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What makes Remind101 safe?

By Christine Garland

When you land on Remind101.com for the first time you’ll read, “A safe way for teachers to text messaging students and stay in touch with parents.” From that communication point on you’ll hear us throw around the word “safe” often. We describe ourselves as a company, and our messaging service, as safe. It’s the word that has resulted in numerous product decisions and sets us apart from similar services to ours.

The safety of our teachers is extremely important to us. You deserve the opportunity to use tools in your classroom that make a difference, without fearing the repercussions of their implementation. We’ve tried, and we hope are succeeding, in offering that comfort with our messaging service.

This blog post is here to act as 2 things.

1) A simple explanation for our teachers of the features put in place by Remind101 to keep you safe.

2) A resource to be shared and distributed to parents, administrators, district heads, and anyone else, that will gain valuable confidence in the implementation of Remind101 at your school from reading this.

What makes Remind101, in a word, “safe”?

No exchange of personal information:

Your Remind101 messages are not sent from your personal cell phone number. You don’t even need to own a cell phone to use Remind101. At the time of sign-up, we issue you an anonymous phone number used only for sending and receiving your messages. As a result, students/parents who sign up to get your messages will never gain access to your personal cell phone number.

Students/parents subscribe to receive your messages by sending a text or email from their personal device with your distinct class code. Once subscribed, they can only be identified by their name (which they provide) on your class roster list. This process ensures that a teacher never has access to a student or parent’s personal information.

One-way mass messaging:

Remind101 is a one-way mass messaging service. This means that all messages sent must go to your entire class list. No teacher has the ability to communicate directly with one student. This precaution is in place to disallow any form of bullying, favoritism, or inappropriate conversation. For the same reasons, subscribers are not able to reply to any messages sent.

Logged communication history:

A log of all messages sent are saved in your account. These messages can never be edited or deleted. This means an accurate log of your communication history will always be at your fingertips should anyone question the content you have, or have not sent.

(We are also in the process of building in the ability for you to export your message history so you can have a hard copy for your records. Stay tuned!)

Preventing inappropriate language:

A lesser known feature in place is the detection and removal of inappropriate language. When a student or parent first subscribes we ask for their name. Occasionally, kids will be kids and send back a stream of inappropriate content instead of their name. When this happens, our system detects the “bad words”, removes them, and replaces them with inoffensive symbols.

This way, when the student name appears in the teacher’s account, s(he) will be able to fix it without dealing directly with any vulgarity.

Server security:

Every click, page view and text message is handled by the Remind101 application, which is hosted on a cloud platform called Heroku. Their business focuses on server management, scaling and implementing security best practices. This frees us up, allowing us to spend our time building great products. If you would like to learn more, Heroku has dedicated an entire page to explain their security provisions, all of which we automatically inherit.

As the company continues to grow and release new features or products, safety will continue to be a defining factor in our decisions. We’re on a mission to never give you a reason to second guess our tools.

If there is anything you don’t feel we’ve covered, or you have questions about these or any other features of Remind101, please reach out to us:contact@remind101.com

To Tweet or to Text?

We recently got an email from a teacher using Twitter to communicate with her class and parents. She had heard about us and was considering switching or adding Remind101 to her communication tactics. She’s had success with Twitter and likes using it (can’t blame her, I’m a twitter addict,#guilty), so she asked in our words what the difference would be in using Remind101.

Which raised the important conversation to us, what are the differences between Twitter and Remind101?

To be very clear. This is NOT a Twitter vs. Remind101 conversation. We adore Twitter. Remind101 is not a replacement for their service. There are extremely distinct differences between our platforms. It’s up to each teacher to decide what they feel is the most valuable communication use for their classroom.

To sum it up, Remind101 is a system built for simple safe messaging in education. Students/Parents cannot reply to messages, and it does not allow for individual conversations. Messages are sent straight to a subscriber’s phone for immediate on the go alerts. Twitter is a social, microblogging platform for conversations. A lot of teacher’s are using both in their classroom in order to capitalize on their separate, and equally awesome, values.

What are you using to communicate?

99.8% of college students own a mobile phone…a Webinar by Jason Rhode

Jason Rhode wrote a great post on SMS in higher ed, “Text messaging students while maintaining privacy”. A few interesting statistics on mobile penetration in schools:

99.8% of college students reportedly own one or more mobile phone (Truong, 2010).
54% of teens text daily (Lenhart, Ling, Campbell, & Purcell, 2010)
97% of students reporting that they use SMS as their main form of communication (Truong, 2010).
53% of students have smartphones
75% of 12-17 year olds owncell phones
50% of teens send 50 or more text messages a day; 30% send more than 100/day

Jason does a live demo of remind101 at 32 minutes, check it out!

