Schools and early childhood centres talk about how they utilised School-links Emergency Alerts during the COVID-19 lockdown We spoke to a number of our schools and early childhood centres to see how they used School-links during the COVID-19 response, both to inform our own ongoing platform development, and to share good practice with other organisations. […]
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edge school: ‘we’ve got this’ during police lockdown
June, 2020
School-links Emergency Alerts keep community informed Cambridge Middle School went into lockdown in February, at approximately 2.45pm, just prior to the end of the school day. The lockdown stemmed from a call from the police to advise of a police operation near the school. They recommended that Cambridge Middle along with three other schools go […]
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New feature for all School-links clients: the Community ALERTS Directory
June, 2020
At School-links we know how in any crisis, communication is critical. To support government, national, regional and local bodies manage communication during a crisis, we are providing a new service, the Community ALERTS Directory (CAD). This service allows organisations such as the Ministry of Education, the Police, or Councils communicate important alerts and updates to […]
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In a school lockdown, fast, easy-to-use and reliable communications are essential
October, 2019
Schools are where children go to learn. That’s their primary function, but the logistics involved with so many people in one location – most of them children – means that imparting knowledge is just one of the challenges faced by school management teams. Student safety is, of course, paramount. Whether it’s a fire in one of the buildings or a chemical leak in a lab, there are procedures in place to keep the kids safe.
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Easy communication between school and home that doesn’t involve social media
November, 2018
Communication between school and home should be effortless. At secondary level, many students are glued to their smartphone, relying on instant messaging, social media and text to communicate, with email increasingly seen as “old school”. Schools are trying to engage with these new mediums, using Facebook or Twitter or other communication Apps to get the […]
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4 emergency communication must-haves for early childhood centres
March, 2018
Cyclone season is upon us and singing “rain, rain go away, come again another day…” isn’t likely to stop it. Disruptive weather, natural disasters and other emergencies aren’t uncommon experiences for Kiwi children at early learning centres. That’s why a water-tight communication strategy comes in handy, when it’s not business-as-usual for your centre. Parents need […]
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Is your school emergency messaging strategy prehistoric?
February, 2018
The Jurassic Park movie would have ended a lot differently if the park coordinators had come up with a more robust emergency plan in the event of the power going out. Although school emergency communication strategies don’t really need to plan for ‘in the event of cloned dinosaurs escaping’, we recommend for New Zealand schools […]
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How an attendance management system can help reduce truancy rates
February, 2018
Following on from our last article on how parent engagement can help with reducing truancy rates at your school, having a Ministry of Education approved attendance management or early notification system can aid in this as well. Early Notification (EN) is the use of text and/or email messages to notify parents that their child is […]
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Keeping your School-links database up to date
February, 2018
Areas which will require updating now Students & Caregivers One of the questions we get asked in the new year is, “what about updating last year’s data?”. If you have been uploading your data file to School-links, then you will continue to do that. The standard data upload CSV files sent into School-links will update […]
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Reduce truancy rates by connecting with parents
January, 2018
The issue of truancy for New Zealand schools reared its head again at the end of 2017, with attendance rates falling even further than previous years. The Ministry of Education reported the number of students regularly attending school fell from nearly 70 percent in Term 2, 2015 to 67 percent in the same period last […]
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