In a survey by the District Administration at the start of the 2023-2024 school year, 45% of schools surveyed reported insufficient staff as an ongoing issue. As districts grapple with the downstream effects of limited resources, it becomes even more important for schools to find technology partners that can create efficiencies and help them overcome operational challenges.

Connect 2023 is almost here! Join us in Nashville March 21-22 or virtually March 27-30 for our largest training conference of the year. This is your chance to learn more about your Heartland products, connect with peers, meet with product experts, and so much more. Here are a few things to look forward to:

As districts start planning for the return of students in the new school year, ensuring the health and safety of staff and students is more important than ever. This new mindset requires schools to rethink some of their policies and procedures, in particular, the way they collect and manage school payments. 

Contactless payments can play an essential role in helping to limit in-person interactions and reducing physical cash handling. Many schools have already adopted an online payment solution that gives parents a convenient way to pay online, while giving staff an easy way to manage those payments.

Here are four key areas where schools can reduce cash handling:

Over the last 23 years, Greenville County Schools in South Carolina has hosted their annual Greenville County Schools (GCS) Scholarship Tournament. The event brings in hundreds of participants to raise scholarship money for high school seniors. Since its inception, the tournament has raised over $550,000 in scholarship funds to help over 4,000 graduating seniors. In the last few years the tournament has partnered with MySchoolBucks to help collect registrations and payments online.  

Parent organizations are committed to fostering positive change and improvements in their school communities, and MySchoolBucks wants to help! In an effort to support opportunities for growth and enrichment, MySchoolBucks is excited to partner with parent organizations this school year with the first-ever Reach2Win Challenge.

School technology continues to evolve to support the operational needs of K12. Student Information Systems (SIS) have revolutionized how school administrators, teachers and parents maintain and access student records. Data such as demographics, student enrollment, class schedules, and grades are electronically and securely managed within a student information database. Now that most - if not all K12 districts use a SIS, other school systems have built integrations to streamline these processes even further. Here are 5 key platforms to consider integrating with your SIS: 

Every year the Advanced Placement Program (AP) grants millions of eligible high school students the opportunity to participate in advanced courses and earn college credit. AP Coordinators who manage and teach AP Courses have several tasks throughout the year to ensure students are prepared to take the AP Exams in May. Part of this process includes collecting student fees and ordering AP Exams through the College Board.

For the past two years, MySchoolBucks and Heartland School Solutions has provided Growth Grants to school nutrition programs across the country. To date, we have awarded over $100,000 to districts who use MySchoolBucks and helped over 130 food service departments promote their nutrition programs in fun and creative ways, using funds they might not otherwise have access to. In addition to offering our food service Growth Grant program for the 2019-20 school year, we are excited to offer for the first time Growth Grants for before & aftercare programs! 

Every year we offer free MySchoolBucks materials so districts can share the benefits of online payments with parents. To make sure we're providing the best marketing resources to districts, we surveyed over 90,000 parents to learn more about how they receive school communications and used this information to grow our offerings!  
 

School cafeterias serve millions of meals to students each day. And as the end of the school year approaches, so does the uneasy task of collecting unpaid student meal balances.