On May 30, Dr. Jennifer Mezzina, NVRHS Director of Data, Compliance, and State Reporting, announced that a new Northern Valley Regional High School (NVRHS) app was available on the App Store for students to download. The app was created to ensure that students, staff, and families can be up to date with NVOT and improve the passage of important information.

For example, the app can send notifications that notify all the members of the school’s community about sudden changes in schedule, such as snow days, and even look at upcoming events in NVOT and other schools in the district.

According to Mezzina, the idea for the app emerged when she and her team were “looking for ways to communicate with Northern Valley families, students, and staff in a streamlined, clear way” as well as update NVOT’s website to make it “more user-friendly, organized, and accessible for families.” 

Dr. Marc Cicchino, NVRHS Director of Special Projects & Innovation, said prioritizing user-friendliness is important as it can provide for “people that might have often been unsure about where to look for information.” 

Mezzina said the update came in the form of an app “since so many of us use our mobile devices when we look up information.” 

The app will work hand-in-hand with a website that will be released at the end of June that will connect the app to the website and the school’s social media. This means that a single message can appear on the website, app, and social media at the same time.

To stay up to date, members of the NVOT community can look to the “calendar in the app” to see upcoming school events, which Mezzina said could make a positive impact on students. 

Additionally, Cicchino adds that the app provides “push notifications” which will be “helpful in keeping up-to-date with current events and time-sensitive information.”