| Mohonasen
is now able to communicate with thousands of
parents, within minutes, via an automated phone
messaging system. "In the event of an emergency,
such as an unplanned early dismissal of students, we can
now send out an automated phone call to our parents to
notify them immediately," Superintendent Robinson says. This
innovative phone messaging system can also be used to
alert parents when report cards and/or interim reports
are issued, to encourage people to vote on the annual
school budget and to communicate on other important
school matters.
Draper Middle School
and Mohonasen High School are also exploring the
possibility of using this system to generate a recorded
phone message that notifies parents automatically if
their child is reported absent from school. (Bradt and
Pinewood Schools are currently required to make
individual calls home if a parent doesn't call first to
report an absence.)
EMERGENCY phone
messages (such an unplanned early dismissal of students)
will be sent to ALL phone numbers parents have provided,
including work numbers and cell phone numbers.
NON-EMERGENCY phone messages (such as report card
alerts, special events, etc.) will be directed only to
the parent's primary phone number which is, in almost
every case, the home phone.
Please note,
the district will NOT use the automated phone
system for a typical snow day announcement. Snow day closings need to be reported to the
wider community and will continue to be announced on the
major television and radio stations, as well as the
Mohonasen Web site explains Robinson.
Robinson also pledged
the district would not use the new phone messaging
system for
frivolous calls that become distracting.
As always, parents are
reminded to report any change in phone numbers to their
child's school office.
Offered
in partnership with Notification Technologies, Inc.
The new phone system is
provided by Notification Technologies, Inc., formerly the Partnership for Academic and Community
Excellence (PACE), a company headquartered in Los
Angeles, California. Mohonasen is one of the first -- if
not THE first -- school to offer the service in the
Capital Region.
The automated system
delivers school messages to a live person, an answering
machine or voice mail system. If there is no
answer to a call, the system is designed to re-try that
number every ten minutes for up to an hour and a half.
Families that have more
than one Mohonasen student should receive only one
message.
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