It's 9:40 on a Wednesday night and a parent wants to know whether Friday is a half day. The answer is in the school's portal, somewhere. She can't remember her password, the reset email doesn't arrive, and at 7:45 the next morning she calls the front office, along with eleven other parents asking the same thing.
Now the same question, sent as a text to the school's number:
Parent: Is Friday a half day? Guru: Yes. Friday, Oct 23, dismissal is at 12:15. After-care runs until 6:00.
No login, no menus, and no call to the office.
That is the whole argument of this post: the portal was built so parents could go find information, and most parents would rather just ask. Portals aren't bad. They solved the school's problem while moving the work onto parents, which is a different thing from solving communication.
The work the portal hands to parents
A portal puts the job of finding information on the parent. She has to remember it exists, remember her login, find the right section and dig through menus for the one thing she needs. That's fine for the organized parent with time on her hands. It's a real barrier for everyone else: the parent juggling two jobs, the parent who finds the interface confusing, the parent who doesn't mainly speak English, the parent who logs in twice a year and just wants a quick answer.
The calls come back anyway
So parents who can't or won't use the portal do what's easier: they call or email and ask. That lands right back on the front office, usually as the same ten questions over and over. The school built the portal, put everything in it, and still fields the questions it was meant to prevent. The portal didn't remove the burden. It added a system to maintain on top of it.
The usage numbers hide this. Portal logins show the parents who use it. The parents who never log in don't appear in those numbers at all. They appear in the phone queue at 7:45 on a Thursday morning.
Asking instead of searching
People don't want to log into a system and search. They want to ask the question when they have it, in whatever channel is handy, and get an answer. That's where our tool for schools fits, alongside the portal rather than instead of it.
The parent on Wednesday night didn't need her password. She asked by text and got the answer from the school's own calendar. Parents can ask by text, email or on the website in their own language, or by phone in English or Spanish, in their own words, at whatever hour the question comes up, and get an accurate answer drawn from the school's real information without logging into anything. The information can still live in the portal for those who want it. The everyday way parents get answers becomes asking.
Who gains the most
This is largely an equity difference. The parent who found the portal confusing or intimidating, or couldn't use it in a second language, is exactly the parent who gains most from asking in her own words. The portal quietly sorted parents into those who could use it and those who couldn't. Letting parents ask undoes that sorting, and gives the overwhelmed, the parent still learning English and the parent uncomfortable with technology the same easy access as everyone else.
What portals are still for
For the detailed, personal, record-keeping work, grades, attendance history, official documents, a secure portal is the right tool, and asking a question doesn't replace that. The problem is that portals were sold as the answer to communication when they're really the answer to record-keeping.
Questions worth asking about any parent portal
- What share of parents logged in during the last month?
- What do the parents who never log in do instead?
- How many front office calls are questions the portal already answers?
- Can a parent get an answer without a password, at 9:40 at night?
- Can a parent ask in the language she's most comfortable in?
The portal is an excellent filing cabinet. Parents don't want a filing cabinet, they want to ask and be answered. Picture that Wednesday night again: a forgotten password and a 7:45 phone call, or one text and an answer before bed.
