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Looking for more ideas on how to increase enrollment at your school? This week, we are going to look at events in your community. Attending these events can help build awareness of your school and add more students in your classrooms!
Finding local events
Wondering where to start? Ask! A great way to find out about events in your community is to ask parents, teachers, and staff at your school about neighborhood events. You can also look at community events paper on your town or city website or local newspaper. Learning about events is step 1! Step 2 is reaching out the organizer to see if you can set up a booth or a table to tell everyone about how great your school is.
Building a plan
In a recent post, we discussed planning an enrollment event at your school. A community event is very similar to the event at your school, with a few changes. For community events, make sure to include things like:
- Key details, including date, time, location address, and a contact from the organization hosting the event
- Staff and volunteers
- Event overview including schedule
- Promotional needs
- Budget
SchoolInfo has created a community event planning sheet to help you and your team get organized for the event! You can save a copy of this document to customize to meet your needs.
Link for Brody to edit: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1R1tIRhtvvEX-HaeXko33ydl1-RYwiyl_G_pk2TcahLA/edit?usp=sharing
A few things to keep in mind for community events.
Flyers
People visiting with you at a community event may not remember all the details you provide. Giving them a flyer to take with them will be helpful!
Giveaways
Giveaways are a great way to draw a crowd, and they don't have to be expensive. Kids love stickers or candy! If your budget is larger, you may want to consider branded items like fidget spinners or stress balls. Branded items help keep you front of mind long after the prospective family has walked away.
Take pictures!
At any event you are attending, make sure to take pictures to post across all of your communication channels. Let people know where you will be. Invite current families to stop by if they are at the event.
Get information
This is key: just like an event at hosted at your school, it is important after the event is is important to contact prospective families. Reach out and invite prospective families to visit your school.
Have fun
If your team of volunteers are having fun, people who stop by to say hello will enjoy learning more about your school. Make sure to smile and enjoy your day!
Remember, you can always go back to the basics with our previous post: Admissions Tips and Tricks: Marketing 101 post. Want to keep learning? Download our ebook, "Digital Communication Strategies for Districts and Schools" is full of great ideas to improve communication at your school. You can download it here.