It’s obvious that students-both high school and highered alike are using mobile phones to communicate but the privacy concerns become an issue when teachers and professors are involved. “Valid concerns exist concerning how to do so in a manner that protects the privacy of both the students and the faculty or staff member.”

Jason Rhode is the Assistant Director of the Faculty Development and Instructional Design Center at Northern Illinois University

“We have a test? You didn’t tell us we had a test!” How Catherine Flippen uses mobile in the class

Catherine Horton Flippen is a foreign language and fine arts teacher at Mill Creek High School in Hoschton, Georgia. She is an educational technology evangelist, effective digitized pedagogy integrator, and all-around technophile. You can follow her on Twitter (twitter.com/CatFlippen), read her blog Ctrl+Alt+Teach (www.ctrlaltteach.com), and browse her digital footprint (about.me/CatFlippen).

I’ve been a victim of communication failure. So has most every other educator I know. It’s practically a pandemic taking over our email and snail mail and leading to even more time spent outside of the classroom desperately trying to reach students and parents. Take, for example, the following scenes from a particular school day that I have experienced at least twice any given semester:

2nd Period Student: “Sorry I’m late. I didn’t know our class had moved. You can’t mark me tardy.”

Teacher: “You should have remembered. I wrote it on the board and reminded you at the end of class. Now you’ve missed the main instruction, and I’ll have to repeat everything again.”

Group of Students in Every Class: “We have a test? You didn’t tell us we had a test!”

Teacher: “Well, it’s been on the class calendar online, and I mentioned it yesterday in class. You all should have written it down in your agenda.”

Parent Email at the End of the School Day: “I didn’t know my child had a big project due / needed to bring something to class. She needs an extension / to be excused from the activity / should get an automatic 100%.”

Teacher: “I posted information on my website and even sent a letter home three weeks ago. Don’t you check my website and didn’t you receive the letter?”

Sound familiar? Just thinking about it makes me shudder. Every educator puts forth so much effort into making calendars, sending home information, and emailing notifications that it becomes a huge disappointment when parents and students are clearly not using your resources. Throw in phone logs, email difficulties and masses of paperwork, and I’m on the verge of bypassing important teacher-parent and teacher-student communication in lieu of spending my time doing even more important things like, you know, grading and planning.

Thankfully, I’ve discovered a communication revolution following on the footsteps of the BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) and Mobile Learning movements: TEXT MESSAGING. No, not the kind that requires your phone number to be shared among adolescents and teenagers (and the potential mess involved with that scenario), but the kind that is FREE, SECURE, and even DOES THE WORK FOR YOU. No actual phone numbers are exchanged, no personal information is shared, messages can be scheduled in advance, and every message you send out is recorded on the Remind101 website for professional and legal reference.

Thanks to Remind101, I’ve been able to circumvent communication failure so far this semester. My students are still talking about how awesome it is to receive messages from their teacher. They come to my class prepared and on time more regularly than I have ever experienced. Parents have told me that they enjoy feeling more “in the know” of what their student is doing in my class. And after I shared Remind101 with other foreign language teachers at Mill Creek High School in Hoschton, Georgia, the entire department adopted the practice en masse.

Here are some specific examples of how real teachers use Remind101:

My classes are heavily integrated with educational technology, so we are often in a computer lab two to three times per week and sometimes on short notice. I send out frequent messages to each subject I teach to remind them at least twice of our relocation beforehand.

Paula Sanchez at Mill Creek High reminds her students at 6pm almost every night what is or what will be due tomorrow.
Lindsey Barwick Brouillard at Berkmar High School in Lilburn, Georgia sends a message to her Language Arts students in the evening once or twice a week asking one or two reflection questions that they are meant to answer as a homework assignment for that day.
Mill Creek Foreign Language classes switch classrooms once per week to use language labs for listening and speaking practice. Whenever Jason Smith or Claire Wise, both of whom have language labs in their classrooms, need to switch with other teachers, they send reminder texts to each individual class period to reduce confusion and tardiness.
Courtney Alexander Lowe at Loganville High School in Loganville, Georgia will text interesting facts and news to her Chemistry students to make learning an often difficult field of science more interesting and relevant.
While she was recently ill, Gillian Bradley of Mill Creek High texted her students to let them know that although she was absent that day, they were still having their vocabulary quiz.
Some of the other ideas we’ve generated involve sending out parent-only reminders for major tests, texting shortened links (using bit.ly) to digital assignments or information, and even sending out a “vocabulary word of the day/week” that students can use on classwork for extra credit. The uses for educational text messaging are endless.

