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CHAMBERLAIN, S.D. — St. Joseph’s Indian School recently implemented a policy and procedure management system called PolicyTech as part of continual efforts to provide the best possible service to the students and families it serves. The implementation is featured in a case study on the Navex Global website.
The immediate access to consistent policies and procedures afforded by the software means all staff have the information and tools needed to respond to circumstances that might arise while caring for students.
“Families who choose to send their children to St. Joseph’s Indian School appreciate the opportunities and better education that the school provides. However, it can be difficult to send their children into the care of others for some time,” said Jennifer Renner-Meyer, executive director of child services at the school. “PolicyTech reassures them that while their children are away from home, they will receive consistent care across campus: school, campus residence, health care, recreation, local community and on excursions away from campus.”
St. Joseph’s operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week during most months of the year, with students and staff onsite at all times. Because of that nature of the organization, quick access to policies and procedures is critical, especially in the case of health events.
Quick access is vital when staff members need to make decisions and act without hesitation.
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“We always have on-call people to come in at a moment’s notice. It has been phenomenal with PolicyTech to search for needed procedures on the phone. You don’t have to quickly run to your office to find a file to print, find a paper copy, or carry a binder when you’re on call. It’s just so much easier to access on your phone,” said Michelle Eggers, a data and program analyst with the school.
PolicyTech is also an integral part of the culture of ethics and transparency at St. Joseph’s, allowing them to consistently execute on its mission as an apostolate of the Congregation of the Priests of the Sacred Heart, to partner with Native American children and families to educate for life-mind, body, heart, and spirit.
The new system is currently being used by about half of the organization. Plans are to roll out the software out to all areas of the school in the coming months. With increased use and adoption, the goal is to continue streamlining communication regarding policies and ensuring that all staff can easily access information needed to pursue their mission.
According to the study, before implementing the new system, the school relied on personal drives, shared drives and binders containing various policies and procedures.
“We had instances of version control issues. For example, someone could email a policy as an attachment to a document, then everyone would save the same version to their own drive, or a shared folder and we would not know when it was updated last or who had the most current version,” Eggers wrote as part of the study.
Adhering to established policies and procedures is highly important in an environment such as St. Joseph’s Indian School.
“There are not many cookie-cutter options out there for policies and procedures. Even with help from HR and compliance, creating policies has been a challenge for us — but having software that helps us at least be congruent across all our departments has helped in creating templates,” Eggers said.
PolicyTech enables organizations to improve efficiency and provide employees with easy access to all necessary policies and procedures. Healthcare, financial, life sciences and industrial manufacturing organizations all use PolicyTech to run audit-ready reports easily, keep documents up-to-date, and manage risk across the organization.
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More than 220 Native American students in first through twelfth grade take part in the educational, counseling, and residential programs at St. Joseph’s Indian School. Strengthened by spirituality and culture, St. Joseph’s Indian School transforms lives — mind, body, heart and spirit — every day, according to a release from the school.
More information on the school can be found at www.sjiskids.org and www.stjo.org.
