The Charms Advantage
The Freedom of the Internet As a web-based software,Charms gives you many advantages over conventional disk-based software. The most obvious is that you can access your data from any computer at any time anywhere you can connect to the internet. Upload an assignment from Starbucks. Listen to student auditions while waiting at the airport. Check your library at a state conference. With Charms your information is not locked on one computer on one desk. Parents can log on day or night to print a tour itinerary or to check what time a bus leaves. A booster parent at work can help enter your new uniforms or collect trip money while you spend quality time working with students. Read below to learn how you too can enjoy the advantages of using Charms.
Cost Effective Although your initial "buy-in" to Charms is $650, that covers everything for three years (except a barcode scanner if one is wanted). That averages to just over $200 per year, about the cost of one or two concert band pieces of music, one drill team costume, a few footballs. For that investment you automatically receive all the upgrades/enhancements/bug fixes for free, in real time, without having to download a patch, wait for a new CD, or install anything on your school computer. You don't have to spend your time programming a database, and you don't have to worry about obsolete software that doesn't work on your new laptop two or three years from now. Hard drives often crash at the worst time, and Charms saves you the grief and expense of building a new computer and restoring precious information.
Multiple User Access Whether you use Windows, Mac, or both, Charms will work. In fact, many teacher offices have two or three computers - each person can be working on a different function of Charms at the same time! One person can be checking off who turned in the permission slip, another can be building a seating chart, and a third can be checking in uniforms. All this happens while your treasurer is entering trip money at home, and your librarian is entering your new music. You can't do that huddled around one computer on your desk. One program with multiple access points!
More time to Teach Your expertise is in teaching, coaching, and working with young people. Why should you spend nearly half your day doing nonsense paper and clerical work. With Charms, you can create as many "helper" logins as you want to leverage the energies and support of your parents and student aides. Even one parent volunteering to maintain the online calendar saves yourself hours of work - hours that can make the difference in helping your students make Region or State. Spend your time doing what's important to you.
Superior and Effective Parent Communication No other software exists today that can provide the level of parent communication that Charms provides. News bulletins are available the minute parents login. Every parent or student in your band, orchestra, choir, swim team, drill team, or theater team can access the calendar, print handouts, check on finances, pay for fees and trips online, maintain practice logs, record auditions and tests, and if you allow it, maintain their own name, address, phone, email address etc. Parents can see what inventory is checked out to their child, how many absences they have, check grades, as well as what uniforms are still outstanding, what music needs to be checked in and whether that permission slip, health form, or handbook acknowledgement actually made it back to the office. Every time a parent checks the website instead of calling gives you more time to make music, direct the play, choreograph the new routine, or coach for the finals.
Leave the Tech Work to the Geeks Maintaining and writing a database is difficult. For less than the cost of one decent band instrument, one musical royalty, one costume, or two sets of shoulder pads you could avoid having to print all new calendars if a date changes. You don't have to design new spreadsheets for every fundraiser. You don't have to figure out how to network your files. You, your assistants, and booster parents can work simultaneously at different desks, in different buildings, in different cities, and you are free from having to worry about backups and computer crashes. Sad to say, but a lot of our business comes from directors right after their computer crashes and their library, inventory, uniform assignments and financial records are lost forever.
Too good to be true? We're not perfect. Our software has bugs we haven't found yet. We make mistakes. But when a bug is found, or a mistake is made our TOP priority is to get you back up and running. Our policy on bugs and errors is simple - DEAF! Drop Everything And Fix. We can often fix an error while you are chatting with us on our live tech support line. When our work is finished, you are back to work instantly, without waiting for a repair patch or a disk in the mail.
Experience the Charms Advantage I'd like to personally invite you to take a look at Charms for free. We offer a truly free 60 day trial. Two months to use it, test it, show it to parents, and get feedback. If you like it, great, we'll send you a bill. If you don't like it, that's fine too, it will just expire. There is no "must cancel" clause. You either like it or you don't. Just click FREE TRIAL and we'll have you set up with your own Charms account. Experience the Charms Advantage and see why Charms is the #1 Office Assistant software available today.