So, why use Remind101 when other SMS options are available? Remind101 was the only one with the easiest user interface as well as simple sign up instructions, e-mail option for those without mobile devices, unlimited texts, up to 10 groups, and amazing one-on-one assistance availability. This service was the best for teachers with extensive technological experience as well as teachers skeptical or unsure of using mobile technology in association with their classes.

Harnessing the power of mobile devices and Web 2.0 communication can connect teachers with students and parents more readily than email, static websites, and send-home paper notifications, and that connection makes your class more relevant and accessible to a generation of students attached to their cell phones and smart technology. Seeing as Remind101 makes text messaging so simple and secure, everyone should be utilizing this resource in their classes. Maybe one day we will see the end of frustrating communication failures and teachers will have one less thing to worry about during their busy days.

(Ironically, just as I finished writing this blog post, a student approached me and asked, “Mrs. Flippen, how do I sign up for that text message thingy?” Even teenagers who are initially unsure eventually see the usefulness of Remind101!)

Guest post by Craig Nobiling, how he uses mobile in the classroom

This is a guest post by Craig Nobiling, a high school social studies teacher from Chadron, Nebraska. You can reach him @Craignobiling or email craig.nobiling@chadronschools.net

What’s your background?

I teach upper-level (grades11 and 12) Social Science courses (Psychology, Sociology & US Government) at Chadron High School in Chadron, NE. Chadron is located in the extreme northwest corner of Nebraska; it is also the home of Chadron State College.

I’ve been in education for nearly 20 years and have seen MANY changes in curriculum and protocol as well as technological advances in this time. Most certainly so in the last 10 years, with the expansion of the internet, the introduction of social networking across the spectrum and their consequent integration into our classrooms.

Cellphones in the classroom. Toy…

Most traditional schools and experienced educators cringe at the thought of introducing a phone into the classroom. Cellphones are not highly regarded in the educational arena because they are seen as a “toy.” Texting and gaming are not part of the educational environment - at least until now. There are literally thousands of educational “games” that engage the new “screen-agers” of today. A visual and interaction-based generation has been born since the turn of the century. And as educators, we can either fight it or be willing to understand and utilize its ever-growing capabilities WITH the students. With those thoughts in mind, Brett Kopf and his team of creators of Remind101 have assisted educators in kindly reminding our cellphone-toting students (and their parents) to complete their work and study for upcoming exams.

What do you think of remind101?

I am currently underway in my second semester as a novice Remind101-user, and thus far I am extremely pleased with its ease of use and simplicity. What two better ways to entice tech-shy educators (with ease of use & simplicity?) coupled with the safety and security of keeping cell numbers private. It’s a teacher’s dream, of sorts, of making sure everyone (with a phone) gets equal notification of due dates, meetings, events, etc. So far every student in my classes has a cellphone with texting capabilities.

What messages do you send home?

I use it to send homework & exam reminders, as well as upcoming academic and school-wide events. The response so far has been very positive from the students, mainly because I set most of the texts to be sent immediately when school dismisses so they don’t forget to take their materials home. I particularly like the scheduling feature for this very fact - so the students can walk out of the building with all of their materials- and I don’t have to send that notification at the same moment.

…A pioneer?

Since I am the first teacher in our district to utilize mobile phones, it has been an experiment to say the least. I was encouraged by both our building and technology administrators to challenge both the students and my comfort zone in regards to the phones. I had to establish clear cut responsibilities and consequences for their use and misuse. So far - the only consequences I’ve had to administer is a friendly reminder to keep them out at the corner of their tables. That phone is as tempting to them as a King Size Snickers bar would be for me sitting out there!

Quick Google searches and fact clarifications have been used so far in the class as well as setting calendars and schedules for city/school board meetings, college representative visitations, ACT tests/deadlines, and the like. Since I have mainly junior and seniors it is truly like speaking to adults and treating them that way. I know there will be glitches, but as my Principal Jerry Mack has noted, “you will have failures, and glitches to work out, but I want to test the waters.” So far, so good…WE have learned together in this process - meaning the students and me. I have learned more from them regarding the different phones (iPhones vs Droid-based systems) and their app’s. I have benefited from their assistance as well, which makes it that much more rewarding in the end for both of us.

What do students say?

