Education public relations shapes how families, alumni, and community members understand and talk about a school long before any official marketing reaches them. Many factors can influence a family’s impression of a school. A conversation at the school pickup line, a news story, or feedback from a graduate can influence a family’s decision to add or remove a school from their consideration list.
Impression management extends beyond school choice. The work of school communicators influences fundraising, faculty hiring, community partnerships, and the school’s public reputation. One negative news story can become the defining element of a school’s reputation. Depending on the strategic communication efforts, a school can counter negative news stories.
Traditional marketing, such as newspaper articles, remain important. A neighbor’s positive recommendation can be valued more than any school-created content. A school’s communication efforts should provide families with information that is valuable enough to justify sharing with other families.
Education Public Relations Strategies That Build Community Advocates
Parents need to hear positive things about a school to be able to speak positively about it. When families see a school is communicating information about student outcomes and faculty accomplishments, they are better able to speak to the accomplishments of the school. Alumni are also able to speak positively and give firsthand accounts about school faculty and staff who positively impacted their lives. Similar testimonials from current parents at school events can provide information that a school brochure cannot.
The institution’s reach extends to business partners and supporters who know the institution the best. Referrals made by these partners help the institution reach potential stakeholders who are outside of the immediate referral circle.
Superintendents and principals, as school leaders, do not need to wait for the media to find them. Faculty members can appear before numerous professional and community organizations. Leaders can engage in chambers of commerce and professional development organizations. They can create opportunities for professional learning and networking in community organizations.
One focus of school work is preparation for the workforce, including safety and mental health. School leaders need to be active in the community beyond the immediate school environment and work with community stakeholders, especially at times of crisis. School personnel are specially trained to work with students.
How Education Public Relations Helps Schools Establish Thought Leadership
School personnel can also partner with other community stakeholders, e.g. the business community, the non-profit sector and higher education.
School personnel should be the primary source of information for members of the school community and the public. School personnel should develop a strategic communication plan to be active, plan and participate in activities that are under the control of the school community. School personnel should know their crisis communication plan and how to engage with members of the media.
Change starts before a situation develops. Schools need to determine communication pathways, processes, and roles for formal communication with the news media, employees, and parents before they’re needed. Somebody has to own the processes for fact-checking, website postings, and social media. That person also has to coordinate with legal and emergency services, as needed.
Education Public Relations Crisis Planning Before Difficult News Arrives
Verified information, including what is being done, what the next step will be, and an estimated time frame for the next communication should be immediately provided. Whenever possible, communicate in broad, simple terms that don’t lend themselves to speculation. Premature communication almost always makes difficult situations worse.
Schools underestimate the challenges of communication with their employees. Different employees will communicate different information based on what they think they know. Without a system and process to manage communication, teachers, administrative staff, etc. will communicate inconsistent and sometimes conflicting information.
A crisis management plan should include the identification of potential weaknesses that can be tested by working through crisis management simulations. An outside firm can facilitate these simulations and provide tailored, school specific, crisis communication plan elements.
Not everyone may remember a brochure, but they will remember how they were treated. The ways in which a school treats guests during events is often the basis for the stories that people share. Even if your school is not selected, sometimes positive testimonials are shared about the treatment guests received on school tours and visits.
Achievements, awards, performances and exhibitions create stories naturally. These are the types of things families take pictures of, talk about and share on their own. Students don’t need to be prompted for school publicity. Often families, especially at the elementary level, will share positive stories from the classroom. Are these positive classroom stories prompted? Not exactly. Most of the time these are teacher initiated or passionate and proud families sharing positive stories from the classroom.
Reputation work also encompasses things like the ordinary, mundane activities. Was the application process clear? Was the admissions staff helpful? Was the campus welcoming? Was someone following up? Sometimes the small things determine whether someone walks away with a negative or positive impression.
Education Public Relations and the Value of Memorable School Experiences
Durable reputation work occurs when many positive things happen at the same time in a community and reinforce each other. Earned media, community activities and involvement, thoughtful leadership, and advocacy all happen at the same time and strengthen each other.
A story can be placed in the newspaper. It doesn’t need to disappear. It has multiple potential uses. Families can use it when giving a tour of the school. It can be used to motivate the school staff and faculty. The story can be shared through the alumni network. It has a life outside of the first and only placement.
Partnerships also allow extended reach. A high school partnering with a health care employer to offer internships and certification programs gives the employers a workforce development angle, gives students a tangible opportunity, gives families real outcomes, and allows the employer to invest in the community. One program can serve multiple audiences when aligned.
Protecting a school’s reputation is often easier when communication has already occurred.
How Education Public Relations Connects Earned Media and Community Relations
Schools that regularly and publicly celebrate student success, place their leadership in front of the community, and prepare for adversity, are often best positioned to influence how they are perceived when it matters the most.
This work ultimately creates advocates (alumni, families, community members) to genuinely praise the school and provides allied schools a public relations advantage, which is the goal of education public relations.
Partnerships offer the same kind of extended reach. A high school that works with a healthcare employer to offer internships and certification programs gives reporters a workforce development angle, gives students a tangible opportunity, gives families evidence of real outcomes, and gives the employer a visible way to invest in the community. One credible program serves multiple audiences when the pieces are connected.
Why Education Public Relations Requires Consistency Before a Problem Appears
Protecting a school’s reputation is significantly easier when communication has already been happening.
Schools that share student success regularly, develop independent advocates, put their leaders into public conversations, and prepare for difficult situations are better positioned to shape how they are perceived when it matters most.
That ongoing work tends to strengthen enrollment, philanthropy, partnerships, and public confidence over time. It also gives families, alumni, and community members genuine reasons to speak well of the school when its name comes up, which is ultimately what education PR is designed to support.
