150 episodes listed below
School social media, learned from the districts doing it.
Mastering Social Media for Schools is a practical show about running Facebook and Instagram for K-12 schools, covering everything from alt text to enrollment campaigns. Guests from districts in South Dakota, Wisconsin, Arizona and Minnesota walk through their campaigns, the results those campaigns got, and lessons learned the hard way during a crisis.
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Mastering Social Media for Schools is a practical show about running Facebook and Instagram for K-12 schools, and it stays close to the ground. The subjects are concrete: enrollment, hiring, accessibility, and the day something goes wrong. Guests from working districts bring the specifics. Elissa Dickey of Aberdeen Public Schools in South Dakota stepped into a position that had been brand new three years before her interview, and took a Facebook following from 36 to almost 2,000. She shares video tips and talks through what has and hasn't worked. She also describes a two-week, members-only Instagram challenge that she found doable once she kept it top of mind. Kari Klebba comes from the school district of Milton in Wisconsin, a district of about 3,500 students. She lays out a 4K enrollment plan: why it started, how it came together, and the tools behind it, including Canva and AI tools. That campaign won a Lighthouse Award, which she calls the professional shock of a lifetime. The conversation also shares the exact wording of the campaign's post, with links promised in the show notes. Sara Meredith, public relations manager for Peoria Unified School District in Arizona and a third-time guest, explains Why Peoria Unified, a teacher recruitment and retention effort. Her district's data showed that word of mouth was a strength and that people were not leaving over pay. So the messaging leaned on staff testimonials and on what the district offered beyond compensation. The crisis conversation shows how much the job can ask of one person. Adelle Wellens runs a one-person communications shop at Duluth Public Schools in Minnesota and began a school year with 13 crises in nine days. One of her examples is simple and practical. While engineers checked a wall and families were still being contacted, she asked neighbors who were taking photos to keep them off social media for a couple of hours. Not every episode is an interview. Andrea Gribble takes a solo episode on the new WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility standards that apply to public schools. She goes through alt text in detail, including adding it through the Facebook app rather than Business Suite and editing it after a post is live. It plays more like a walkthrough than a briefing. Leadership sits alongside the tactics. Dr. Joe Sanfelippo returns to discuss his book Lead From Who You Are, which is organized around personal, people and process rhythms. He argues that a leader's presence is built in small hallway conversations more than in big decisions. The register is warm and openly enthusiastic: guests are introduced as people worth meeting, and their wins are celebrated. Episodes end on a pitch for the membership group, speaking and social media management offered through socialschool4edu.com, then the same sign-off: 'keep telling those stories'.
Made for: Suits a listener who handles Facebook and Instagram for a K-12 school or district, often alone, and wants specific campaign examples and platform how-to rather than general marketing theory.
What sets it apart: The lessons come from named districts with results attached, such as a Facebook following grown from 36 to almost 2,000 and award-winning enrollment and recruitment campaigns, and the advice gets as specific as where to fix alt text in the Facebook app. The show is also openly tied to #SocialSchool4EDU, whose services are pitched at the close of episodes.
Do you manage social media for a K12 school? Then this podcast is for you! Struggling to find time for social media? Wondering why people won’t engage on your Facebook page? Can’t get content from your staff? Trying to get students to follow your Instagram Stories? These are just some of the big struggles that #SocialSchool4EDU CEO and social media storyteller, Andrea Gribble, digs into on the Mastering Social Media for Schools podcast. In addition to exclusive interviews and step-by-step strategies, each episode is designed to inspire and empower you on your journey to master school social media! This podcast is meant for anyone in K12 education - public schools, private schools, charter sc…
A school page goes from 36 followers to nearly 2,000, and your next post feels less mysterious.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A school communicator shows how small social experiments can become a district storytelling practice.
Alyssa Dickey's path from 36 Facebook followers to almost 2,000 gives the episode a useful throughline: school public relations improves through steady, practical experimentation.
A practical 4K enrollment discussion shows how social media can help schools build stronger connections with families, staff, and students.
A 4K enrollment plan gives the episode its practical center: school communication has to meet families in places that feel current, useful, and easy to act on.
A practical reminder that school posts still need human-written alt text.
Accessibility lands here as a practical publishing issue, not an abstract compliance topic. Andrea Gribble connects new standards for public organizations, including public schools, to the everyday choices that determine whether a post is usable.
A grounded look at shaping teacher recruitment and retention messaging from staff evidence.
