PS130 Konstella usage policy:
What is Konstella?
Konstella is a private communications platform which allows schools to send and share digital information to parents and guardians. The system has many features that organizations can use to keep their communities connected and informed and to aid in expanding voluntarism. Parents may also use the system as an easier way to communicate quickly with other parents, to set up parent social groups for themselves, or to arrange playdates and adventures with other parents for their children.
Expectations:
Konstella at PS130 is used for top down communication, meaning that information is provided and comes directly from:
School Administration → PTA & Teachers → Class Parent Chairs → Class Parents.
This hierarchy is important and is put into place to ensure that the information parents and guardians receive is vetted, correct, and accountable. This model also provides a chain of escalation for both questions and concerns. All users of the system expect that information they receive is accurate, timely, and is provided to keep them abreast of current events inside of our school community. We strive on a whole to ensure this system is used for these purposes only and further to keep the system free of misinformation, bias, hate speech, gossip, or other inappropriate behaviors.
Your use of Konstella is governed by the following guidelines:
Please read this information carefully. Should you have any questions or concerns please reach out to the PS130 PTA or PS130 Class Parents.
Privacy
Konstella is a closed system, without an invitation no one can log on or get into our online school space. Although sign up process seems open, in the background all of the account requests were approved by the Konstella system administrator, the classroom teacher, or the class parent lead. While parents can invite other parents onto the system or into their class rooms, those requests still need to be and are approved. Items and information that are inside of the school community, particularly classrooms, should stay within the school community. Please do not share information from or about a teacher or parent on Konstella with outside parties unless that expectation is understood by all parties.
Active traffic
Please consider the amount of email and application traffic that this system can generate when informing your class, social group, or committee of an event, announcement, or update. The main school calendar has been pre-populated to send reminders for important dates such as school closings, events, and conferences. Items that you add to your classroom, social group, or committee are sent in addition to the school reminders which can create overload for some people which may cause them to ignore all of the notifications.
Things you can do to reduce traffic/notifications:
When setting up events or calendar dates there is a reminder feature that will send an email or notification for the event unless removed from the event set-up. Please consider if such a reminder is actually needed.
As you finish entering your event or calendar item use the Publish feature rather than the Publish and Notify Users Now feature. Publish will place the item on the classroom, social group, or committee calendar and show it on the main calendar for those in that group. Conversely selecting Publish and Notify Users Now will send an email in addition to placing it on your room calendar.
Some events and deadlines within social groups, committees, and classrooms do require the Publish and Notify Users Now option such an upcoming class trip, project reminders, items due, etc.
Classroom only: Try to keep classroom discussions to a minimum.
If a question/comment is to another parent, send a message to that parent directly rather than to the entire classroom unless it is information that everyone may need to know.
Types of Communication:
The good:
Information from a teacher or class parent
School committees discussions
Parent to parent communication
Social group communication
The bad:
Mass emails and messages across the school body
Political discussions in the open rooms or committees
Bullying a parent, the child of a parent, or a teacher
Solicitation.
Too much communication in the classroom space. Please keep parent to parent communication in the private message system or establish a social group.
Discussion/Messages
Social groups and committees are public, anyone who can see them on the listing can join that room. Private messages are private and users inside those spaces must invite other users into the space. No matter where you are, like any communication system, please be mindful of your comments and postings. Be sure that the person or group you intend to speak to is actually that person or that group. When in doubt, or if you need to broach a sensitive topic, use the private message system or send that person an email. Konstella is an administered system and items or comments may be removed along with the user.
Photographs
We would like to take this time to aware parents/guardians that the photo release form that is signed at the beginning of the year is specifically for the publication of photographs for Department of Education materials. The waiver and exclusion forms do not cover non DOE events or public spaces.
All PTA functions are considered public events and parents can assume that photographs taken at a PTA event may be included in PTA photos which are sometimes posted on www.ps130pta.org. These photographs are not used in promotional materials but are taken and used rather as a fun record of the day. Photographs taken by other parents and shared within the school community are outside of these guidelines.
If a parent has not consented to the sharing of their child’s photograph within the private class space they can request that the photo be removed from the class album if the photograph is not of a larger class event or was taken by another parent.
Expulsion: Should any user abuse the open nature of or cause interference with the system, or refuse to adhere to the guidelines given above, that user may be removed from the system.
