Set your school's notification defaults
For school admins: what families get unless they choose otherwise — digest cadence and contents, push, and texts — and who your changes actually move.
Most families never open their notification settings — they get whatever the school decided. This page is where you decide it: Admin › School settings › Notifications.
Defaults move only the undecided
Everything on this page is a default, not a bulk edit. Changing one moves every family who has never set that preference themselves — including families who join later — and touches nobody who has already chosen. Beside each control the page tells you exactly how many people currently follow it, which is the number to look at before you flip anything.
The email digest: cadence plus contents
The digest is four decisions, not one:
- How often — daily, weekly, or off. Off means no digest email at all for following families, including sign-up reminders — so if your goal is just less announcement noise, leave the cadence on and turn off the Announcements section instead. The page warns you about exactly this.
- What goes in it — three sections you can include or drop:
- Announcements — broadcast school news.
- Messages — only chats a parent chose to receive by digest; switching this off leaves those chats with no notification at all.
- Sign-ups — a family’s own commitments (“you’re bringing napkins Friday,” “this sheet closes tomorrow”). Not school news — think twice before quieting reminders people signed up for.
Push and texts
- Push defaults — one switch for school news and events, one for chat messages. Each family’s own devices still have to allow notifications; the default just decides where the account-level switches start.
- Text messages — whether new families start opted in or out of urgent- announcement texts. Most schools leave this off and let families opt in themselves: opting people into automated texts on their behalf may not meet the consent rules in your state, and the page says so.
The page also warns when a combination leaves a gap — for instance, school push off and the sign-up digest off means an undecided family hears about a sign-up deadline nowhere but inside the app.
The one control that isn’t a default
Service program reminders — the monthly email to families behind on their commitment — is a plain on/off switch for the whole school. Turning it off stops the reminder for everyone, including families who wanted it. It’s labeled as such on the page; treat it accordingly.