Parents
Best School App for Parents: What Parents Actually Want
What makes a school app parents actually open: absence alerts, fee reminders, results, the school bus and notices. A checklist for principals choosing one.
Most schools that launch a parent app see the same thing: lots of downloads in the first week, then silence. Parents keep an app only when it answers the questions they would otherwise call the school about.
The five questions parents ask most
- Is my child in school today?
- How much fee is due, and when?
- How did my child do in the exam?
- Where is the school bus?
- What notices did the school send?
A good school app for parents answers all five on its first screen, without searching.
Alerts that come to the parent
Parents should not have to open the app to find out their child is absent. The best apps send the alert as soon as attendance is marked, and also by SMS, because not every parent checks their phone for app notifications, and not every parent has a smartphone.
One app, not five
If fees are in one app, the bus in another and results on a website, parents give up. Look for a school ERP with a parent app built in, so everything comes from the same student record.
A checklist for principals
- Absence, fee and result alerts sent automatically, by SMS as well.
- A receipt for every fee payment, visible to the parent.
- Live school bus location and the child’s boarding status.
- Notices for the whole school, one class or one family.
- Works on any phone, with nothing complicated to set up.
In EduMaxim, parents see attendance, fees, results, the school bus tracking app and every notice in one place, and the school SMS system makes sure parents with basic phones are told too.