District 518 aims to expand notification system

• District 518

District 518

Talk about it

WORTHINGTON — District 518 implemented a notification system during the middle of last school year in which the system was primarily utilized for weather related announcements to parents and staff. The district did utilize this for a couple of events during the spring and summer to help keep parents informed of changes as well as important events.

This year, District 518 will be looking at ways to expand the utilization of the notification system beyond the primary use of weather-related notification (many positive comments from parents) and just a few special notifications. The system has the potential for many positive ways to communicate with parents and even the community if given the opportunity through planning.

During this time we will be discussing how this notification system can be used as a communication tool in order to provide quality communication. Some of the items that will be reviewed and discussed are lunch account balances, attendance, special events, testing reminders, survey completions and other items that might be suggested. So if you have suggested uses of the notification system, we would encourage you to share those ideas with one of the offices or administrators, so that that it can be reviewed as a potential utilization of the system.

An important aspect of this system in order to make it work properly is for the district to have updated information in the database. Parents are able to enter the parent portal portion of our student data base to update contact information such as home phone numbers, cell phone numbers, address and so on. We would encourage you to keep this up to date in order for the district to communicate with you. Likewise, you do have the option to select how the notification system contacts you, such as only through your cell phone or home phone or e-mail or all of the above. Also, you have the availability to receive this information in another language if identified in the system. One option that is not available at this time is through text messages, but we are hoping that this will be available in the future.

One area that we would like to develop is the opportunity for the business community and other community members to utilize the notification system as well. We believe that it would be beneficial to the overall community if they would like to be a part of these communications either for weather events or special events. If you as a community member or business would like to participate in the notification system, I would encourage you to contact Tom Ahlberg at the High School (376-6121), so that he can help get you established on the system.

The overall benefits of the District 518 notification system will hopefully create a valuable communication benefit to participants as well as save time for everyone. This can also provide the district with a fiscal benefit that can reduce costs (avoiding paper copies for example) and help the overall environment.

We are excited to create new opportunities to communicate better with the community of District 518. We would like to thank you for the continued support of our strong school system and again encourage you to share your ideas.

John Landgaard is the superintendent of District 518 schools.

Tags: district 518, opinion, education, columns