Communication

Ask Google for a definition of communication and the result is "the imparting or exchanging of information or news." Communication is a focus for our school district this year, an effort to let our parents, community, and world know the great things that are happening in our schools.

In light of a recent communication snafu, I started thinking about communication and how important that is. As I reflect upon my past twenty-one years in education, I have thought about people and entities that have had good communication skills.

Rewind back to my first years of teaching. I worked for a very small city school district in our state, and I mean small. We had four elementary schools, one middle school, and one high school. I had central office administrators in my classroom on a regular basis, including the superintendent. All central office personnel knew all the teachers by name and we all understood the mission and vision of the school system. I guess it was easy since we were so small.

Fast forward a couple of years, when all three systems in the county merged into a county system. We grew to eighteen elementary schools, four middle schools, and four high schools. Smaller than most, but much larger than we had been used to. Did things change? A little at first, but to the credit of some amazing leadership, all three districts merged and still was able to communicate to everyone in the system. Every teacher knew the initiatives of the district and the reasoning behind them. After a couple of years, the departments at central office knew all the teachers names and still visited classrooms.

Then I started thinking about some key people in my career that emulated great communication to their faculty and staff. I have been fortunate to work for some amazing principals who were great communicators. They kept us abreast of everything from DPI to Central office, to PTO, to well anything and everything that had an impact in our school. Some of this was even before email!

Today we have Facebook, Twitter, blogs, wikis, Google Apps for education, smart phones, and the list goes on. The question is, how can we truly leverage technology to communicate effectively?

So with the district focus on communication and communication a key component to success in the 21st century, what are some ways that you make sure you are communicating effectively? Seriously, I want to know, so please list your ideas here.