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BrightArrow Parent Instructions

To enhance communications between the school and parents, Galloway School is piloting a telephone, email and text message broadcast system that will enable us to notify all households and parents of an emergency, unplanned event, early dismissal or school cancellation. The service will also be used to send the Galloway Gazette, general announcements and reminders. This service is provided by BrightArrow Technologies, who specializes in school-to-parent communications. Please note that Galloway School is piloting this program, and our other schools are not using BrightArrow at this time.

How to use the BrightArrow system within PowerSchool.

When you log into the PowerSchool Parent Portal, you will see a new Navigation Icon on the left edge entitled BrightArrow Messages. When you click on that icon, you will see a page that describes options and messages. There are three sections to this page:

1. Choose the types of messages you want to receive using your PowerSchool phone numbers.

The top section in the BrightArrow Settings/Messages page allows you to adjust how you would like to receive alerts on the phone numbers listed for your student within PowerSchool. You can choose whether you want voice calls or text messages for each phone number, or to opt-out entirely for specific phone numbers. Note: You are not able to change your primary phone numbers and email addresses within this screen. If you need to update that information, you will still need to contact the respective school to get phone numbers and emails changed.

2. Add temporary phone numbers and emails into PowerSchool.

The middle (green) section of the BrightArrow Settings/Messages page allows you to put in temporary phones and emails. These are phone numbers and emails that are only used for automated notification–they are not going into your student’s normal PowerSchool records. This should only be used if you have a temporary need to have non-parents receive alerts, such as when your children are staying with relatives for short periods. Any phones and emails that you put into this middle (green) section will remain there and will continue to receive messages until you take them out.

3. Review prior messages sent via PowerSchool.

When you scroll the page down, you will see recent messages sent to you from Galloway School. It will display messages that are sent out as voice calls, text messages and emails. You can view the text messages and emails by clicking on the message date. To hear the voice call audio you can click the Play on Device button at the bottom of the page, or you may choose Call My Phone if you do not have any speakers on the computer or device.

What I need to know about the automated phone calls.

When used, the service will simultaneously call the phone numbers in our parent contact database. The service will deliver the message to both live answer and answering machines. Unanswered calls and busy signals will be automatically retried twice in 30 minute intervals after the initial call.

Specific information you should know regarding receiving phone calls:

• Caller ID. The Caller ID will display the main number for <school/district>, or the phone number for your student’s school if it is a school-specific call.
• Live Answers: Please answer your phone as you normally would by saying “Hello” immediately. The message should start playing right away. Please do not talk while it is speaking as sounds may cause the message to stop and then start over when it hears silence. Inform all family members of this process who may answer your phone. Note: If you have unavoidable background sounds that are causing the message to stop and restart repeatedly, you can press the Star key to have it start again from the beginning without repeating. If you must answer with background sounds, you might also put your hand over the mouthpiece of your telephone to prevent the system from stopping and restarting.
• Answering Machines or Voice Mails: The system will detect that your voice mail has answered and will play the recording to your machine or voice mail.
• Message Repeat: At any time during the message you may press the Star key on your telephone to repeat the message in its entirety.
• Emails: If the school sends out a message by email as well as voice, and if you supply the school with your email address, you can be included in the email broadcasting service.

BrightArrow, the service provider, uses the best available technology in the industry to detect the difference between human answer and machine answer.

How the detection works:

1. The system calls your phone and starts speaking immediately when you answer.
2. By listening while it is speaking, the system decides whether it thinks it has reached a live person or voice mail. So that it thinks you are a live person, you simply say “Hello” or an equivalent short statement when you answer, and then be quiet to hear the message.
3. If it is not sure whether it reached a live person or voice mail, the system must allow for the possibility that it might be voice mail, so it stops the audio upon hearing sound and starts it up again upon hearing silence – that way it will reliably leave a full message on a voice mail or answering machine.
4. Sometimes you will hear a little snippet of sound at the beginning of your voice mail recording, followed by the whole message. If that happens, it is simply because of a pause before your beep that caused the audio to start, stop, and start again to ensure it leaves the full message. In that case, it is working as intended.

Some reasons for false detection:

1. Loud background noise, television, radio, ring back tones, or a generally noisy environment.
2. Not saying hello, delaying saying hello, saying hello more than once, or talking while the system is speaking to you.

What can be done to remedy this?

1. Say Hello immediately and then be silent, and do not say Hello more than once.
2. If, after you answer, the message stops and restarts repeatedly, you can cover the mouthpiece of the phone to cutout all background noise--the message should then start over and replay in its entirety. Alternatively, you can press the Star key and the messages will play fully from the beginning without further repeating.