Great communication is at the heart of any great school. What’s not so easy to grasp is identifying which communication channels to focus on, and when to use them to reach your audiences.

Improving your school communications while being realistic about your resources might be the greatest challenge facing you and just about every other school communicator.

In your school communications planning, you need to focus on using and embracing technology and using all the channels at your disposal. There are many free resources for educators that you can use.

There are five key areas that you need to focus:

• Website
  
• Social Media (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pintest, LInkedin)
  
• Text notifications
  
• Emails
  
• Video
  

Each channel is used differently and in some cases, at the same time. The goal here is to communicate continuously and while recognizing the purpose and limitations of each channel. When used properly, your parents, staff and students will appreciate it.

Types of school communications

How and when to share school information has changed in recent years. What hasn’t changed, are the kinds of information that need to be shared. Most of your school information you want to share falls into the following categories:

• Promotion of school happenings and news (e.g., achievements, events, etc.)

• Time-critical school information (e.g., school closings, policies, etc.)

• PTO events and other important issues

• Leadership and education improvement ideas (e.g., parent resources)

• School community outreach (including fundraising)

• Stories and imagery of the school’s impact on the community (cool human interest content, alumni, photos, videos)

Not all channels are meant for every kind of communication from your school. While a text message to a parent is helpful when there’s a one-hour weather delay, text messages about, say, the score of the Friday night football game, is hardly news that needs to be pushed via emergency notification.