Getting the word out in the future…?
April 10, 2009
During the last few weeks since the Ann Arbor News announced their general demise set for this July I have been wondering about how I will be able to get information out to the Saline community. We still have the Saline Reporter, the school website, notes home with students, etc. However, how am I going to be able to engage community members who do not have kids in school (65%+ of our district residents do not) and inform them about their school system?
Using Twitter, I was able to ask the new AnnArbor.com folks about whether or not Saline or other “out county” communities would be covered. New “Content Director”, Mr. Tony Dearing replied back that the coverage would likely not be in-depth.
Any suggestions?
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Scot Graden's Blog 
Scot,
The loss of the News definitely will have an impact on community news and information. Its hard to realize a world without the 4th estate. For us old paper boys it is hard to believe. Perhaps, we might focus on creating a semi annual news letter that could be distributed both by mail and students. How about a weekly show on our cable outlet?
David
Scot,
What is twitter?
It is a micro-blogging communication tool – sign up and follow SalineSchools. Check us out at http://www.twitter.com/salineschools
Speaking of getting the word out… Why are we not informed when our schools decide to “sell” school property for a minimal amount of money, while potentially putting our children’s developing brains at risk? Our neighborhood would pay $12,000 for the land your selling to Verizon and put a community garden there. We get more notices about PTA sales and parking than we do about the really important things. If that cell tower goes up, you will lose students in your “head count” and I imagine it will cost the district more than the paltry $12,000 it’s going to get from Verizon. We need to be smarter than this. Our kids’ health is not for sale.
Any chance of holding good old fashioned townhall meetings? Advertise them by putting fliers up at the local grocery stores as well as sending e-mail loop messages and notes home with students and involving the PTO/A’s. Perhaps you could color code items so we know which are homework, which are Rec & Ed advertising and which are School District Notices in the explosion of papers that come home. By the way, I am concerned at the issue Juliet brings up above…… There needs to be some method of communicating this kind of pending decision to the populous, however contentious it might be, especially where the issue brings potential health problems and an alternative use could have been found at the same sale cost. We sure got to know about the CARES and Sinking Fund stuff!