Communication is at our fingertips through the use of phones, emails, texts and social media. It’s so easy to send a “quick text” to student-athletes about basketball practice changing times or drop a reminder to parents via social media about an upcoming assignment.
While it may seem ok in the moment, these are not professional channels of communication to distribute or discuss school-related matters. The administration team at South Harrison Community School Corporation wants to ensure every teacher, staff member, student, and parent or guardian has access to a district-approved easily-accessible communication tool.
That is why, starting this upcoming 2023-2024 school year, all parent and student communication with teachers will run through the SHCSC app, using a feature called Rooms. Rooms has messaging capabilities for groups as well as individual student/parent communication. As such, South Harrison will no longer utilize other messaging systems and platforms such as School Messenger, Seesaw, Dojo, GroupMe, or Remind to communicate with students and/or parents.
Parents and guardians with a student at a South Harrison school will need to download the SHCSC app to access Rooms. On Wednesday, May 17, all parents and guardians will receive an email with a secure access code to create a Rooms account associated with their student. It is important for all contact information to be accurate in Harmony Family Access.
Please click on the links below to download the free app and set up your notification preferences, and also to update contact information in Harmony Family Access:
Download for Android https://bit.ly/3NDFemw
Download for iPhone https://apple.co/3NWfQbG
Harmony Family Access: https://harmony.shcsc.k12.in.u...
The administration team is excited for this new tool to streamline communication even further and truly making the SHCSC app a “one-stop shop” for all announcements, reminders, events and more.
Rooms FAQ’s
1. How will I receive school-wide or group messages?
School-wide announcements will be made by the school office via the SHCSC App or text alerts. Teachers may also send group messages to the families of their students using Rooms.
2. Will athletic teams, extracurriculars, clubs, class sponsors, etc. be using Rooms?
Yes. All student communication will be through Rooms.
3. Can I still use email to communicate with my student's teacher?
Yes, you can still use email to contact your student’s teacher as long as it is to their official school account.
4. Will my child’s teacher still use Seesaw for student work?
Your student’s teacher may continue to share student work through Seesaw. However, there will not be a messaging component.
5. Will my child’s teacher still connect with families through Class Dojo?
No. Your student’s teacher may use Dojo within their classroom to keep track of points or rewards; however, they will not be connecting with families.
6. I know a teacher outside of school. Can I text them about my child?
If it is regarding school, all school-related print messages have to be archived for 3 years so we cannot use personal text messaging as a way to communicate between teachers and parents regarding school business.
7. What if a teacher needs to communicate with my student for non-school reasons?
We strongly discourage teachers from texting with students for any reason; however, if this is necessary, it is highly encouraged for the teacher to keep documentation of parental recognition and approval of this communication for the specific purpose.
8. Can I message a teacher through Facebook or other social media?
If it is regarding school or your child, communication should be through school email or Rooms. You should not communicate about school-related matters through social media and school staff are not to communicate with students through social media.
9. How can my child’s bus driver communicate with parents/guardians?
Due to the nature of needing to communicate immediately with some families on the road, bus drivers are allowed to text families. However, bus drivers will not use text messaging to communicate with students.
10. What if I need help using the SHCSC App or Rooms?
Our technology department is working to create how-to videos that will be shared on social media, the website and in the app.