I want to expand my knowledge and minimize my fear by further integrating them into my subjects. This will just take time - and if they(my students) are patient with me it should benefit the classes as a whole. It is amazing how the students take even more ownership of the class by helping me - and I think they like the fact that these “tools” can FINALLY be used IN school - without fear of confiscation. Hopefully the “anti-cellphone directives” can be re-written with proper guidelines by our schools and students can responsibly use them in the classroom.

(We didn’t pay him to say this!)

I am excited and anticipate the Remind101 teams expansion of this program in the future. I have spoken directly with Brett and have expressed my successes and questions with the program and he listened genuinely. I wish other creators would “put themselves out there” when their product hits the market. Thank you Brett for a product that truly makes education easier for me AND my students.

If any teacher wants to get in touch with me my email address is below as well as the school’s phone number - who knows maybe we can talk as a “class” and I could let my class tell you how well it works!

Here is a sampling of the messages that I’ve sent home in the past few days:

Soc1a, Soc1b

1A&1B We’ll have a speaker in class Thur from CSC Admissions Office;assignment is still due(pg10 1&2)upon arrival 2 class;Handout due Friday

sent to 28 people 5 days ago

Soc1a, Soc1b

1A&1B Ques 1&2 pg 10 due Thur; GoogleDoc/Word or Email ONLY - NOT handwritten!

sent to 28 people 5 days ago

Soc1a, Soc1b

1A/1B Don’t forget your Study of Soc Handout is due 2morrow & it is “Habitude Friday”as well-all you need is a highlighter&pen/pencil

sent to 28 people 4 days ago

Soc1a, Gov2, Gov3, Soc1b

ALL CLASSES-don’t 4get the Financial Aid Mtg in the HS Auditorium Tonight@6:30pm-Xtra Credit for my classes-bring ur parent(s)&ur questions!

sent to 57 people 6 days ago

Teacher Spotlight: Darcy Esparza

Darcy Esparza teaches 7th grade math (regular and Pre-AP) at Vernon Middle School

How’d you hear about remind101?

I heard about remind101 from our school superintendant — he sent out a “mass” email to the entire district asking us to check it out. I signed up (along with others at our district) within 10 minutes of reading the email. So easy!!

How do you use remind101 in your class?

I use remind101 for parents and students. I send out reminders of tests/quizzes, ect.. I have also used it to remind them about dress up days for school spirit, ect. I have even used it to send “math facts” to students right before tests/quizzes. Parents REALLY love it.

What problem is remind101 solving for you as a teacher?

The problem remind101 is helping me with as a teacher is that I can send texts to students without getting “personal” with students. I also like how no one can text back and no one has my personal cell number.

Have you received any feedback from students/parents? If so how do they like it?

I get the most feedback from parents — they really like the reminders; face it, middle school students are not the best with responsibility.

Do you have any tips for teachers who may want to use remind101?

If you are thinking about using remind101 — its crazy easy. Sign up takes about 2 minutes and you can print off an PDF with instructions to send home or handout to parents. I notified my parents via an email list with it attached.

If you’d like to be featured on our blog, leave a comment or email contact@remind101.com!

Teacher Spotlight: Kimberley Lewis

Kimberley Lewis teaches Creative Writing, Journalism and Speech 9-12 at Rockwall-Heath High School

Why did you start using remind101?

I was trying to give my students another resource to help students get their work done on time and get messages to groups on campus that I sponsor.

How did you hear about remind101?

I wanted be able to get messages to students in classes and activities I sponsor without giving my personal cell phone number out. Having students as friends on my “teacher” facebook felt awkward, and not all students have facebook access. I had looked into getting a google number, and I was afraid that I would not keep up with it. I didn’t want it to be one more thing to do. Ann Knostman our Instructional Technology Specialist found Remind 101.com for me. It is perfect for sending messages safely.

How do you use remind101 in your class? i.e, reminders, updates, positive motivation…

So far, I have only used it for reminders & updates, but if I have room, I include supporting our teams that are playing that evening.

What problem is remind101 solving for you as a teacher?

I love the ability to set reminders ahead of time. I think it really helps the kids stay on track… especially when journalism has deadlines. I had some students tell me that they forgot about a test. That won’t happen when they are signed up for Remind101.com. It really helped the kids stay organized during homecoming week when the different groups had different places to be.

Have you received any feedback from students/parents? If so how do they like it? (The good and the bad)

I only signed up recently, so I haven’t gotten a lot of feedback yet, but when I rolled it out, one of my students said, “Can you please teach the other teacher how to use this?”

