In the recent months, Fairfield has been subject to intense inclement weather that has often required changes to school schedules. Whenever there’s a delay, early dismissal, or a cancelled day, it’s important to communicate this with students in a timely and effective manner. 

Last year, students were told to download the ParentSquare app in order to get direct notifications informing us about sudden schedule changes. But if this were the case, why is it that these updates are being sent to parents rather than us?

When I was leaving for school on March 3rd, I was shocked to hear that we might have an early dismissal due to snow. Upon arriving at school, multiple students also expressed similar disapproval to the lack of direct communication to the students. One student even stated that he often misses these notifications entirely due to his parents assuming that he’s already seen them. 

This information is more important for the hundreds of students that either drive themselves or take the bus to school rather than parents. Other important communications have also only been sent to parents in the past. For instance, superintendent Mike Testani’s apology for making students commute to school on dangerous roads during a snowstorm and the rationale behind the decision was not delivered to students.

 Additionally, it shouldn’t fall upon the shoulders of parents to give their students the most basic of communications. Out of the 17 students who filled out a questionnaire, 10 reported that they rely on their parents for snow day announcements. This can create a problem because many parents may not see alerts and be able to communicate them with students due to differing schedules. Additionally, a significant population of students are legal adults, yet still must get announcements from their parents.

We were told that ParentSquare would be the basis of all future communications between the student and the school, yet it seems like all we get are the monthly newsletter announcements. Of the 17 aforementioned participants, 10 also stated that they found ParentSquare to be “effectively useless” for non-extracurricular activities. Obviously, it’s important that parents are informed about any schedule changes as well, but it’s just as important that students are additionally informed.