administration hub app.

4. Select the app, and then select Share.

5. Select users from the list of available users or groups with whom you want to share the app.

6. Repeat steps 2-5 for the Check-in hub app.

Important

Even if the user has access to the canvas app, you still need to assign the user with the Return to School – Test Administrator security role for Test administration hub users, and the Return to School – Staff security role for Check-in hub users.

Portal: Rename the website (optional)

After you deploy Return to School, you can rename the website name of your portal so that the browser tab shows a meaningful name for screen readers.

To update the website name:

1. Sign in to Power Apps and select the environment where you deployed Return to School.

2. Select Apps from the left navigation pane, and then select Portal Management.

   

3. Select Websites in the left pane.

   

4. Select Return to school portal to open the record.

5. Change the value of the Name field.

   

6. Select Save.

Set up portal URL environment variable

1. Sign in to Power Apps. From the upper-right corner, select Environment.

2. You will see a message to set up and update your environment variable. Select the See environment variable link and set the URL of the portal that you have set up as part of the deployment process (include the forward slash at the end of the URL). Example: https://contososchooldistrict.powerappsportals.com/

This variable will be used in your Contact - Create Portal Invitation flow to send out email invitations for users to redeem an invitation code in the portal.

Cloud flows

Cloud flows are used in Microsoft Return to school to send portal notifications, appointment confirmation emails, portal invitations and for other tasks. Before the flows can be used, you will have to perform some configuration.

Tip

As a best practice, create an unmanaged solution to add the flows that you want to edit, and then edit the flows in the new unmanaged solution to ensure that you don't lose your customization in case you need to update Return to School.

Configure connections

Microsoft Power Cloud flows in Microsoft Return To School need the following two connections to perform as required:

• Microsoft Dataverse: Used for connecting to Microsoft Dataverse data.

• Office 365 Outlook: Used for sending emails. You might need multiple copies of this connector to scale the send email flows.

After you have created these connections, you need to update the connection references in Microsoft Return To School to point to these connections.

To create connections:

1. Sign in to Microsoft Power Apps and select the environment where you deployed the solution.

2. In the left pane, select Data > Connections, and then select New connection.

3. Type "Common" in the search box in the upper-right corner, and then select the plus sign (+) next to Microsoft Dataverse.

4. On the next screen, select Create, and then type or select the credentials to connect to your Microsoft Dataverse environment.

   On successful authentication, your connection will be added in the connection list.

5. Select New connection to add another connection.

6. Type "Office" in the search box in the upper-right corner, and then select the plus sign (+) next to Office 365 Outlook.

   

7. On the next screen, select Create, and then type or select the credentials to connect to your Microsoft 365 instance.

   On successful authentication, your connection will be added in the connection list.

Next, you need to update the connection references used by Microsoft Return To School to point to these connections.

1. In Power Apps, select Solutions in the left pane, and then select Return To School. The following connection references will have to be updated in a new solution:

   • Mail Connection Reference

2. Create a new solution, and then select Add existing > Connection Reference Flows.

3. Select Mail Connection Reference, and then select Edit.

4. In the edit screen, make sure that you select the Office 365 Outlook connection that you created earlier in the Connection list, and then select Save.

   

   Your flows can now use your connections.

Turn on flows

After you deploy Microsoft Return to school, the flows aren't turned on by default. You will have to manually turn on the flow; this is just a one-time task after deployment.

1. Sign in to Microsoft Power Apps. From the upper-right corner, select Environment.

2. In the left navigation pane, select Solutions.

3. Select Return to School from the list of solutions.

4. Select the Send Email (Appointment) flow, and then select Edit. Connect the flow with the Dataverse (current environment) and Office 365 Outlook connector, and then select Continue. Select Save.

5. Select the back button, and then select Turn on. Validate whether the flow is turned on to ensure that it can be used. Additionally, the flow should be shared with others to prevent issues with people who aren't allowed to enter it.

   Note

   The connection used for Office 365 Outlook is the email address used to send emails to guests. Use a service account for sending generic emails or use a shared mailbox.

6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 for the following flows (in order) if these are needed in your Return To School implementation:

   • Send Email (Portal invitation)
   • Send Email (Daily pass)
   • Appointment - Send email confirmation
   • Contact - Create portal invitation
   • Share Guest Attestation - Email
   • Employee Case - Create Access Action
   • Health & safety Plan - Notification Daily
   • Health & safety Plan - Notification Weekly
   • Health & safety Plan - Notification Monthly

   

Email template in flows

Each flow that sends email has the email content and subject, and can be customized if needed. All emails are sent using the Send Email ([Name]) flow.

1. In Return to school in Power Apps, select one of the Send Email ([Name]) flows. For example, Send Email (Appointment).

