One Stop Communication: Critical Information All in One Location

Ever wondered how a school district can revolutionize its communication with parents and the community? Join us as we uncover the Jefferson R-7 School District's groundbreaking efforts to enhance accessibility and transparency. Hear from Superintendent David Haug, who unveils the district's new streamlined one-page communication tool, a game-changer following last year's traffic flow improvements. Principal Rouggly shares his expert strategies on maintaining consistent and timely communication, which has impressively driven a 95% registration turnout. Plus, Athletic Director Tara Fish introduces her plans to leverage the ThrillShare app, keeping everyone in the loop about school events and activities with real-time updates.

Celebrate the exceptional leadership and communication prowess of Mr. Rouggly and Mrs. Fish in their new roles. Discover how their ongoing contributions have fortified the school's connection with the community. Understand the importance of including non-staff members in meetings for a more holistic perspective on school matters. Stevie’s initiative to centralize information through a user-friendly one-page design also comes under the spotlight. As we look toward the upcoming school year, we extend our gratitude for the team's unwavering dedication to improving communication, making it more effective and accessible for families and patrons. Tune in for this enlightening discussion that promises valuable insights and practical takeaways!

Chapters

• 0:06 Improving Communication for Community
• 8:45 Recognizing Positive Leadership and Communication

Transcript

David Haug: 0:06

Hey, I'm David Haug, superintendent of the Jefferson Hill 7t School District. I'm just going to cover briefly what this is about and give, and then those that want to stay can kind of listen a little further detail. But if you think back to last year, we spent a lot of time in preparation to make things easy for our parents and patrons with our traffic flow, and I think we really did a great job of addressing the traffic issue after school last year. This year, the concentration what can we do for our parents, what can we do for those that are connected to our community to make their lives easier and that was really centered around communication. And so the group of us between Stevie, these two right here and some others really dug into what we call a one-page communication that we're going to share with you, and these two right here and some others really dug into what we call a one one page communication that we're going to share with you, and essentially the bottom line is this this is really for the casual user to our website. This is for those parents and our grandparents and our patrons who attend our events, to put our updated, most accurate information in a one-stop location for you. I would just kind of recommend perusing through it. Not everything that we do in the district will be on there. This truly is a one-stop shop that you can find quickly. You're not having to search all over our website or multiple apps to find it. So check that link out.

David Haug: 1:20

If you want to stay a little further and listen to us here we're going to talk about it in a little bit more detail. But really to concentrate on our families to make their lives easier as far as communication, with the accuracy of it, use that one-page communication. So I'm going to segue here. Mr Rugley, I know, going back to part of our training for you being principal, I think sometimes and this was my opinion I've been doing this 20 years, 20 plus years started as an AD Communication with your community is difficult and my recommendation to you was trying to get too caught up in the latest and greatest app, because it's just another change in another area, but find your method of communication. I know we talked about your registration numbers. This week.

David Haug: 2:05

You had almost 95% attendance. That's incredible in the last week of July. So something is you're communicating well, so that concept, what do you do? And it's kind of what we're trying to do with this app here or this web page we put together.

Alex Rouggly: 2:19

Yeah, our registration numbers were fantastic, like you had spoken about, and one thing that I try to utilize is just sending those reminders to our to our parents and and of our students as well as our students, and we really started that out by utilizing just email and seeing the numbers that we saw on Tuesday and Thursday of last week, you realize that the way that you're communicating with your parents and your students is working. So we sent out just the general information. I like to try to send out our information to our families and our students roughly around a month-ish ahead of time, and then I sent another reminder, you know out, a couple of weeks before registration.

Alex Rouggly: 2:58

And like you said, we were right at about 95% attendance rate for our registration, which was fantastic, and, I think, our discussion.

David Haug: 3:07

Nobody has to agree with me on this, but sometimes it's not how you communicate with them, but how does your community find you? I know you. I said just if you find that, when you start, just be as consistent as long as you can until the technology would change, and I think you're doing a great job of that. First of all, we're really glad to have you on board, coach Fish. Miss Fish, I don't know how you want to call you, tara, I'm not sure, but you've been such a breath of fresh air and you're going to do amazing things with our athletic director position as part of the director of student services.

David Haug: 3:35

I know you've got the A-plus and the at-risk stuff coming, but one of the things that really I know that you did well before taking this position was the way you communicated with families, either in your sports program but also, I think, as a teacher. You know. I think you did a tremendous job of that. So I know in this day and age, communication is important. So we've talked about this as well be consistent, and we're trying to put that together, but I know that you'll be in charge of a lot of the information on there.

