SUCCESS STORY SUMMARY
Challenge:
Fort Wayne Community Schools (IN) needed to compete for students in a saturated education market while improving engagement and response times.
Solution:
The district implemented K12 Insight’s Let’s Talk unified service desk and Let’s Talk Assistant, the AI-powered chatbot, to streamline communications, automate FAQs, and deliver fast, friendly service.
Results:
The platform helped boost satisfaction, saved time for staff, and contributed to steady enrollment through a superior customer experience.
Located in northeast Indiana, Fort Wayne Community Schools serves nearly 30,000 students and 4,000 staff. The district operates in one of the most competitive education markets in the country, where public schools must deliver exceptional service to maintain enrollment.
“With the highly competitive market in Indiana, we need to provide excellent customer service and be responsive to parents, otherwise families will walk away,” said Krista Stockman, director of communication and marketing at Fort Wayne Community Schools.
Indiana’s landscape of charter, voucher, virtual, and private schools makes student retention an ongoing challenge.
“If competition hasn’t come to your state yet, it will sooner or later,” Stockman said.
Stockman recognized that customer experience could be a differentiator — one that sets public schools apart from private alternatives.
“In the past, private schools have had an edge on public schools with the way they relate to their parents,” Stockman said.
Stockman knew the experience her district offered could be the factor that encouraged stakeholders to stay.
To address these challenges, Fort Wayne Community Schools launched Let’s Talk in 2014 to serve as a centralized hub for community inquiries and stakeholder engagement.
“Let’s Talk allows parents to reach out at any time that’s convenient for them, which has helped us build strong relationships with our families,” Stockman said. The platform replaced the district’s original website contact page and helped unify all inbound communications, preventing lost emails and voicemails and ensuring questions reached the right people.
In 2020, the district launched Let’s Talk Assistant, a 24/7 AI-powered chatbot branded as Charley the Chatbot. In April 2023, Fort Wayne became one of the first adopters of the newest AI-powered version of the Assistant.
“Let’s Talk Assistant has streamlined our district’s operations and customer experience by automating routine tasks and allowing us to deliver fast, accurate, and friendly AI-powered customer service to all families — which helps us stay competitive in today’s K-12 market,” Stockman said.
Let’s Talk has become a powerful tool for Fort Wayne Community Schools, driving measurable gains in efficiency, responsiveness, and community satisfaction. During the 2021–2022 school year, the Let’s Talk Assistant answered over 1,600 questions, delivering an average customer experience score of 9.5 out of 10. In the same period, more than 4,300 dialogues were submitted through Let’s Talk, with an average response time of just 1.7 days and an 8.4 out of 10 customer experience score.
“We are finding AI to be an important tool in creating efficiencies and saving time for staff and administrators. School districts looking to improve their online customer service experience should consider adding the Let’s Talk Assistant,” Stockman said.
The Let’s Talk platform also helped consolidate and resolve repeated inquiries, creating efficiencies across departments.
“If we receive 20 inquiries from the same community member, I can combine all of the messages into one thread and resolve the inquiries with one message, rather than sending 20 individual messages,” Stockman said.
Let’s Talk has also had a measurable impact on engagement and trust within the community.
“It’s not uncommon to see parents suggesting Let’s Talk to other parents on Facebook to get answers addressed quickly,” Stockman said. “We hear a lot of positive feedback from our parents.”
Stockman credits the platform with helping Fort Wayne Community Schools maintain steady enrollment and foster stronger family relationships.
“There’s no dollar amount on what engagement from families really means,” Stockman said. “Let’s Talk and Let’s Talk Assistant have been powerful tools to facilitate meaningful conversations with our community.”
“I don’t know how we would live without it,” Stockman said. “Let’s Talk helps us save time, improve engagement, and satisfy our community members.”
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