2. The flow opens in Power Automate. Select Edit to open the flow definition.

3. In the flow definition, select Send an email to expand it, and then update the email content as required.

4. Save your changes to the flow.

Configure email body

Each of the following flows has 3 (Get, Set & Compose) actions running in the backend to minimize the number of steps utlized in the email sending flows:

• Share Guest Attestation – Email
• Contact - Create portal invitation
• Appointment - Send email confirmation

The Set[Entity]LocalizedStrings** action assigns the labels used in the email based on a specific language.

The Compose[Entity]]Email action will build the custom email template.

The Get[Entity]Email action will be called on the flow and will return the composed email to be sent.

To modify the email template:

1. Go to Advanced Settings.

   

2. Select Processes.

   

3. Open the ComposeAppointmentConfirmationEmail process

4. Deactivate the process to edit

   

5. Configure the process:

   • Get Localized Strings will set that labels for the email template.
   • Set the Email Subject will set the subject for the email template.
   • Create the Email Body will create the body for the email to be sent
   • Set the email body will return the body of the email composed from the process inputs

6. To customize the email template, select View Properties of the Create The Email Body step.

   

   The email template handles HTML as well as plain text. The highlighted values are dynamic values that are set based on the appointment record input. The process can also fetch data of related entities.

7. After you modify the template, click Save and Close

8. Activate the process

Similar steps can be followed for the following flows:

1. Share Guest Attestation – Email
2. Contact - Create portal invitation

Below are a list of available actions used by the Return To School email sending cloud flows:

• SetAppointmentLocalizedStrings
• SetLocalizedStringsAttestation
• SetPortalInvitationLocalizedStrings
• ComposeAppointmentConfirmationEmail
• ComposeGetAttestationEmail
• ComposePortalInvitation
• GetAppointmentConfirmationEmail
• GetSharedAttestationEmail
• GetPortalInvitationEmail

Scaling send email flow

There are certain limitations on flows per day and per user that you should be aware of in case you need to scale up. The primary limits are as follows:

• Flow limits: Assuming that you have a "Per flow" license, flow steps in 24 hrs = 500,000
• Connector limits
  • Outlook connector: 300 requests per 60 seconds (432,000 per day)
  • SendGrid connector: 1200 requests per 60 seconds (1,728,000 per day)
  • Custom connector: 500 requests per 60 seconds (720,000 per day)

More information: Limits for Power Automate flows

All emails are sent using Send Email ([name]) flows:

• Send Email (Appointment) is used for appointment confirmation emails.
• Send Email (Portal invitation) is used for portal invitation emails.
• Send Email (Daily pass) is used for sharing daily passes through emails.

By default, these flows use the Outlook connection to send email, which has a 10,000 emails per day limit per mailbox. You can use other email providers to increase the email capacity.

Strategy	Description
Scaling up Send Email flow	Each send email flow has five steps, which means it can be run up to 100,000 times per day (500,000/5). Therefore, you can send a maximum of 100,000 emails per day.
Scaling out Send Email flow	Users can duplicate the Send Email ([name]) flow to scale out the email sending as per their requirements.
Third-party connector	Another option to scale Send Email flow is to use a third-party connector with higher daily limits. For example: SendGrid You might still need to scale out, depending on how many steps the Send Email ([name]) flow has.

Configure bulk email service for Microsoft Return To School

Microsoft Return To School requires use of a bulk email service to send emails for various scenarios, including appointment confirmations and portal registration invitations. Choose a bulk email service based on your compliance and deployment needs. While the actual number of emails sent will vary for each deployment based on your appointment and portal invitation volumes, the number of emails can be excessively high per day during peak times.

Your implementation can extend the standard Microsoft Power Automate flows in Microsoft Return To School to integrate Return to School with the third-party bulk email provider of your choice.

Some of the popular bulk email services like SendGrid have standard Power Automate connectors that can be used. Other bulk email services can be integrated by building a Power Automate custom connector.

Note

Microsoft Exchange Online is not a bulk email service. It has a limit of 10,000 emails per day per mailbox, which will not suffice for typical email volumes required for Return to School scenarios.

Power BI

Follow the steps in this article to publish dashboards from Power BI to the web.

Configure base and reference data

Microsoft Return To School requires some base reference and management data to work.

During deployment, you have the option to install sample data that populates most of the reference and management data for the applications.

Note

You should review the sample data and deactivate any records that you don't want to be displayed or available in your system.

If you did not install the sample data during the deployment, you must manually enter or import the general settings, state, school, test location, and schedule data using the School Management app.

Feedback about Microsoft Return to School

To provide feedback about Microsoft Return to School, visit the community page.