Mobilize Your Silent Majority

When most of us think about the squeaky wheel, it is not usually a super positive thing.  While not necessarily and explicitly negative, the squeaky wheel is a means to an end for some person or group.  Car maintenance is an appropriate metaphor for how school often goes.  When things are good/great, it is quiet and you roll with it!  When things break you start to get those noises, warning lights and error messages on that nifty screen that front and center.  That's how the machine works, right?

What if our machine worked differently?   What if our notification console gave us green lights and thumbs up instead of those alarming and anxiety creating red and orange lights (those things give the amazing color of red a bad name...).  Below is a great nugget from the Blunt Educator:

Social Media & Schools: The Celebration Post

There are few things that people, in general, enjoy more than a good celebration!  Celebrations evoke so many positive feelings & emotions and have the effect of bringing people together!  We have so many things to celebrate and be excited about in schools!  Whether it be learning, social, or milestone, celebrations are a huge part of the story we tell and we should be proactive to ensure that our families have the opportunity to take part in these because these are the events and happenings that can have the greatest effect on our family engagement and brand building experience!

Folks like myself, Tony Sinanis & Joe Sanfelippo, as well as my own district's superintendent, speak regularly about taking control of the narrative being told in regards to school.  The celebration post on your campus and/or classroom social media pages should be an important part of what is being shared!  These celebration posts speak directly to all of the wonderful and positive things that happen at school daily and should highlight individuals, groups, clubs, events, learning, service to name a few!  All that said, the celebration post was a very natural progression after beginning with the information posts!  Here are some great places to find celebrations on your campus.

Social Media & Schools: The Information Post

The next few posts regarding social media will dig into five (5) post types I have identified after meticulously sifting through a year's worth of posts (yup, that's how I spend my time :))!  Time consuming yes, but I believe there is value in knowing how we use the tool of social media so that we can use it more efficiently to build the level of engagement with families and brand that we desire!

The first post type that we'll tackle is probably the one that most got into the social media scene to use and probably why you chose to start a social media page for your campus or classroom.  The information post is pretty self explanatory.  Information posts can be:

I Don't Want to be a Special Guest

I don't want to be a special guest.  Not at school or in a classroom, at least.

This past Thursday, I was out and about visiting classrooms, walking through, checking things out.  Nothing super official yet, but really trying to work on being present where the learning happens.  I ended up hanging out a little longer in a 4th grade classroom where an interactive read aloud was taking place (a shared book will always catch my attention).  As the teacher read, then made her calculated stops to ask questions, driving the objective of point of view, she asked the question, "what do you think the point of view of our special guest will be?"  A number of the students who had noticed me come in turned to look at me.

More to the Story

I am knee deep into the idea of branding.  I think I would really enjoy a 21st century marketing course!  Social media has changed the game in how marketing takes place and organizations are able to interact with people and vice versa.  It has also, in a dramatic fashion, leveled the playing field and allowed a new level of competition for the "little guy" if the right tools are used correctly and you are passionate about your product and/or service!  Branding is also a current hot topic for schools and reading about branding in business has become a favorite pass time (and blog topic) as I think about the school I want to lead.  I read this article The Power of Branding a couple days ago and enjoyed it finding myself nodding along with everything it had to say.  I also found that I had a number of points and elements included in my upcoming presentation.  I won't lie, it's nice to see others seeing and coming to similar conclusions!  The article really focused on the power of telling and getting the narrative of schools out their in all of the various ways that we communicate.

Social Media & Schools: The Platforms

When jumping into the social media scene it the choices and options can be overwhelming.  Starting in, I would recommend selecting one that you feel is going to make the greatest impact with families.  All provide options for passing information as well as the ability to connect and interact with your community.  Here are some quick points on the platforms that we use at Eagle Ridge.

Facebook

• Primary social media platform and where we started - getting everybody who is has admin rights to our pages on Hootsuite hasn't risen to the top of the priority list, so Facebook even for posting is the "go to" location to post.
• Most visited and posted - We are currently sitting at 620+ likes which is a little more than 75% of our student population
• Great combination of visual & communication purposes - The limit on post size is pretty high and you can easily include a visual with links so including extra details.  Other platforms provide the options to post to Facebook so integration is pretty easy.

Lead Like a Pirate!

If teachers or administrators had a choice, would they follow you? That question popped into my mind as I prepared for a meeting this past week.  The wonderful Dave Burgess came to mind in connection and I couldn't help but think about that challenge question he included in Teach Like a Pirate: If students had the choice, would they come to your class?  Shouldn't the same question apply to our leadership?   As I thought more and more about that question, I was, first and foremost, encouraged by my own response (not answering in  arrogance, but answering in self reflection) and then, second, it reestablished that point that true leadership is not a position or a job held.  Here is a visual a I had retweeted awhile back that will help frame my ideas.