When Lynn Dambruch became Superintendent of Warwick Schools last summer, she said one of her goals is to improve the district’s website. 

“Our website is extremely difficult to navigate and to find information,” said Dambruch. 

It's what led the School Committee to approve a contract to build a new district website. 

“That's the key place where parents and students and the community members look for information about what is going on in the district,” said Dambruch. 

Dambruch said she went to Director of Technology Jeff Taylor in the fall and said they had to get it done this year. 

Taylor, a former teacher and then Principal at Gorton Junior High School, said he understands the importance of good communication. 

“Parent community communication is paramount,” said Taylor.

He said the website is “clunky at best.”

“We know that we needed to make a move in this direction,” he said. 

As part of the process of deciding on what direction to go, Taylor said a team reviewed and assessed five different solutions including web design companies, as well as companies that specialize in K-12 communication solutions. 

From there they narrowed the search down to two companies and had a search team consisting of stakeholders from a number of different departments along with building leaders. 

“After the presentation, it was with unanimous agreement that the team felt confident that the Apptegy Program would be a much needed solution for our District, with positive impacts for all stakeholders,” Taylor said. 

Taylor said that the Apptegy works with 2,500 school districts across the country including some in Rhode Island. 

One of the issues the district has now, Taylor said, is that their website and their software Blackboard, which is a communication tool for parents to receive messages from the District, aren't connected.

With the new company Taylor said their communications software will be integrated, which will allow communications to be posted on different platforms at one time including social media, texting and phone calls. 

The company will also be develop an app for the district.

Taylor said that the first three years of the contract is budgeted through ESSER III funds, which are part of the American Rescue Plan. The first three years of the contract will include the one time cost for the app, which is a total of $19,500. 

Taylor said after three years the cost would be $32,200 a year. Since they wouldn’t be renewing their subscription with blackboard and other web services it means that it will be budget neutral going forward, Taylor said. 

Vice Chair David Testa said that he is supportive of it. 

“I really like the idea of being able to do one action and then it spreads out across a number of platforms,” said Testa. 

Testa said presently they aren’t meeting parents where they are when it comes to communications. 

“I’m grateful for this. I look forward to its implementation,” said Testa.