Data gathering - use of Official Notes for communication/documentation?

Rebecca Plona

Hello! At a previous school, we used Official Notes for a wide range of communication/documentation purposes from general Academic Notes from teachers (to family/student/admin/advisor) to share triumphs and concerns to Missed Medication Alerts from health center (to family/student/admin) to Learning Center Notes noting changes to learning profiles (to family/student/teachers/admin). Here at a new school we do not use Official Notes and I was hoping to introduce this as a communication/documentation feature as it worked quite well at the last school.

I have been told by a Blackbaud consultant that the feature is not designed for communication and documentation, so I was hoping to check my assumptions and hear from others a) if you are using Official Notes in this capacity and b) are there pitfalls to using this feature that I might not be considering?

Thank you so much!

Ami Naik

Hello Rebecca,

We use official notes for admission notification of decisions/visits plus Faculty/Coaches communication with parents and students. We use pushpage templates for any other community communications.

Christy Pyankov

Hello,

We use official notes to send admission decisions to all applicants, send application deadline, events, supplemental materials reminders, financial aid information if a family requests more info, and follow up emails if we don't hear from a family.