Alyssa Thornley

Alyssa Thornley has spent her career working to support schools and communities in providing opportunity to all students. In positions as a teacher, professional development coordinator, and as a volunteer, she has focused on the community’s role in education, and in designing efficient programs that work for diverse needs. Alyssa leads TransACT’s customer engagement and market strategy efforts, and works to ensure innovative programs, guidance, and thought leadership from across the country’s districts are being shared and spread.
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Recent Posts

Leading The Way In Modern Parent Engagement Software

By Alyssa Thornley | February 10, 2020

This blog was published in 2020 but was updated on May 25th, 2023.

Parent engagement software is modernizing how administrators manage school-to-home communications while remaining compliant with federal and civil rights laws.

Rather than developing required notifications and forms individually and translating each one every time, there is an amendment or update, administrators can use parent engagement software systems to send out translated notifications and comply with federal requirements and civil rights laws.

TransACT® ParentNotices is a software subscription to pre-translated federally required (or recommended) parent notifications and online collections of multi-language parent-school communications. ParentNotices is aligned with federal requirements, supports teachers in creating an inclusive communication strategy for all students, and keeps schools prepared in the event of a monitoring visit. 

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TransACT-RightLabs Sponsors National Philanthropy Day for 11th Year

By Alyssa Thornley | November 21, 2019

Continuing Our Tradition of Support as Official Partner of the Association of Fundraising Professionals Edmonton Chapter  

Edmonton, Canada – RightLabs (a TransACT Communications brand) the customer-friendly, easy-to-use event registration software is pleased to join the Association of Fundraising Professionals -Edmonton Chapter in celebrating National Philanthropy Day November 21, 2019.  

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Webinar: Changes to Requirements for Students in Foster Care under ESSA

By Alyssa Thornley | November 15, 2019

The reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) by the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) resulted in significant changes for requirements related to students in foster care in both the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act and Title I of the ESEA/ESSA.  

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4 Benefits of Compliance Software for School Districts

By Alyssa Thornley | November 14, 2019

In today’s progressively diverse districts, it is increasingly complicated for school systems to ensure compliance with the federal communication and language requirements for parent notices, school forms, campus-wide signs, and important school-to-home messaging. An education compliance solution such as TransACT Parent Notices provides school and district staff with instant access to compliant communications in priority languages to improve district communications, compliance, and parent and family engagement.

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Data-Driven School Improvement

By Alyssa Thornley | October 16, 2019

Making the Grade for Students Experiencing Homelessness

We all share the same mission, to provide the best services we can and help students succeed. It is easy to get swept away in the day-to-day of running a district, or Coordinating Title I, Title III, and McKinney-Vento programming or becoming caught up in an overwhelming amount of data without knowing where you can make a further positive impact. 

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TransACT Launches New Web Presence With RightLabs

By Alyssa Thornley | May 1, 2019

TransACT is proud to launch a new web presence, www.rightlabs.com.

ActivityRightInviteRight, and CampusRight recently joined our family so that we could expand our services to educators. 

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EL Advocacy Resources from the National Council of State Title III Directors

By Alyssa Thornley | March 6, 2019

The National Council of State Title III Directors (soon re-branding to the National Association of English Learner Program Administrators) held a council meeting and professional development conference in Coronado Springs, Florida on March 6, 2019. NCSTIIID's professional development purposes include ensuring that members are knowledgeable of effective administration of national and state programs for the education of EL students and ensuring that members are knowledgeable of the laws governing the administration of language development programs.

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RightLabs Partners with TransACT Communications to Offer Educators Better Options for Modern Parent Engagement

By Alyssa Thornley | February 14, 2019
TransACT Communications ( transact.com) has partnered with RightLabs, Inc ( www.rightlabs.com), a leader in K-12 and collegiate online form and fees software. RightLabs has over 10 years of experience in developing online registration and parent engagement forms that enable parents to manage their students’ activities and also support the district in compliance, reporting, and streamlining processes. Working together, TransACT and RightLabs are proud to offer educators of all levels a single platform to securely manage forms, fees, and engagement with simplicity.

“Joining teams with TransACT allows us to reach more schools in the United States and bring more form functionality to our Canadian customers. We are thrilled for the opportunities that this partnership has already provided for existing customers, and are looking forward to taking on more projects to increase our service offerings to help more organizations and communities.” - Dave Bodnarchuk, Founder and President, RightLabs, Inc

"We are excited to welcome RightLabs to the TransACT family, and to be able to partner in providing customers with the industry-leading solution automating workflow across departments to deliver mobile-centric notifications and fee payment functionality to parents. Dave and the RightLabs team have been providing outstanding software services to schools for over 10 years, and we found a strong alignment between our respective missions and customers to provide educators at all levels of the education system with cost-effective software that supports streamlined, compliant parent engagement and reduces bureaucratic burden on education agencies. In our work together, TransACT and RightLabs clients will see increased capabilities within their products and a continued focus on exceptional consultative support and service.” - Alex Jarzebowicz, President & CEO, TransACT Communications, LLC.

RightLabs is the creator of ActivityRight, the all-in-one platform for mobile-friendly, cashless and compliant parent engagement. Watch this short video to see how easy we have made activity communications, fees, and payments for parents, teachers and district administrators.  Read More

rSmart, Leader in Post-Secondary, Mobile-Friendly Campus Portal Integrations Partners with TransACT Communications to Increase Service Offerings for Educators

By Alyssa Thornley | December 20, 2018

TransACT Communications, LLC (transact.com) has acquired The rSmart Group, Inc.  (www.rsmart.com), a leader in higher education technology solutions. rSmart has over 19 years of experience in higher education and are leaders in SaaS delivery of campus engagement, verification, and service discovery tools that unify the user experience into a searchable, responsive, mobile-friendly platform. Working together, TransACT and rSmart are proud to offer a broader educational service portfolio that will now span K-12 institutions as well as colleges and universities.

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The Indiana Department of Education Collaborates with TransACT For ESSA Implementation Support

By Alyssa Thornley | November 16, 2018

To help with Parent and Family Engagement requirements under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) and to meet the Civil Rights obligations of schools in working with Limited English Proficient (LEP) families and English Learner (EL) students across the state of Indiana, leaders in the Indiana Department of Education are partnering with TransACT® Parent Notices. The new partnership, which started in June of 2018, provides all 467 local education agencies representing thousands of schools and teachers with unlimited access to expertly written parent notifications that meet legal requirements and guidance on required audiences, and recommended timelines.

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