Three ways you can help families complete complex tasks

I remember my first year working at a middle school in Brooklyn, and the shock as I watched my 8th grade students undergo the application process for high schools . If you work or live in an area where the days of easily moving from your neighborhood elementary school to neighborhood middle school to neighborhood high school are long gone, you might have an idea of the complexity of it all.

The whole process resembles college applications to an extent I would have never expected. In the beginning, I had trouble navigating the process, that I can only imagine the confusion of parents who are new to the country, going through this for the first time, or speak a language other than English.

A 2018 study measured the effectiveness of sending text messages to get high school students to complete their FAFSA forms. Did it work? The answer is more complex than a simple yes or no.

Getting information to your target groups, whether it’s students or families, is not just sending the information their way, making sure it arrives safely in their laps. It’s about how you message that information. Yes, texts and push notifications are great because everyone is looking at their phones almost constantly these days. You can be sure the message arrives to their back pocket, but how do you make sure they understand the message and they take action?

Messaging fosters action when:

1. It comes from someone you know
2. You can directly respond and ask clarifying questions
3. You receive individualized action steps in bite-size bits based on what you need to do right now, rather than a generalized and extensive list of to-do’s

“Information that provides individuals with highly personalized, actionable information about concrete steps they can take to advance through complicated processes may support people to persevere through these informational and behavioral bottlenecks.”