 |
 |
 |
|
Mineral Schools Sign Up for New Emergency Notification System
KEYSER, W VA -- Beginning this fall, parents of Mineral County School students will be able to receive notices of school closings or other emergencies almost instantaneously, thanks to SchoolReach, the fastest-growing parental notification service used among K-12 public schools in the United States.
SchoolReach has been chosen by Mineral County schools to implement the SchoolReach Instant Parent Contact system this fall.
The SchoolReach system, currently used by more than 4,200 schools in 49 states, provides a way for school officials to send personally recorded messages to parents for emergency alerts and general announcements of timely interest. "Having access to this service equips Mineral County schools with a strong communications tool that will be used during non-emergency and urgent situations to keep the parents of our students informed in a timely manner," said Skip Hackworth, superintendent, Mineral County schools. "We believe that the flexibility of the SchoolReach system will help strengthen the partnership between school and home." According to Hackworth, the new system will be utilized in all of Mineral County's schools beginning this fall.
SchoolReach allows a school administrator to record a brief message for delivery to an extensive, or selective, list of parents, teachers or students, simultaneously. Greeted by the familiar voice of a school representative, after seeing their school's Caller ID, parents immediately know that the message is important. The "List-Record-Launch" rapid messaging process takes only minutes for the notification to reach parents.
Replacing older forms of communication, such as phone trees and sending notes home with students, the system allows for beneficial, timely distribution of accurate and vital information. "Schools struggle with 'immediate, same day, or night-before' notices to parents," said Paul Langhorst, vice president of operations at GroupCast, SchoolReach's parent company. "SchoolReach fills this need perfectly and requires no additional hardware, software, or phone lines to operate the solution."
Schools already using the SchoolReach system have found that it is an ideal way to provide parents with updates, such as school closings, meeting reminders, and even rumor abatement. And because the SchoolReach system is able to call parents at a preferred phone number or multiple phone numbers, including work, home, or cell phone numbers, the system also performs extremely well in emergency situations, like lockdowns, or whenever every second is critical.
More information about SchoolReach can be found at www.schoolreach.com and www.groupcast.com