Using Text Messaging to Engage Students and Reduce Absenteeism

Presented by Joanna Smith, Founder and CEO, AllHere Intelligent Attendance Interventions; and Alice Opalka, Research Analyst, Center on Reinventing Public Education, University of Washington – Bothell

Sponsored by AllHere

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Join Joanna Smith, CEO of AllHere, for this edWebinar as she provides insights and best practices on using SMS two-way conversational text messaging to engage students and parents, and how the science shows increased participation in remote or hybrid school settings and ultimately how to drive to higher student engagement and lower absenteeism.

Key takeaways of the presentation will include:

• The latest science and stats on improving student engagement during remote learning.
• How technology-powered solutions can intelligently automate the nudging and outreach to students and families in response to early indicators of disengagement.
• Best practices for using SMS messaging for attendance management including why send, who to send to, what messages to send and how to optimize the timing, personalization, and delivery of messages.

This edWebinar will be of interest to elementary through high school district and school leaders. 

About the Presenters

Joanna Smith works in the education technology space to support school and district leaders to improve learning and life outcomes for K-12 students. She founded AllHere as CEO. The startup software company built a Chronic Absenteeism Campaign System at the Harvard University Innovation Lab and began partnering with schools soon after. AllHere currently serves K-12 students and student services professionals and reduced thousands of student absences in the school year across the United States. Prior to founding AllHere, Joanna served as manager of a school’s family engagement initiatives and was the research associate of the Redesign Lab, the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s K-12 national education reform division.

Alice Opalka is a research analyst at the Center on Reinventing Public Education, where she works on projects related to portfolio strategy, cross-sector collaboration, system governance, and more. Before joining CRPE, Alice was an Education Pioneers Fellow in Los Angeles, an AmeriCorps volunteer coordinator at a children’s literacy organization in Los Angeles, and a college access mentor with College Access Now in Seattle. Alice holds a BA in Environmental Analysis from Scripps College, and an MPA from the University of Southern California.

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AllHere combines the power of technology and research to deliver innovative, scalable, and evidence-based interventions to improve student engagement and attendance. The company’s foundation in research, in-depth data analysis process, and ability to handle the entire process of supporting students and families makes it a best-in-class solution for reducing absenteeism.