David Haug: 4:03

So so what are your thoughts on? Because we do have the ThrillShare app that we can reach out through texting, through the email, through social media in one push out and we do choose. We try to be a little bit selective to not bother everybody when we need to with the text, but social media generally is a push, or maybe just email and social media. Let's say they add in the Easter egg hunt or add in night with Santa, because it incorporates all levels. How do you think you will maybe keep our community updated?

Tara Fish: 4:38

I think that as soon as those dates are given, I will send it out through that ThrillShare app to make sure that I feel like that's an important one. That would go on text message and email and on Twitter too, just because parents want to know dates as quickly as they can. I always try to look at things how would I want it, how would I want to know as a parent, and so that's how I approach it all, and so putting it out there in that manner, as quickly and as accurate as possible, is the best way, and this one-stop communication is amazing. Like to be able to get to that one place and parents can find everything that they need.

David Haug: 5:17

It is the first thing that pops up on our webpage and, to your point, I guess what I'm alluding to and should have maybe outlined better is that when you go that one-stop communication right now, there's some dead links in there, but what we're letting our community know is that when those become available, we'll put them in, and then the way you'll communicate is that, at the appropriate time, let them know hey, this has been added. Check it out. Uh, and it might be as simple as night with sand has been added, but also some softball changes. Please check that out. Just kind of some general reminders when you have that opportunity. But then you'll also find your flow with this too, and I think that's what sometimes in this business we get a little caught up how do we reach our people? But sometimes maybe it's how we guide them to find us.

David Haug: 5:55

Better is what we're looking at Now. Part of this lies in what Stevie Holdinghausen, who manages all this stuff through ThrillShare and also takes care of our podcast she's over there in the corner and does an amazing job was the repeatable link, which is nice for us. So one of the reasons we were able to do this is because, let's say, you make a change on the fall sports schedule. You no longer have to create a new link and go find it. The link is still there. You can actually put the paper in. So we're training our staff on how to do that and make that easier. So wherever that link is, it pops up again. I mean you would find the fall sports calendar probably on different versions, but all the versions would be the same through that one link. Have you had a chance to use that yet?

Tara Fish: 6:41

So we did put the fall schedule on there and on the fall schedule the one-page fall schedule for sports and fine arts there is a date on it so you can see when the last time it was updated for any changes. So both of those are on there for everyone.

David Haug: 6:55

And then as soon as we add the Platinum Telegraph ones, I'll send out a message and say here's when our choir concerts are for Platinum Telegraph and here's the link to the one page for you to go directly to to find that I think at some point this year I don't know why I never thought of it like this we always talked about we ended up creating almost like a sports-style schedule for our fine arts and added them all together and that, I think, was very well received. I don't know why it took me so long to think of that one, but we did. And so what she's alluding to is that we, like Mr Sykes and Mrs Sykes, have some other stuff in there. There may be things they add, but then, like right now we don't have Platinum Telegraph in, but it's gonna be there and as soon as it's added we intend to let everybody know hey, it's there, you can start sharing it out with your, with your families and all that.

David Haug: 7:43

I did want to follow up with this, and this is something I have dealt with since I started at Potosi years ago. Is that one place for one? It's always a bad idea. I've never found a good way to do this. So what you will not find on this page is like this master calendar with all the events, because what I have found, especially since we've gone to the technology again, it's just more layers of making sure it's accurate, the way the one page is kind of designed is that very few people will be on there able to update and so it's accurate more often, if that makes sense.

David Haug: 8:18

However, we've always sent out what we call a written calendar, but Stevie has created this additional. What's it called, stevie? There's another link the parent calendar. I have gotten a lot of good. We've shared that with specific groups and a lot of good feedback on that. It's really a nice printable version, but I think we're trying to put it in those senses that there's some key dates you want to be aware of for your families and vacations and stuff like that. So I know we're kind of going on and on about the one-page leak. I will just say this this group these two here amazing with their communication skills as coaches I've seen it for years. As Mr Rugley's transitioned to AD position, the principal continued and what Mrs Fish is going to do is awesome. I will say when we sit at our meetings, one of the things we ask is to have people in there. That aren't part of what we do, because sometimes we get in our own little world and think, well, it's there Just to have people really look at it not as employees but as parents.

David Haug: 9:15

And that's something that she alluded to earlier. We really stress and I'm not saying this is perfect, but I believe, if you, we're trying to get our community to understand the best way that we're putting our information out there and keep it in one place and not have to have you chase it down. So can't thank these two enough for their work, especially Stevie too. She's done an amazing job with the one pagepage design and then training us on how to use it. So thank you. We're looking forward to school year. Have a good one.