The district will begin using the app SchoolConnect instead of Twitter beginning next school year.

 Canyon High School is currently using Twitter to inform students, faculty and the community about sports, general information and classwork. However, the school has just begun using SchoolConnect, an app provided by publishing company Jostens.

“We’re going to practice using it this semester,” principal Tim Gilliland said. “So many people are set up with Twitter that you hate to quit and stop it right in the middle of the year. We want people to be connected. ”

Anyone with a smartphone can download the free app. Also, the app can be accessed online from a computer.

“We were looking for something that would make it easier to access every campus because there are so many who have spouses or kids at other campuses,” Gilliland said. “Parents have kids at Canyon High School and Canyon Junior High or Westover Park and Randall. This would allow them to go to one app.”

The app contains different tabs with each school in the district, including the bus routes. Depending on the user’s settings, the app will send notifications about chosen clubs, sports, teachers and so on.

“The app is another way to effectively communicate to parents, community, students and staff,” April McDaniel, Coordinator of District Communications, said. “The app goes deeper than just general information. It communicates information about courses, clubs, athletics and groups.”

The app can send push notifications, emails and texts depending on the user’s specifications.

“SchoolConnect is specifically designed for the school environment,” computer science teacher Lance Culbert said. “It can provide shortcuts to school websites all in one place instead of following 700 different Twitter feeds.”

The administration will be able to control the app, which will help with year-to-year changes.

“When you have staffing changes, it’ll be easier to deal with that,” Culbert said. “The administration feels that it’ll be easier, rather than each teacher having control over a Twitter account, for that to stay in the SchoolConnect app. Also, with electronic communications, all will be in one place.”

The app not only connects users to school event, but it also has the local weather, gradebook, lunch menu and school calendar.

“We were wishing we could create an app,” Gilliland said. “That was going to cost some money and be pretty intensive. Now, we can run it kind of along with our site. It uses our site.”

Gilliland said that Culbert is currently helping the teachers learn how to run the app.

“The rest of our teachers are still in the learning process and are still trying to figure out how to make it all work,” Gilliland said. “We’re going to really push it through the summer. When you do your online registration, there’s probably going to be a lot of information.”

Gilliland said that he considers this to be the Wal-Mart of apps because it has everything in one spot.

“The only tough thing is that it took a long time to get everyone on Twitter and using Twitter,” Gilliland said. “It’s going to take a while for this to catch on for our Canyon I.S.D. community. If we just keep getting the word out, it’ll catch on.”