Chinese International School

Too Many Emails. Not Enough Clarity.

Sometimes, CIS parents were receiving up to sixteen emails a week. For those parents with multiple children at the school, Friday afternoons were especially busy, with as many as six different newsletters landing in inboxes. Some were lengthy, some were redundant, but they were all competing for attention at the end of a busy week. And it wasn’t just an issue about quantity…The content itself often felt cluttered and inconsistent.

There were primary newsletters, secondary updates, year-level bulletins, head of school messages, and division reminders—all sent individually. For families with children in multiple year levels, it added up fast.

Parents were tuning out. Key reminders about conferences were missed, and when that happened, the school had to scramble, sending additional emails to reinforce what was already shared, further flooding inboxes. It became a cycle: poor engagement led to more emails, which led to more frustration.

With clear feedback from parents and school leadership, CIS took a new approach to school communication, one that respected parents' time, reduced errors, and allowed the team to respond in real time.

Drawing on a long-standing collaboration with Liz Kingston, a consultant from Inner Works For Schools who has a deep understanding of Finalsite’s capabilities, they designed a new way of thinking about school-home communication and built a framework that addressed the identified issues from parents.

They took full advantage of Finalsite’s technology and developed a creative and thoughtful solution tailored to the school's unique needs.

What started as a response to parent frustration evolved into a transformation of how CIS communicates. With the new system fully in place, the difference is clear, not only in how the school communicates, but in how the community engages.

Stronger Engagement, Happier Parents

One of the most immediate outcomes was a shift in parent sentiment, and how families felt more in control and less overwhelmed. Messages were easier to read, easier to find, and sent at times that made sense for busy families. The confusion and complaints that once dominated inboxes and WhatsApp chats began to fade.

"The parent communications have improved so much this year," said one parent. "I love how effortlessly I can access information and love having the ability to add events to my calendar using the new mobile app," shared another family.

And with the new newsletter, families now have a space to simply enjoy what’s happening at school. “The kids actually love seeing themselves featured,” Cheryl said. That pride, and the visibility it creates, reinforces the school’s culture of belonging and involvement.

A System That Saves Time and Reduces Errors

Behind the scenes, the changes were just as impactful. What once took hours—compiling emails, formatting updates, triple-checking for errors—is now a faster, smoother process.

The team no longer has to write content in three different places. A single post can power the website, the email, and the app. And if a date does change or a detail needs to be corrected, it can be fixed in one place and updated everywhere. “We’ve saved so much time and significantly reduced mistakes,” Cheryl said. “And now with the mobile app, we can leverage the process for time-critical messages, so we're not panicking.”

Even better, staff across departments have embraced the shift. Initial concerns about “yet another new system” gave way to appreciation once people saw how easy the templates and folders made their work. Year-level teams now focus more on what’s happening in the classroom rather than formatting newsletters, and everyone appreciates the consistency and clarity that the new cadence provides.

Real-Time Emergency Response

During Hong Kong’s unpredictable weather season, CIS now operates with confidence. With pre-written messages, clear publishing workflows, and push notifications through the app, the school can alert families in less than a minute. No scrambling, no guessing. Two trained staff members handle morning alerts with ease, and the system is resilient enough to adapt if things change midday.

Parents no longer wait for a flurry of emails or rely on informal WhatsApp chains. They know where to look, and they trust what they find. That kind of operational reliability builds the trust found at the core of every strong school community.

While the results have been strong, the CIS team sees this as just a starting point. They’ve already updated the look and layout of the hub multiple times based on user feedback; they're exploring how to incorporate tags and dropdown filters to make the search experience even more user-friendly; and they’re keeping an eye on new features, like AI-powered search features that could further streamline how families find what they need.

They’ve also learned valuable lessons about change management: the importance of timing, the power of stakeholder buy-in, and the need to bring parent leaders into the conversation early.

As Cheryl put it, “It’s not about forcing a new system. Rather, it’s about making it easier for people to do what they already want to do.”