Ravenscroft School is a Pre-K through 12th grade independent school in Raleigh, North Carolina. They’ve been using the Veracross student information system (SIS) since 2008. Over the last fifteen years, they’ve expanded their use of the SIS to include all modules and the Veracross API to integrate with critical third-party applications. Read this case study to learn how Ravenscroft has benefitted from a single-record database across admission, academics, and communications.
Streamlining the Admission Process
As any K-12 employee knows, admission is a critical function of the school that involves many moving parts. Ravenscroft relies on Veracross to streamline their admission process on both the front and back ends.
When a prospective student or parent is interested in learning more about Ravenscroft, one of the first things they do is complete an inquiry form. Because Ravenscroft uses Veracross as their source of truth, they can easily identify if the prospect already exists in their database as a duplicate record. This information is invaluable for the admission team as it allows them to curate their outreach strategy based on the prospect’s unique relationship with the school. For example, a local applicant referred to Ravenscroft by a parent of a current student may be best served by different communications than someone who is relocating from another state and has only recently learned about the school.
After the initial inquiry, Ravenscroft directs prospects to a Veracross Admissions Portal that houses all pertinent information like the application, faculty and staff highlights, school FAQs, and more. This helps build transparency throughout the admission process for both the applicant family and the school.
On the back end, the school conducts candidate evaluation and application review within Veracross, a solution that Louis Tullo, Chief Technology Officer, calls “a huge value-add.”
Having been a reader at a previous school that used a third-party admission system that did not talk to our student information system, I can definitely say that our experience is a lot better, having that process happen in one place! Having that funneled into your SIS is a huge value-add in terms of user training and the kind of reporting you can do.
Empowering the Canvas LMS
When it comes to academics, Ravenscroft uses the Veracross API to integrate their SIS with their learning management system (LMS), Canvas. The integration is automated to sync each evening. Any changes within Veracross like course schedules, parent email addresses, or student enrollment are reflected and accounted for in Canvas. This integration is essential for the school; it allows student learning to happen in Canvas, grades and report cards to happen in Veracross, and trustworthy, reliable data to live in both platforms.
Veracross is our system of record for everything. Even though a lot of learning is happening in our LMS, grades and report cards all happen within Veracross.
Strengthening Communications
Veracross’ built-in email and SMS tools have helped Ravenscroft improve their school communications. With Composer, faculty and staff can easily send school-branded newsletters and major email communications using drag-and-drop functionality and automated distribution lists. In terms of workflow, the functionality of Composer has allowed the Marketing and Communications teams to collaborate with other content contributors and key spokespeople across campus by allowing them access to create drafts of messages using templates they’ve developed. For example, Class Deans draft newsletters using templates that are reviewed by the Marketing and Communications team for style and can schedule them strategically to minimize overlapping communications to families.
These send lists are also helpful for Ravenscroft associates, like grade-level parent assistants, who have limited access to Veracross. With the distribution list, they can send emails outside of the SIS while still trusting the accuracy of each email address. Teachers benefit, too. They can pull a class-specific distribution list and communicate with every child in their class — and, if a child drops the class or there is a schedule change, the list is automatically updated.
Improving Data Management
Having one platform that informs all school activity has been a gamechanger for the school and has enabled Ravenscroft to unify campus workflows and relationships. Tullo credits this to data management.
[With other systems] you end up spending a lot of time passing data back and forth between different places. With Veracross, you spend much of your time thinking about the quality of data and reporting — which is a welcome change… You can focus more on having the data in your system look good and transition to robust reporting, which you can’t really do if you’re spending all of your time pulling data from one place and not getting a sense for its accuracy.
By leveraging the power of Veracross from a prospect’s initial inquiry through matriculation and beyond, Ravenscroft School has reaped the benefits of a comprehensive SIS that can support all areas of their school community. To learn more about how Ravenscroft uses the Veracross SIS, watch our on-demand webinar.
