ASHLAND – The Ashland City School Board received a technology update at its meeting Monday.

Ben Spieldenner, the district’s chief innovation officer, provided the board with an overview of the ongoing transition to Final Forms.

He also talked about the district’s new website, which went live this summer, and the transition to Bloomz as the district’s primary form of communication.

“It’s been a really busy summer and we’ve seen a lot of pretty massive and profound technological changes that have been in the works for quite some time,” Spieldenner said.

Redesign of the website

These changes included a new website design for the user interface.

Spieldenner said the design of the website is based on the terms most frequently searched for.

“I tried to develop a website where parents and children can find information quickly and easily,” said Spieldenner.

He hopes that the design will also be more visually appealing than the previous website.

A new Ashland City Schools application will come with the website, Spieldenner said. The old app expired and he received several messages from parents who relied on the information there.

The new app is in the works and information will be sent out as soon as it is ready, Spieldenner said.

Final forms

Spieldenner announced the move to Final Forms at a board meeting last August and told the board that the new system is expected to be implemented in November. Final Forms takes external forms, such as medical forms, and converts them into electronic format.

Spieldenner said that since the district made the change, he has been communicating with parents to get them to fill out the forms online.

On Monday, he told the board that 84% of families in the district had successfully transitioned to the final forms.

Just over 200 families still need to provide information on the final forms, said Spieldenner.

According to Spieldenner, the change will benefit the district in the long term. The forms will be easier for families to fill out and update. Instead of sending paper packages home every year, parents can sign the forms digitally.

Final Forms also made it easier to update parent and emergency contact information, Spieldenner said. That contact information then easily transferred to Bloomz, the district’s new communications platform.

Fully operational

The district announced its plan to switch to Bloomz in May. It had previously used Remind, another application that enabled direct communication between schools, teachers, coaches, parents and students.

According to Spieldenner, Bloomz also offered several other perks.

Teachers could link Google calendars or create calendars in the app, making it easier to schedule parent-teacher meetings. Students could submit assignments through Bloomz and track PBIS rewards.

Spieldenner previously estimated the district could save around $20,000 by switching to Bloomz, which replaces several other applications the district was using.

Spieldenner told the board Monday that more than 6,000 people are registered to receive Bloomz alerts from the district.

His office is working to ensure that the information in Bloomz is accurate, he said, and is also making sure the technology is working properly.

This independent, local reporting by our Report for America Corps members is brought to you in part by the generous support of the Ashland County Community Foundation.