HPSD Upgrading Notification System - WHLT 22 Connecting the Pine Belt

HPSD Upgrading Notification System

According to school officials parents receive phone calls about severe weather and school closures.

Soon parents and students will receive daily text messages and emails from the school.

More than 4600 students attend Hattiesburg Schools. Each and every student's contact information will be put in the new system for updates.

"The new system will allow us to integrate in calls, text messaging, emails and also integrating with our Facebook and Twitter accounts."

Ross Randall says the web-based software will update the system all at once. Starting next week the director of information technology will be getting ready to launch the alerts, but there are a few set-backs.

"Currently one of the limitations on the system is that the only numbers we have are the ones in our student information systems which can be out of date sometimes."

With the new software parents can go online and create an account to update new contact numbers.

Also the alert will have a caller-ID feature so parents can see the specific number of where the call came from instead of the district office's number... 

Another alert upgrade is language selection. "We'll have the ability to be able to translate our messages to several different languages."

The alert software costs about 16 thousand dollars a year; the upgrades were free. Randall says it's a key tool to stay connected to parents. "We want to make sure we have every opportunity we can to get information to them and for them to be able to communicate with us."