Abstract:

Today there is a widespread concern in almost all schools: WhatsApp groups of parents. The vast majority of parents is part of a group, and in many cases is due to the lack of effective communication by the centers.
Schools are still communicating mostly with last century tools: emails, intranets, or even paper. But parents want to receive information on their smartphone, and get notified when there’s something new about their kids. So that’s why they use a tool like WhatsApp: you get informed of everything in real time and straight to your smartphone.

The problem is that communication in these groups is not managed by the school, but are parents themselves who send messages. These groups are initially created to disclose relevant information about the school and children's activities at the slowness or lack of effective communication by the school. However these groups end up resulting in many cases in gossip and irrelevant information. Most of the parents are not interested in gossip at all, but they do not quit those groups because, inspite of all, it’s still the most efficient way to get informed.

The solution is to give the school a communication tool that allows the center to send messages directly to parent’s and student’s smartphone. Dinantia is a pioneer app focused in communication between schools and families. Its aim is to improve communication within educational organizations and facilitate communication between the school and families.

When parents get what they want, a communication channel with the school in their hand, WhatsApp groups fall completely into disuse.

Keywords:

whatsapp, communication, school, families, parents, students