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Thursday, August 25, 2022
Dear Rush-Henrietta Families,
We are excited to announce that Rush-Henrietta is now using Remind as the districtwide classroom communication tool! This decision is the result of extensive conversations with parents and employees in recent years. The District Parent Advisory Council played an important role in these discussions and helped us identify ways to improve communication.
Remind makes it easy to stay involved with your child's school experience. The district subscribes to the service; there is no cost to the users. It allows teachers, coaches, and club advisors to send messages and updates directly to your phone or electronic device.
The safety of our students and employees is important to us, as is protecting the private personal data of our students, parents, and employees. That’s why Remind will be the only tool teachers, coaches, club advisors, and others will use this year to communicate to students. It provides built-in protections that are not available when individuals use their personal devices. When students and employees communicate electronically with one another, this should only be done using district email, Google Classroom, or Remind.
Principals will still send their weekly E-News messages and the district will use the automated calling system for important information. Remind is an additional tool that will allow you to stay more closely connected to your child’s daily school experience. Many people in our district have opted to use a basic form of the service in recent years. In fact, 470,000 messages were sent from R-H users within the past 12 months.
As part of the Remind rollout, official accounts will be created for all educators and parents, as well as students at our secondary schools. On Monday, August 29, you'll receive an email from Remind. Just follow the steps in that message to finish setting up your account. Here is a video demo to see how Remind works.
Parents and students are able to choose the way they receive messages. In addition to email and text messages, parents have the option of downloading the Remind app from the Google Play or Apple App stores. We encourage you to check out this parent guide to get tips on how to use Remind. Students will receive announcements through their email that can be accessed on their Chromebooks or through the Remind App. Students 13 and older can enter their personal phone number if they choose to receive announcements and messages as texts.
We want to make sure that all parents can participate easily in school conversations. Remind automatically translates messages into a parent’s preferred language. We've already set the preferred language for you and your child based on the primary language that is identified in SchoolTool. This will allow you to receive messages in your home language. You can change your preferred language at any time. If a teacher has set his or her account to receive replies, you can send messages back in your preferred language, and they’ll automatically be translated into the teacher’s preferred language.
Thank you for your support, patience, and flexibility as we make this change. We're excited to use Remind to make connecting with your school easier and more engaging!
Sincerely,
Dr. Pamela Kissel
Interim Superintendent
