St Bernard's PS in Glengormley has launched an app to cover all aspects of school life and better communicate with parents.
Over the past two years, the school has successfully introduced the use of social media - namely Facebook and Twitter to communicate with parents.
The app was developed by the company myschoolapp, which works to help schools communicate with parents in a way that fits in with their lives, and in a way that is easy for the school to manage.
Teacher John Meighan said the school recognised, however, that not all of parents used social media, so set about trying to find a way to reach a larger number of them.
"Our solution to the problem was to develop a school app as we know all of our parents have smart phones," he said.
"Other features of the app include a full school calendar outlining important dates, a news-feed of up to date news and goings on in the school, an image gallery containing up to date images of events from around the school, school contact details including Google Maps, links to all school policies, important documents and the school prospectus."
Another important feature of the app is the absence notification for parents, which enables them to fill in an absentee form and send it to the school on the morning of a child being sick.
"The school will be notified instantly regarding the absence which enables us to keep attendance records accurate and up-to-date and saves the parents from trying to phone the school or have to remember to send in a note to explain the absence," Mr Meighan added.
"The app is essentially a condensed version of the website, it allows us to send push notifications to all parents from the school or to target parents from specific year groups."
For further informartion visit myschoolapp.co.uk
