In our effort to improve communication between parents and school the Ishpeming Public School District has implemented 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, a company specializing in school-to-parent communications. We will continue to report school closings due to snow or weather on WJPD, WZAM, WKQS, WHWL, WMQT, WNMU, WFXD, WGLQ, WLUC TV-6, and WBKP 5 and 10 and will use this system as an overlay to the public announcements.
When used, the service will call all phone numbers in our selected parent contact lists and will deliver a recorded message from a school administrator. The service will deliver the message to both live answer and answering machines. No answers (phones ringing over 40 sec.) and busies will be automatically retried twice in fifteen minute intervals after the initial call.
Along with the phone call, a text message (to detected cell phone) and an e-mail will be sent out. To stop text messages please reply STOP to the message you received. Calls, text messages, and e-mail will be sent to the numbers and addresses on file with the school. If you need to add or update these numbers or addresses, please contact the building secretary.
PLEASE NOTE THE FOLLOWING:
This requires NO registration by the parent on the School Messenger website.
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 Call ID will display one of our District Numbers [906-485-5501] — main district number, [906-485-1066] — Middle/High School or [906-485-6341] — Birchview.
Live Answers: There is a short pause at the beginning of the message, usually a few seconds. Answer your phone as you normally would; “hello” and hold for the message to begin. Multiple “hellos” will delay the message. Inform all family members who may answer your phone of this process.
Answering Machines: The system will detect that your machine has answered and will play the recording to your machine. The phone will ring for up to 40 seconds. Make sure that your machine answers after four rings or you may miss the message.
Message Repeat: At the end of the message you will be prompted to ‘press any key’ to hear the message again. This is very helpful when a child answers the phone and hands it to a parent, who can then ‘repeat’ the message in its entirety.
If you have any questions, please contact your child's school office.
School Messenger, the service provider, uses the best available technology in the industry to detect the difference between human answer and machine or voicemail answer.
Phone voice message Opt-out procedure
At any time, while listening to a recorded phone message sent through School Messenger, recipients can press “5” on their phone to initiate the opt-out process. After pressing 5, they will be asked to press “1” to confirm they no longer wish to receive any recorded messages on that phone through your School Messenger account.
SMS Text Opt-In
School Messenger uses a true SMS protocol developed by the telecommunications industry specifically for mass text messaging. This is different than sending individual text messages between two phones (mobile-to-mobile) or from email-to-text (SMTP). Referred to as “short code” texting, this method is highly reliable and fast because it is strictly regulated by the wireless carriers themselves and allows only approved providers direct connectivity to the wireless carrier networks.
There are only two requirements for a recipient to receive messages from you via SMS text: the recipient’s wireless number imported into Schoo lMessenger and “Opt-In Confirmation” from the recipient’s wireless device. These requirements address any concerns related to the accuracy of the database and costs associated with receiving text messages.
Recipients can easily opt-in by simply sending “Y” (or “Yes”), via text message, to our SchoolMessenger Short Code number (68453). We will be inviting recipients to do this over the next several weeks and continue throughout the year.
The wireless number(s) must be in the School Messenger database associated with a student or staff ID number; these numbers are updated nightly. If a recipient’s number SMS Text number is changed, or a new number added, in our student information system database, the new number will automatically be sent an Opt-In message.