Instant Parent Contact...
In our efforts to improve communications between parents and school, The Warren County R-III School District is instituting a telephone broadcast system that will enable school personnel to notify all households and parents by phone within minutes of an emergency or unplanned event that causes early dismissal, school cancellation or late start. The service may also be used from time-to-time to communicate general announcements or reminders. This service is provided by SchoolReach, which specializes in school-to-parent communications. The District will continue to report school closings due to snow or weather on Radio Stations KWRE, KFAV, KSLQ, KLPW and KMCR. Television stations—Newschannel 5 "Stormwatch", News4 Snow Alert, and Fox 2 News Snow Watch, and will use this system as an overlay to the public announcements.
When used, the service will simultaneously call all listed phone numbers in our parent contact list and will deliver a recorded message from me or another school administrator if appropriate. The service will deliver the message to both live answer and answering machines. No answers and busies will be automatically retried twice in 15 minute intervals after the initial call. In the event a cancellation decision is made in the early morning hours, the calls may begin as early as 5:00 a.m.
NOTE: 1) This requires NO registration by the parent on the SchoolReach website. 2) All information and contact numbers are strictly secure and confidential and are only used for the purposes described herein.
Here is some specific information you should know.
• Caller ID: The Caller ID may display as 636-456-690X for a building generated call, or as 636-456-4311 which is the main number for the District.
• Live Answers: There is a short pause at the beginning of the message, usually just a few seconds. Answer your phone as you normally would “Hello” and hold for the message to begin. Multiple “Hello’s” will delay the message. Inform all family members of this process who may answer your phone.
• Answering Machines: The system will detect that your machine has answered and will play the recording to your machine. The maximum numbers of rings before hang up is five. Make sure your machine answers after four rings or you may miss the message.
• Morning & Day Calls: In the event a cancellation decision is made the night before, or in the early morning hours, the broadcast message will be sent only to home phone numbers. In the event a cancellation decision is made mid-day, the broadcast message will be sent to home and cellular numbers. General announcements would be sent only to home numbers.
• Message Repeat: At the end of the message you will be prompted to ‘press one’ to hear the message again. This is very effective when a child answers the phone and hands it to a parent, who can then ‘Repeat’ the message in its entirety.
• Emails: This is another option that exists for you only if you supply the school with your email address.
If you have any questions or need to make a change to your phone numbers, please contact your individual building principal.
For more information on the School Reach communication system please visit their website at www.schoolreach
