Caledonia — Parents, families and members of the Caledonia community can now access school news and information at their fingertips.
The new Caledonia Community Schools app is designed to help keep students, parents, and staff connected with calendars, extra-curricular updates, access to grades and more.
Superintendent Dr. Dedrick Martin says the app will be a “one stop shop” for families to get reliable information directly from the district.
“Parents can look up their kids’ grades, the lunch menu, and whatever we sent out in emails gets pushed directly to their phones,” Martin said. “This is the next evolution of our organizational coherence goals in our strategic plan.”
One of Martin’s goals from “day one” in the district was to improve overall communication between the schools and the community.
“When I became the superintendent, communication was one of the issues identified by the board and community, getting the wrong information or misinformation over social media,” Martin said. “We listened a couple years back to focus groups from the community and our long-term goal is for a parent to get news and communication from their child’s school, directly to their phone.”
Through the app, users can subscribe to their students’ school and receive direct notifications, in addition to district-wide news from newsletters and Facebook.
Martin assured parents that the app will serve as an addition to current methods of communication, such as the website, emails and Facebook.
After the app went live for download on Sept. 10, Martin said they’ve gotten “phenomenal feedback” from the community.
According to the district’s website, “the app works wherever you go – on iPhone, iPad, Android phones, and tablets and you can receive notifications on your Chromebook or using a computer’s web browser.”
Download instructions, tutorials and other app support resources can be found on the newly designed website.
“The app design was created to be in sync with our more user-friendly website,” Martin added. “I want to give credit to our tech team and communications coordinator. We needed people with the time and energy to follow through on making our idea a reality.” The “Caledonia Community Schools” app can be downloaded from the App Store or Google Play.
