HENRICO COUNTY, Va. (WRIC) — Henrico County Public Schools announced Tuesday that the school district will use a new app and website called “Anonymous Alerts” in an attempt to improve communication with school administrators and give students a way to share safety concerns.
“The system provides a new way to voice safety concerns – from threats and bullying to worries about classmates who may be depressed,” a release from Henrico County Public Schools stated. “The free tool establishes encrypted, anonymous two-way communication between those submitting reports and administrators, and allows those using the system to include photos, screenshots and videos with their reports.”
The school system hopes the system will give students, parents, guardians and others a better method to communicate about concerns they may have.
“Sometimes you won’t say something to somebody cause your friends will make fun of you for it but if it’s anonymous they’d never know,” 7th grader at Short Pump Middle School Landon Nelson said.
“Using the system, school administrators will not only be able to engage in anonymous two-way communication with those submitting reports, they can get incident reports in real time and analyze trends,” a release from Henrico County Public Schools stated.
A mother of two sons who attend HCPS told 8News she worries that anonymous postings could be used the wrong way by students.
“The new system has the potential to be a great thing, they’re just going to have to be really careful with false reports and the system being used to bully someone rather than report a bully,” Gina Chapman said.
However, students think it will be beneficial.
“You could say like hey I saw this, this might be happening, you know, we could figure some stuff out,” Nelson said. “See what’s going on in our school system and help it grow and develop as a school system and as a whole.”
App users can select from multiple languages and for those who don’t wish to download the app can use the website. The link to the site can also be found on each school’s webpage.
The code to log into the system once you download it is, ‘Henrico.’