Do you have any tips for teachers who may want to use remind101? i.e, how to get started, how you shared the code with students…

95% of kids and parents use cell phones and email. My best advice is don’t wait to roll it out. I posted the pdf invite on my teacher website. I mass emailed parents, and I showed my students as a warm up one day. We are using a “Bring your own Technology” program at school where the students can use their devices appropriately. I gave them the opportunity to “Sign up now.” It will make communication with parents much easier when they know you care enough to set this up. You are showing you are doing everything you can to help your kids be successful.

Any feedback for remind101? What features/updates would you like to see, if any

I love it. Please don’t cap the number of people we can have in our lists. I would have liked to decide what each group texted to get on the list* @lewis made sense, but @chai would have made more sense to be @chain. I love it though. If that is the worst anyone can say, you know you have an amazing product.

If you are a teacher and want to be featured on our blog, leave a commnent or email contact@remind101.com

*You can choose your own code now!

Teacher Spotlight: Paul Goodenough

Paul Goodenough teaches 8th grade science at Jenks Middle School

How are teachers using remind101 and what do they think? Here’s an unedited Q & A with Paul, a middle school teacher from Tulsa, Oklahoma. If you’d like to be featured, email contact@remind101.com!

When did you start using remind101?

August 2011

How’d you hear about remind101?

Email

How do you use remind101 in your class?

On Sunday to let students and parents know what we’re doing that week. Project reminders. Hints to assignments. Updates to directions. Changes to website.

What problem is remind101 solving for you as a teacher?

Parents actually knowing what’s going on. Keeping students accountable of information.

Have you received any feedback from students/parents? If so how do they like it?

They love it. Would like an option to reply if they don’t understand the message. (I supply my Google Number) Maybe a shortcode they can reply with that notifies me of their question so I can contact them.

Do you have any tips for teachers who may want to use remind101?

Made business cards for open house and conferences for parents. Had students bring their phones to class so they could sign up. Added information to my website and posted it in my classroom.

Any feedback for remind101?

Mobile site would be nice. iPad or iPhone app. (working on it!)

Do you have a story to tell? Email contact@remind101.com.

Screencast Tutorial by Shawna O’Halloran

Shawna posted an excellent 5 minute screencast overview of how to use remind101, thanks @sohall!

View on screencast.com »

We’d love to see your screencasts, send them to contact@remind101.com so we can feature them!

Remind101 is live!

Yup. That’s right. We spoke with 200+ teachers over the past two months to hear feedback on what they really wanted.

This is what we learned teachers wanted from remind101:

Instantly send a text message to every student or parent
A safe way to communicate with students
Improve parental engagement

What is remind101?

Remind101 is a website that allows teachers safely text message or email students and parents from the comfort of their own computer.

Who should use remind101?

Teachers! K-12, higher ed, you name it! If you’d like an easy way to communicate with students or parents outside the class, this is it.

Why should I use remind101?

Good question. Remind101 was built to make teachers lives easier and increase engagement with students and parents. Some teachers use remind101 to send homework reminders, “All projects are due tomorrow at 12:00pm”; others for quick messages “Don’t forget your permission slips”.

You’ll find that remind101 is:

Fast- You can sign up and start sending messages instantly
Safe- No student ever sees your personal cell phone number and you never see theirs
Easy- Students or parents never have to visit our website, they sign up by text message or email

Remind101 provides an easy way for teachers to communicate with students outside the class and it’s free. Yup, free. You can learn more here if you’d like.

When can I use it?

Now is good.

Who uses remind101?

Hundreds of teachers are already using remind101 - 7th grade science teachers, university professors, you name it…but don’t just take our word for it:

“Honestly this is 400% improved. What a difference a few months and a million hours of work makes!” Sidneyeve Matrix, Media Professor at Queens University
“I used it from day one, and students who seemed like it was going to be “just another class” perked up right away” Bill Erlendson, High school biology teacher
“Saves me time, reams of paper and entire cartridges of ink”Jennie D, 7th grade science teacher (NYC)
“Love it! Easy. Quick. Unique way of communicating with parents/students especially at an elementary level” Michael Buist, 5th grade teacher, Chandler, AZ
“Even the best students can get distracted, remind101 is insurance against this kind of oversight” Dr. Kathryn Cook, Professor at Georgian College

Get started by signing up or learn more.

Teachers:

Remind101 was built 100% for you. If you have questions, comments or feedback please let us know. How you ask? Contact@remind101.com, Tweet us, comment on this post, like us on Facebook or use the chat feature on remind101!

Sincerely,

-The remind101 team (David & Brett)