Using the news centre


From the news centre you can send whole-school communications such as newsletters via email. You can also publish news to your School-links portal and Beep newsfeed.


Please note that items broadcast from the news centre are sent to all email addresses in the database: staff, students, caregivers and associates. To send a message to a select group please use the messaging tool.


To create a broadcast you will need:


  • A  School-links master or admin user account for your school

  • Up-to-date data imported to  School-links via CSV or API file. 


If your school uses the Edge management system data is automatically updated regularly, if not updates must be done manually. For help importing files contact the School-links helpdesk.

Creating your message


  1. Login to school-links using your master or admin user account and password
  2. Click 'news' in the menu bar.
  3. Click 'Create News item'
  4. Enter the title and body of the email into the fields provided to create your email. News items can be written and formatted using the new centre word processing tool, or sent as an attachment along with a short message.
  5. To add an attachment, click 'browse' and select your desired file. 
  6. Click 'Save as Draft.' Your draft will appear as the top item in the listed news.

Tips:

  • Only one file can be attached to a broadcasted message. Write your news as a single item (digest). or create multiple shorter messages, e.g. sports news, cultural news, important dates/events.
  • Attached files should be in a readable format e.g. PDF, and must not exceed 128MB.
  • Avoid copying and pasting from Word as formatting codes in Word documents sometimes conflict with HTML code


Previewing your message


Preview your message by sending a single test email to any email address. To do this:


  1. Click 'send email'
  2. Enter an email address on the screen as shown.
  3. Edit your message if desired by returning to the news centre and clicking 'edit'.

Tip:

  • Changes to formatting or content will only be visible through the master or admin account unless republished and broadcast after editing. 


Broadcasting 


To email your news to the whole school community:


  1. Click 'send email'
  2. Click  'Yes, broadcast news' as shown below.

Tip:

  • Broadcasts are sent to all email addresses in your school's database. If your students have email addresses in your school's database and you wish to broadcast to parents and caregivers only, contact helpdesk to discuss removing student emails from the database.


Publishing and editing


Click 'publish' next to a news item to add it to your school links homepage and beep newsfeed.

 

Clicking 'unpublish' takes the news item offline; it will however remain in the news centre available to republish or edit unless deleted. 

Published news items can be edited by unpublishing, making any changes, and republishing.


Tip:

  • Edited and republished items are NOT automically broadcast again, but must be re-sent manually.


Deleting news items


To delete news items permanently, click 'delete' next to the item in question.