Teacher recruitment and retention are framed as a staff-listening problem before they become a communications problem. Sarah Meredith, Public Relations Manager for Peoria Unified School District in Arizona, walks through how micro focus groups, anecdotal feedback, an interview…
Leadership presence is built through small daily interactions that help school communicators and leaders meet bigger decisions with trust already in place.
Leadership here takes shape in the ordinary contact that happens before a major decision. Dr. Joe Sanfilippo frames Lead From Who You Are around personal, people, and process rhythms, connecting that structure to mistakes that shaped his thinking and to the steady discipline of…
A single communications shop turns 13 crises in nine days into a practical lesson in timing, trust, and restraint.
Duluth Public Schools communicator Adele Wellens starts from a school year with 13 crises in nine days, which leaves little space for abstract advice.
School Pulse recasts student support as a steady conversation that can begin before crisis takes over.
Student wellness is treated here as work schools can begin before a crisis arrives. The conversation with Yuri Mello, the clinical social worker behind School Pulse, centers on a model that uses anonymous texting, twice-weekly proactive messages, videos tied to positive…
Andrea Gribble introduces a podcast episode featuring Sparshaw, a musician who used social media to transform his life, discussing his viral Eminem cover and advice for dealing with haters.
Andrea Gribble interviews Shane about how Kansas City Public Schools used social media strategies to pass a $474 million bond after 58 years.
Andrea Gribble breaks down the 2025 social media survey results for K-12 schools, discussing roles, channels, and struggles.
Alyssa Dickey says Aberdeen Public Schools' Facebook following grew from 36 to nearly 2,000 after she started a brand-new communications and marketing role three years ago.
["Mastering Social Media for Schools features Keri Klebba of the School District of Milton, Wisconsin, where a 4K enrollment push helped produce the district's largest 4K class.", "Klebba says Milton, a district of about 3,500 students across nine municipalities and two cities, had relied on flyers, newspaper ads, childcare reminders, and traditional posts for 4K and kindergarten enrollment before the 2024-25 school year.", "She rebuilt the campaign around a 4K signing day with Rocky the Red Hawk, classroom photos, Canva graphics, and ChatGPT-generated mascot art, then saw more website traffic and more clicks to the enrollment page.", "The conversation also cites Social Schools for EDU, Barbara Hunter's 'admire and acquire' idea, and WISPRA's Lighthouse Award as proof that authentic school storytelling can move families."]
["Andrea Gribble\u2019s Mastering Social Media for Schools episode on accessibility centers WCAG 2.1AA and the two compliance dates she names: April 24, 2026 for communities over 50,000 people and April 26, 2027 for communities under 50,000.", "She says public schools fall under the new rules, notes that Social School for EDU manages social media for 88 school districts, and frames the episode for communicators publishing school content.", "Her practical guidance covers captions, alt text, color contrast, closed captions, silent-video descriptions, and short URLs, with examples from Facebook, Instagram Reels, Meta Business Suite, NVDA, WebAIM, and Canva.", "She also points listeners to the June 23-25 retreat in Stillwater, Minnesota, plus the blog, YouTube walkthrough, and membership group she uses for training and support."]
Mastering Social Media for Schools focuses on Sarah Meredith's teacher recruitment and retention campaign, Why Peoria Unified, for Peoria Unified School District in Arizona.
The host opens with a caution on AI-generated images for school social media, pointing to criticism about energy use, children's likenesses, and nearby data centers, then plugs the Golden Gribbles awards.
Adele Wellens, a communications officer at Duluth Public Schools, describes handling 13 crises during the district’s first nine days of school as a one-person communications shop.
Andrea Gribble analyzes 497 responses to the 2026 Social Media Survey for Mastering Social Media for Schools, covering platforms, staffing, student participation, accessibility, and operational challenges.
Andrea interviews Iuri Melo, a licensed clinical social worker who co-founded School Pulse after seven student suicides occurred in his southern Utah area about eight years earlier.
Jeanette Hartwig, a one-person communications department for North Plainfield School District’s six schools and approximately 3,600 students, describes building a customer-service mindset.
Tasha Shue recounts falling 16 feet through a stage trapdoor during a 1997 high-school production of The Wizard of Oz, an accident that resulted in C5 quadriplegia and years of depression.
Kayla and Kelly of Waukee Community School District explain how a paid Social Media Champions role brought consistent ownership to Facebook and Instagram accounts across about 20 education buildings.
Coty Kuschinsky, Chief of Staff and Communications Director at Saginaw Intermediate School District, explains how staff members use ThrillShare to publish moderated stories from classrooms and district programs.
Mastering Social Media for Schools examines Rowan Salisbury School System’s Kinder Ready campaign with Director of Marketing and Communications Michelle Hsu.