How SchoolVillage works for guardians

SchoolVillage is organised around your child's classroom or activity group, not a school-wide group chat. Each one is private to the guardians in it and is joined by invite code. Inside, you'll find a noticeboard (public to the group), a guardian directory, parties and the shared calendar.

There are no private messages on SchoolVillage. Everything posted in a classroom is visible to every member of that classroom. If you want to reach a particular guardian, @mention their name on the noticeboard.

As well as school classrooms, SchoolVillage brings together every other part of your child's week — dance schools, scout troops, sports clubs, drama groups and more. Each activity is its own private group, joined by invite code, with the same privacy and safety rules as a classroom.

Leaders register their organisation and are verified by us, then invite guardians to join with a code. Notices, the shared calendar and the directory sit alongside your school classrooms in one place — a single calm view of your child's whole week instead of a dozen separate chats.

Any guardian can create a classroom for their child's school (creating new classrooms is a Premium Guardian feature, £2.99/month):

1. Choose Create a classroom during onboarding (or from the Classroom page).
2. Search the UK schools database for your school.
3. Give the classroom a name, e.g. "Reception" or "Year 1 Mrs Smith".
4. A secure 6-digit invite code is generated — share it with other guardians to let them join.

When you type a classroom name, SchoolVillage checks for an existing classroom with the same name at that school (it recognises "Year 1", "Year One" and "Yr 1" as the same). If one already exists, you'll be offered a choice:

• Join the existing classroom — so all the guardians for that class are in one place.
• Create for a different intake — for example when this year's "Year 1" already has a classroom but you want one for next September's new class. SchoolVillage will suggest a name like "Year 1 2026 intake" so the two never get confused.

This keeps one cohort together instead of fragmenting guardians across duplicate classrooms.

Every classroom has its own invite code, shown on the Classroom page. You can share it three ways:

• Code — read out or text the 6-digit code. The other guardian enters it when they join.
• Link — a shareable link that pre-fills the code automatically when opened.
• QR code — another guardian scans it to open the join link directly.

Only share invite codes with guardians who genuinely belong to that classroom. Codes keep classrooms private and strangers out.

Every join is announced: when a guardian joins, a System Alert is posted to the noticeboard and existing members are notified, so a newcomer can never slip in unnoticed. Until an existing member taps Welcome next to the new arrival in the directory, the newcomer's details stay hidden and they can't post or reply — so a leaked code can't expose a classroom before the community has a chance to act. If a code ever leaks, any Premium Guardian in the classroom can tap Reset Invite Code to invalidate it instantly and issue a fresh one.

Group chats fragment quickly — the same class ends up in three WhatsApp groups and half the guardians miss half the information. One classroom per cohort, joined by code, keeps everyone together. Public, classroom-wide posting (instead of private DMs) means nothing is hidden from the community and there is nowhere for unkind or unsafe behaviour to take root unseen.

Children are represented by an alias only — first name and last initial — so coordinating school life never builds a profile that could identify a child.

If a guardian should no longer be in a classroom — for example their child has left, or their behaviour is inappropriate — any member can request their removal from the Directory. The request, with a short reason, goes to our admins for review.

For everyday content concerns, you don't need an admin: flag a post from the post itself, and if a second guardian confirms the concern the post is removed automatically (see our Acceptable Use policy).

Children move up a year every September, so in July SchoolVillage prompts guardians to rename their classroom (for example "Reception" becomes "Year 1").

A rename needs two guardians to agree: one guardian proposes the new name, a second guardian confirms it, and the classroom is renamed for everyone. This stops a single guardian changing the name for the whole class by accident.

If your school has been claimed by verified staff, the school's staff (or an admin) can also use Roll over classroom on the Classroom page to advance the whole class in one step — updating the name and issuing a fresh invite code for the new year, while keeping everyone's history and members.