letters from school

[agnesf]

Is it unreasonable to expect schools to get into the digital age? I don't know anyone who hasn't either got a home computer or smartphone yet our school still persists in sending home a printed out newsletter which gets scrumpled up in a heap at the bottom of the bag.

Even more annoying are important additional letters such as those needed to book appointments at parents evening/ get tickets for school concerts ("donation" of £3 required). These have often not made it home or even worse not even been given out by the class teacher.

Is mine the only school that still thinks its in the 1970's. Its really annoying plus in these days of increasingly short resources seems to be really inefficient.

I like paper copies, the newsletters are amazing with all the key dates. It goes on my notice board.

I'm a school governor and we had this debate at a recent meeting. We're going to start doing both as we know there are parents who don't have smartphones or computers, we think around 15% of the population, but also parents who prefer to get an email. It's extra work for us, away from learning which is never good, but hopefully will keep everyone happy.

I read out the newsletter to children at home time in case of illiterate parents at home. Email won't help them.

Funny that the OP refers to the 70s. Then not everyone even had a home phone, never mind a mobile. If you were ill at school you went to the sick room. I don't know how evacuations were handled but our school did not close for snow when were in Primary. I can remember us building a great big wall of snow at school....

In Secondary the main issue was the buses would stop running so you had to listen to the radio. I think when that happened I went on my bike though, once the Deputy head gave me a lift...the school did not close. I remember some children been cut off by floods and snow but school was open, the children just did not make it in.

Our schools send e-mails and have parent portals. We even have to download school reports. I save things to my laptop or cloud - never print anything out unless it's an exam timetable or complex list for a trip, etc.. I certainly don't print out to sign and return - I complete forms on-line, add an electronic signature and return them to the school. That also provides me with an audit trail and means the school can't claim that things haven't been returned. Even for trip lists - I can bring them up on my phone while I'm shopping so don't need even to remember to take with me the piece of paper.

Ours are email only .
I couldn't care less as I ignore most of the crap either way .

We have recently gone to email-only from paper-only then paper-and-email. Those without email can opt to have paper, but tbh it's far easier to keep track of an email than a crumpled piece of paper. And you can forward emails.

I think it's probably easier in the cases of RP/NRP families too - just add more addresses to the list.

I agree, DP wouldn't have a clue what was going on if I hadn't added his email to the list as well. I know its nice to have bits of paper on the fridge but often these don't make it home in our house, or arrive crumpled, wet, covered in mud and illegible. plus the time of sports day or whatever is no good to me on the fridge when I am at work updating my diary or arranging childcare or whatever. electronic copies that can be accessed from anywhere and forwarded to people are the way to go, surely? do people really know any parents now who don't get text messages? is there really anyone left with email on their phones?

without!

we have texts, email and paper and parents still complain that they haven't received the information.

But then the OP shows that whatever the school does they can't win.

Forago
"is there really anyone left with email on their phones?"

Assuming that you mean without, I know loads as they don't want to receive spam all day.

According to ONS 83% of households have an internet connection and when you look at who doesn't access the internet daily its old people. hence most parents are likely to have an internet connection.

I can't understand why we have to sign bits of paper anymore. A signature is just as easily faked as an email reply, in fact probably easier.

I don't think that whatever the school does they can't win. Emails don't get lost. You can look back at them. I wouldn't even mind if the school just kept an up to date copy of letters on their website but they don't.

DS school is much easier to manage - its all there in one email.

agnes

Emails do get lost, Servers go down, email addresses are written down/inputted wrong.

Waltons I imagine the teachers at your children's school just love engaging with you...

I would say losing emails is much rarer than losing a piece of screwed up paper. That's why most businesses operate by email these days.

Even if the email is lost you can just look up on website or ask a friend to forward to you.

Actually they do because I try not to get bogged down in unnecessary detail !
Lots of the school bumpf is repetitious and irrelevant .

rarer possibly, but if you never receive an email you will never know that it was sent.

Schools have to cover themselves, where I work we use all three.
Depending of course on what the parents want.

I prefer hard copy i am fed up with the amount of stuff i have to print off because it saves the school money and the worry of having enough ink and paper and a working printer plus all the homework and handouts which are no longer handed out and yes we do it twice because a friend can't afford their own - seriously not everyone can and we might look as if we can but it is another thing to budget for when you have children now. I often print things as i find i need to read something just as I've switched off which is time consuming especially when you need to check just one point!

My DD's school seem to have it right as far as I can see, they email the weekly newsletter but have paper copies given to children without an email registered and more in the reception if anyone needed them.

They send texts to remind of important things. They have also just got their own app on android, windows and apple that has all the news updated on it too, you can get all the info or filter by year/s.

Some things always come home on paper such as trip and clubs that require a slip filled in and/or payment - a list of letters sent home is included in the newsletter too though so you know it they've got lost.

We get paper and parent mail. They still failed to tell us they were striking last week. Relying on reception class children with that message is a little hit and miss to say the least!

school letters at the bottom of bags is NOT the school's fault. It's about time the child AND the parent are both responsible for making sure letters get into the bag and taken out to be read.
I am fed up of parents not checking school bags. It's that time of year when school bags get heavier when handed out at the end of the day and when I look inside, I find letters from September still in there. I once found YR word cards in the bag of a Y2 child!!!!
To have an electronic version of the letter would mean that a large proportion of the school community may miss it. Not everyone in my class has access to the internet and even those who do, parents forget to check the system on a regular basis. Also, to separate into two groups - electronic and paper is actually more cumbersome than just sending paper. Letters get printed, then either individually named or the teacher has to go round the class giving letters to individuals from a pre-written list of children who need the paper copy - more time consuming than counting out groups of letters and placing on home tables or home drawers at the end of the day.
It winds me up that PARENTS think they are experienced enough to tell schools how to distribute their letters when they have never stepped foot in a school office and seen first-hand what they have to do between the hours of 8am and 4pm!
Just install some responsibility into your child to take letter from teacher's hand, or the table/drawer, put it into their bag and then PARENT to take out of the bag. Simple!

Junkfood, fuck off

Teachers who lecture parents in a hectoring tone like that loose the parents cooperation instantly.

DD2 didn't leave notes in her bag where I might have found them, she left them in her draw the other side of the school security system.

A simple Email isn't much to ask, I'm on all sorts of group email lists, they aren't rocket science.

Seriously at the DDs school the teacher who took junkfood's attitude to pupil responsibility, didn't notice that she wasn't loosing things, they were being Hidden.

She didn't care less that DD was getting really upset at very nice lunch boxes and bottles going missing.

Thankfully her job share DID care and went looking for things (some of which) turned up in the boys loo, others in the computer room where no one takes food and drink.

Do you know what really used to annoy me and that was all the calls from all the other mums to find out various details because they were too disorganised to keep track of letters, etc.. Even happens now sometimes. It must drive the poor teachers nuts. And these people are people who don't have jobs; I work full time and can get organised and know what's what. It's insane. I'd be tempted to tell people to get themselves organised.