Schools have long talked about how best to connect with parents. Do you send them text messages, send a notice home with the students, put it in your school blog, website or newsletter, use robocalls (heaven forbid) or shout it from the school’s roof top?
A nephew of mine who is a middle-school Principal told me a story about a communications problem he had. The district decided to start the school day an hour later in the coming school year. Starting 6 mon
ths before, they began announcing it to the parents and students. They used every form of communications they could think of. But, sure enough, on the first day of school about 20% of the kids showed up at the wrong time. Confused kids, angry parents, frustrated administration.
You might never achieve total communications with parents and your students, after all they are busy people just like you. But here are 4 suggestions to consider for connecting with Colorado school parents.
- Pull Don’t Push: Communications starts with engagement. Rather than focusing on only “pushing information” out to parents, create ways to get parents involved so that they want to seek information. (Pull the information from you).
- Need to Know Versus Want to Know: Schools spend a lot of energy sending out information that is interesting (maybe) but not very important. When you do too much of this you can bury the important information in the noise of “too much information”.
- It’s About Them Not You: School communications is usually based on the school bragging about all the good things they are doing. That’s OK. There is a place for that. But as every marketing communications manager in private industry knows, good communications that gets read takes an audience-centric approach. Talk to the parents not about yourself.
- Make it Fun: Good school-parent communications is full of pictures, graphics and white space. Don’t over explain or describe. Create school newsletters and parent Apps that are visually inviting.
At The School Communications Agency we partner with schools to achieve a community of engaged, informed parents