Case Study: Ballyclare High School achieves rapid, reliable emergency communication during storm closure with Textlocal

Streamlining emergency weather updates and school closure alerts with SMS

Ballyclare High School, one of the largest grammar schools in County Antrim with over 1,200 pupils, faced an urgent communications challenge when the Department of Education announced school closures due to the storms from Hurricane Ophelia late on a Sunday. The school needed a fast, simple way to notify parents and staff before the Monday morning start, so they turned to Textlocal’s SMS messaging platform (integrated via the SIMS MIS system).

Textlocal responded quickly—an account manager arranged the necessary credits and the school used the SIMS integration to send mass texts to parents and staff before Monday. The solution worked effectively: out of more than 1,500 parents only two rang into the school the following morning, demonstrating that Textlocal’s service delivered rapid, reliable communication with minimal issues.

Ballyclare High School

Mark Farley

IT Teacher