St Joseph Schools are offering a new parent alert program for the new school year.

The program, announced Thursday, allows families to select how they want to receive information from the school district.

It’s called the Parent Alert System. You can chose to be contacted by phone, text, email, or all three.

“We think that phone, text or email should cover just about everyone in terms of meeting their needs,” said Beery Johnson, Director of Student Services, Safety and Transportation for the District.

School officials say the information sent through the system will include school closings and safety-related updates.

“If we have to close school district-wide, or if an individual school is placed on ‘lock-
down,’ we’ll be able to get them that information in the way that parents want to receive it,” said Johnson. “We believe that parents will appreciate the choice.”

The new system will eventually replace AlertNow, the current system that uses automated phone calls only.

You can sign  up here.