Glitches Appear After Upgrade
FlashAlert, the longstanding notification system, has undergone some changes that have affected some member emails.
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What is FlashAlert?
MSD mostly uses FlashAlert to notify the broadcast media of school closures or delays. FlashAlert cannot be efficiently used to send out custom messages, so the district only uses FlashAlert for notifications of snow routes when *all* buses that use snow routes are included.
Families can sign up for direct notification from FlashAlert by creating an account on their website.
Snow route notifications, as well as closure and delays, are also sent via ParentSquare, posted on district/school websites, and shared on social media.
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Why use FlashAlert?
MSD does not send notifications to families before 6 a.m. A notification is sent via FlashAlert as soon as a decision is made to close, delay or use all snow routes. If you need to know before 6 a.m., using FlashAlert could be helpful. (Note: the decision to close or delay considers the forecast and current conditions, so those decisions are not always made before 6 a.m.)
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Sign Up for FlashAlert
To receive FlashAlert notifications, click here and choose “create new account” under the red login button. Select “Portland-Vanc-Salem” as your region then scroll down to “Yamhill Co. Schools” and select McMinnville and enter your email. You can also download the free app in the Apple App Store for your iPhone or Google Play for an Android.
Note: The FlashAlert team is also diagnosing a known bug affecting Microsoft Edge users. A conflict between the FlashAlert system and some users of Microsoft Edge has been causing password resets, account lockouts and account region changes. They advise Windows users to switch to an alternative free browser like Google’s Chrome or Mozilla’s Firefox to access FlashAlert until they are able to identify and resolve this issue.