1. Building Community
Engagement
An online strategy for
Willowbank School
2010

2. Context
• Willowbank School
• Multi-cultural
• Multi-lingual parent group
• Approximately 800 learners
• Silver Enviro School

3. Issues
• Communication with parent group perceived as
erratic
• Newsletters not checked online by all parents
• Website often perceived as out of date
• Aiming to be a paperless school

4. Proposal
• Discover the potential of virtual
environments to develop an online
strategy to nurture relationships
with our various communities
through the use of social media.

5. Opportunities
• Parents informed on a continuous basis via Facebook and Twitter
• Marketing of events and needs reaches the widest possible audience
• Business sponsorship possibilities through online advertising
• Ability to utilise language tools on applications allowing equitable access to information for non
English speakers – Facebook has 69 language options and Twitter has 6.
• Opportunities to post links to websites and posts on supporting learning at home
• Facebook supports the use of Survey Monkey for community surveys and feedback
• Facebook and Twitter able to reach a wide audience over a short period of time to facilitate
planning for 10th anniversary
• Clobby Group Chat – chatroom for invited guests on Facebook – generate focus groups

6. Facts
• More than 55.8% of Facebook users are female
• More than 41.9% of Facebook users are in the 25-44 age
range
• http://www.checkfacebook.com/
• Twitter allows for short tweets which can redirect to a
web page or act as reminders
• Facebook allows for embedding of photos, video, surveys
and larger amounts of information as well as possibilities
for business sponsorship

7. Risks and Rewards
Risks Rewards
• Online environments can be • Continuous, up to date
open to hacking streaming of information
• Not all parents will have • Parent community informed
access to online environments of updates and availability of
information
• Consistent monitoring of
sites and tweets/posts • Quick, easy to access
required information provided in a
variety of languages
• Teacher facebook accounts
need to be privacy protected

8. Impact
• Community informed of information and events
• Paperless school a possible reality
• Administration of accounts required by SLT
• Facebook and Twitter settings required to be tightly
controlled
• Social Media etiquette professional learning required
for teachers and available to parents

9. Suggestions
• Facebook account in the name of Willowbank
School created
• Twitter account in the name of Willowbank School
created
• An online strategy account to be set up for the
updating and monitoring of the above accounts

10. Action Plan
• Professional learning for staff and parents
• Facebook and Twitter etiquette resources available
• Specific administrator email set up so that school has
continuing access
• Careful monitoring of privacy and sharing settings
• Professional updates and tweets
• Monitoring of site by SLT

11. Personnel
• Administrator of strategy
• ICT facilitator liaison for professional learning
• Marketing Strategist support
• Teacher input
• Parent education and support

12. Timeline
Term 2: Term 3:
• Accounts set up • Teacher education on
online etiquette
• Strategy advertised to
parent community • Online strategy explored for
business opportunities
• Initial posts completed
• Aiming for X to sign up
within term 3
• Incentives for “liking” and
“re tweeting” of posts

13. Who is using social media?
Twitter Facebook
• Several professionals • Gifted Kids Programme
• @yis – Yokohama • Allergy New Zealand
International School
• TED
• @sumprimary –
Summerlands Primary
• JPPS Elementary School –
• @tawaint – Tawa Canada
Intermediate School
• Kidicorp
• @ptengland – Point England
School

14. What would we tweet/post?
Tweet Post
• Notices • Event videos
• Sports results • Event photos
• Sports cancellations • Links to websites/
KnowledgeNet
• Reminders for mufti etc
• Information for parents
• Meeting reminders
• Event information
• Newsletter links on website • Surveys

15. Ongoing
Analysing Monitoring
• Engagement • Reputation online
• Trawl content on Facebook
• Growth of community and Twitter
• Visits to individual pages • Tweet funnel for monitoring
of tweets to align with
• http://www.facebook.com/ Willowbank values
insights • http://
openfacebooksearch.com/
• http://
www.socialmention.com/

17. Traffic Generators
• Generate via existing strategies ie newsletter
• Buttons on website
• Email to parents
• Print run in partnership with local newspapers

18. How does this all fit together?
• Semi Private
• S, T, P use
• Password protected
• Learning focus
KnowledgeNet
Twitter Facebook

19. Looking to the future …
A recent report indicated the top six technologies that will impact on education
in the next 3-5 years:
Major Impact Challenges
• Cloud computing • Poor digital media literacy for educators
• Collaborative environments • Out of date pedagogy and materials
• Poor strategy on evolution
• Game based learning
• Failure to adapt
• Mobile technology
• Lack of support for non traditional
• Augmented reality learning environments
• Flexible displays
http://thejournal.com/Articles/2010/04/13/6-Technologies-That-Will-Shape-Education.aspx?Page=1

20. Still unsure?
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFZ0z5Fm-Ng

21. Activity to date
• 5 followers • 12 people like us
• 11 tweets • 6 posts to wall
• Follow us on twitter • 1 photo album
@willowbanknz
• 1 discussion
• Like us at:
http://www.facebook.com/
pages/Howick/
Willowbank-School/
125796360796155

22. Web links
• http://www.checkfacebook.com/
• http://www.businessweek.com/idg/2010-06-19/keep-
kids-safe-on-facebook.html
• http://www.pcworld.com/article/199162/
can_you_really_trust_facebook.html?tk=hp_new
• http://www.nzherald.co.nz/technology/news/
article.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10650497&pnum=2
• http://thejournal.com/Articles/2010/04/13/6-
Technologies-That-Will-Shape-Education.aspx?Page=1