Family engagement and clear school communication are essential throughout the school year. How do you stay connected with your entire school community? Education technology tools can help all members of a school and district share information.
As you reflect on the ways you’ve established clear channels of communication in the past and think forward to the upcoming school year, I have a powerful EdTech tool to share with you! It is called ParentSquare, and as the name calls out it puts today’s parents in the focus! ParentSquare addresses some of the common problems schools and districts face when looking to streamline communication and stay in touch with parents and guardians . Earlier this year I had the chance to connect with their team. They shared a demo of the platform so I could see it in action and I can’t wait to tell you all about it! In this blog post, we’ll dive into common problems faced by schools and how ParentSquare can address these issues.
Streamlining School Communication
Many schools employ a variety of overlapping EdTech tools to communicate with parents and promote family engagement. Although the intentions come from a great place of course, when different teachers or even different schools within a district use different tools, a breakdown of communication can take place. The video above helps illustrate some of the challenges that many of us in school settings have encountered.
In your school or district, you might have one person posting a message on a community board. Then another who uses email newsletters, and another who sends out SMS messages. If teachers, school leaders, and parent-teacher organizations all use different communication tools, there are bound to be moments throughout the school year when families miss a message or forget how to send a message to a specific person.
One of the reasons this “communication overload” happens is because stakeholders in a school community often use What I find especially powerful about ParentSquare is it’s ability to take on the wide breadth of school communication, including: invoicing, paymentsdifferent digital tools for the same purpose. Whether it’s a resource for permission slips or sign-ups, a tool that lets schools send text messages with updates, or a learning management system with grades to review, schools can streamline their communication channels to place everything in one spot.
Examining a Parent’s Role
Families need to access information in a way that makes sense for them. It should be easy and convenient for parents to check in and take action. If families have more than one child in a school building or a child who works with more than one teacher, having multiple parent communication tools to navigate is a challenge. Simply stated, sorting through the information presented in numerous places isn’t convenient and can cause frustration.
Keeping classroom teacher and school communication in one place can help everyone in your school community streamline communication. ParentSquare supports the two-way communication teachers love and real-time translation for families who speak languages other than English.
With ParentSquare, families can access documents like report cards securely, and automatically receive updates related to student absences and attendance. It covers everything from lunch balances at the school level to teacher wish-list items at the classroom level.
ParentSquare in Action
ParentSquare is a school communication tool that works at a variety of levels. It can take care of communication at the classroom level and handle larger tasks such as collecting forms and managing permission slips. In addition to keeping this type of information organized, ParentSquare can help you schedule parent-teacher conferences and host a school calendar that allows families to RSVP to events.
I often hear questions from educators about which tools can handle one specific small task or another. What I find especially powerful about ParentSquare is its ability to take on the wide breadth of school communication, including: invoicing, payments, volunteer signups and even polling — tools you typically don’t find all in one place. With ParentSqaure, schools can collect and review real-time data so they know who received communication on a particular issue and who might need support staying connected.
ParentSquare can help bridge the gap between school and home for families. It makes sure that all of the information they need is in one place. Instead of sorting through a handful of different platforms, ParentSquare is an excellent choice for districts and schools looking to make everything organized this school year. You can see what other educators and parents have to say about ParentSquare on this page.
Ready to get started? Schools and districts can schedule a free demo of ParentSquare to see the platform in action. Use this link to request a demo of ParentSquare!
