An alert is not the same as an @mention. An alert means this may be something you should know about — it fires from a rule, usually to several people at once, and is dismissed once read. A mention means a colleague is asking you specifically — for what you saw, a follow-up, or a decision — and stays unread until opened.Worth making explicit when training staff, so alerts are not mistaken for tasks assigned to them, and mentions are not left sitting as background noise.
How alerts are generated
When an incident is created and matches a workflow’s trigger, an alert action:- Identifies the recipients — the automatic class and year group options, Staff Groups, and Individual Users on an Alert Users action, or all DSL-level staff on an Alert DSLs action
- Creates an alert for each recipient
- The alert appears immediately on the recipient’s dashboard
- An email notification is sent (subject to working schedules)
Configuring alert actions
The Alert Users action lets you choose exactly who is notified:- The student’s class staff — alert the staff for whichever class the student is in
- The student’s year group staff — alert the staff for whichever year group the student is in
- Staff Groups — alert everyone in one or more Staff Groups
- Individual Users — select individual staff members to alert
Staff whose only role is Reporter do not appear in the Individual Users picker. Reporters see only the incidents they recorded or were @mentioned in, so an alert about anything else would lead them to a record they cannot open. To bring a Reporter into a specific case, @mention them in it instead — see Roles and permissions.
Alerting a student’s own class or year group
Most schools want teachers to hear about incidents for their own class, and only a few people — such as a head of year — to see everything for a whole year group. Rather than building a separate workflow for every class, tick The student’s class staff on an Alert Users action. When an incident is logged, Signal looks at which class the student is in and alerts that class’s staff. One workflow covers every class in the school. The student’s year group staff works the same way at year group level.These options apply to student incidents only. Staff incidents have no student, so there is no class or year group to work out — the tick boxes are hidden on staff incident workflows.
How Signal finds the right staff
Signal matches the student’s class or year group to the Staff Group named after it:
The name must match exactly, with Staff on the end. If you connect your MIS, these groups are usually created for you. Otherwise you can create them yourself — see Staff Groups.
Family incidents also reach siblings’ staff
When an incident is marked as a family incident, these two options reach further. As well as the pupil’s own class and year staff, Signal alerts the class and year staff of every sibling at your school — because a concern about the household matters just as much to the staff looking after a brother or sister in another year group. This applies only to the two dynamic tick boxes. A workflow that alerts named individuals or specific Staff Groups is unaffected — those recipients are exactly who you chose. Student restrictions are still respected: a staff member restricted from a sibling is not alerted about them.Why this keeps working
Because Signal works out the recipients each time an incident is logged, you do not need to revisit the workflow when things change. Students moving between classes, new teachers joining, or staff changing class are all picked up automatically. The one thing to keep right is Staff Group membership. Groups synced from your MIS update themselves; groups you created manually need updating by hand when staff change.Setting up class and year group alerts quickly
Setting up alerts requires you to be a Deputy DSL or above.
The panel is never shown during a demo, because setting up class and year group alerts requires a subscription.
1
Check your class coverage
The wizard opens by telling you how many of your classes have a Staff Group — for example, “12 of 14 classes have a staff group”. Any classes without one are listed by name.If classes are missing, you can carry on and add their groups later, but no class staff will be alerted for those students in the meantime.
2
Choose who gets alerted
Pick the option that matches how your school works:
- Class staff only — staff hear about incidents for students in their own class, and nobody else’s.
- Class staff, plus chosen people per year group — class staff hear about their own class, and you choose who else sees everything for each year group.
- All year group staff — everyone in a year group’s staff is alerted about any incident for a student in that year.
3
Choose your year group people
If you picked the second option, you are shown each year group with a staff picker. Select the people who should see every incident in that year — typically the head of year.Leave a year group blank if nobody needs year-wide alerts. Class staff are still alerted for those students.
4
Set up alerts
Click Set up alerts. Signal creates the workflows and confirms how many were created.
Where alerts appear
Alerts appear in two places:- Dashboard — the My Alerts section on your dashboard shows all alerts you have received. Staff with the Owner, DSL, or Deputy DSL role also see a Staff Alerts section for alerts related to staff incidents.
- Email — if your school has email notifications enabled, you receive an email for each alert. Email delivery respects your working schedule, so you are not disturbed outside school hours.
Managing alerts
When you see an alert on your dashboard, you can:- View the incident — click on the alert to open the related incident and review the details.
- Dismiss — remove the alert from your dashboard once no further action is needed.