As summer winds down, children, teachers and administrators are heading back into the classroom, ready for a successful year of learning and growing together. To help districts, schools and networks ensure their students and communities have a successful year, we’ve outlined a few helpful communications tips below.
Connect With Local Media
A great way to drum up interest and excitement for the coming school year is to reach out to local media outlets and invite them to your back to school/first day of school events. Media coverage is a great way to alert the community about the positive events and experiences happening at your school. Having a point of contact person to set up coverage will be important as news editors and education reporters will likely need a guide to help them provide the best coverage possible.
Get Students And Their Parents Involved
Using all internal and external communications outlets to reach parents and families to ensure their students are present on day one, and bring their students to your back to school and first day events, is the best way to spark interest and excitement in the kids as they get ready for another year of learning.
Additionally, consider providing your students with a special sign or print out that can hold in their first day of school photos. This is a great way to build brand awareness, family connection, and to flood your social media channels with super sweet (and joyful) first day of school photos of students.
Leverage the Power of Social Media
Another great way to engage students and parents is using your social media channels to post important information and fun posts, such as:
- Sharing tips for the new school year,
- Showcasing new and renovated areas of the school,
- Highlighting a back to school calendar of events,
- Sharing a throwback photo of when the school first opened,
- Announcing new school programs and extracurricular activities, and
- Building excitement around the new school year with highlights from the previous school year’s events.
Pump Up Your Staff And Administrators
One way to ensure that your students and their parents are excited about the coming school year is to have your teachers, paraprofessionals, administrators and more excited about school as well. Meet with them and assure them that they have your support and can turn to you for help when needed. From professional development, to exciting welcome back celebrations, it’s important to provide staff with the resources, tools, and culture they need to succeed. Additionally, be sure to plan internal communications you can send and share to build excitement among staff as the first day of school approaches. Teachers now more than ever need a strong support system in place and if that is taken care of, they can be excited about shaping the young minds of tomorrow.
Back To School Open Houses are key
While in person meeting is still risky due to ongoing and probable pandemics, there’s nothing like face to face interaction with parents and students to set the tone for the coming school year. To make your Open Houses an exciting and interesting experience, promote, promote, promote. Use your internal communication systems to alert parents and students of the event and if possible, create competition between teachers to see who can get the most parents and students to attend.
If your team needs a Strategic Communications partner to help you meet your school goals, send us a message and we’ll reach out to set up a discovery call.