Visual message reinforcement technology is essential to help schools communicate important information to students, who are bombarded with thousands of messages a day.
Kids, tweens and teens today are like no generation before them; they’ve only ever known the world in the digital age. Generation Z, which includes people born between 1995 and 2015, makes up the entirety of school-aged people today. Its members are early tech adopters and mobile natives. They seek on-demand content and expect nonstop connectivity to social media wherever they go.
The Pew Research Center states 95% of U.S. teens have access to a smartphone. And according to a nationwide survey by Common Sense, 8- to 12-year-olds average nearly five hours of entertainment screen media a day, and teens log just under seven hours—not including time spent using screens for school or homework. Additionally, among teens those surveyed by Pew, 45% say they are constantly online.
With so much engagement on digital channels, kids are inundated with a range of diverse, and sometimes contradictory or misleading, messages on a daily basis. So, when news develops on their school’s campus—whether it’s related to a change in the regular schedule, or an update during an emergency situation—communications need to stand out from the digital clutter to deliver a unified message.
Visual communication technology, like OneVue Notify InfoBoards, provide an additional layer of messaging to ensure alerts and notifications reach students, educators and staff. Here are four reasons school administrators should consider these solutions for their protocols:
1. Accessibility
According to the U.S. Department of Education’s 41st Annual Report to Congress, over 67,000 students between the ages of 6 and 21 have some type of hearing impairment. In schools, announcements are traditionally made via overhead public address (PA) systems, but these don’t always effectively reach students during loud passing periods or lunch, and they don’t serve those with hearing impairments. Visual notifications ensure verbal messages made over PA systems or with megaphones and microphones are received in real time, and they ensure all students are included in every communication.
2. Emergency Preparedness
Communicating information quickly in emergencies is critical, which is why message boards like OneVue Notify InfoBoards should be integrated into schools’ protocols. Whether an emergency occurs during a passing period, while class is in session or before or after school hours, visual messages on screens can capture the attention of students, faculty and staff. In addition, visual communications can reinforce messages when school members are focused on their smartphones (either listening to music or watching videos), busy with after-school activities or in a chaotic situation that requires quick action be taken. Additionally, the color-coding features can cue the level of importance a message carries.
3. News and Announcements
A school email or post on the school intranet may go ignored or unopened, but repeated communications on visual OneVue Notify InfoBoards about school events and updates can increase the likelihood of students absorbing important, pertinent messages. Visual messaging can reiterate communications such as:
- Weekly school happenings including spirit days, dances and upcoming activities
- Sporting events including game or race days and results
- School closures
- Testing reminders such as finals, AP, ACT and SAT
4. Message Reinforcement
The amount of content reaching school-aged people is the highest it has ever been. The average American is bombarded with anywhere from 4,000 to 10,000 advertisements every day, and across the world, 306.4 billion emails are sent every day. That means if every person in the world received emails, they’d have 44 new ones to sift through every morning. Layer in the other content school-aged people are consuming on TV, their phones and computers, it’s easy to understand how they may accidentally tune out important messages. OneVue Notify InfoBoards can help cut through the clutter and reinforce important messages by going outside traditional PA, computer or smartphone means.
As the number of messages and distractions grow for Generation Z, attention-commanding and effective methods of communication are necessary to break through and reach them with important messages.
To learn more about how OneVue Notify InfoBoards can help your school reinforce important announcements and messages, visit: https://www.primexinc.com/infoboards