Show Notes: 

Read All Hands on Deck to learn more about Lytle ISD and Skull Studios.

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Episode Transcript

Welcome to SchoolCEO Podcast. I’m your host, Eileen Beard. Today, let’s talk about another way so-called weaknesses—such as a small team or small budget—are also opportunities to think outside the box. 

In a perfect world, every school district would have access to a well-resourced communications team, right? But that’s usually not the case, especially for smaller districts—According to NSPRA’s 2022 Profile of a School Communicator survey, over three-fourths of districts—with fewer than 2,000 students—reported having only one communications pro on staff. 

If you’re at a small school district, then you may have to get creative to cover all of your communications needs. Districts across the country are doing just that, and I’m going to share how one district in Texas got creative to cover theirs. 

Right on the outskirts of San Antonio, Lytle ISD has just over 1,700 students, 74% of whom are economically disadvantaged. The district wanted to find ways to expand both the capacity of their communications office and the opportunities they offer students. Their answer? Skull Studios. That’s S-K-U-L-L. (It’s not as scary as it sounds—the name is a nod to their mascot, the Pirates.) 

Skull Studios is a student club that provides logo design, commercial printing, video production and more, for both their district and businesses in the community. After all, many small businesses have the same budgeting issues as small districts. A company with 5 employees is unlikely to have a communications and marketing professional on staff. When Skull Studios takes on a project, they charge for materials plus a suggested donation of only $10 per hour of work, making it much more affordable for those businesses. But even businesses that have the capital to hire bigger professional outfits, often hire Skull because they want to support Lytle ISD. 

The bulk of the club’s projects come from within the school, though, including things like printing prom tickets and designing event banners. So all Lytle ISD’s branded materials are printed in house instead of outsourced. That way, Comms can keep tighter control of the process, while saving money. And it gives them some flexibility, too. For instance, they can more readily fix printing mistakes or make things last minute if they need to. Print materials are not the only thing Skull produces for Lytle, either. They help out with district video and photography, too. In fact, it produces almost 100% of the district’s sports photography. That’s obviously a big value add for their comms team.  

In addition to supporting the district and community, Skull Studios supports the growth of the students doing the work. The club lets them explore a variety of career paths and gain job experience and even allows them to build creative portfolios. For example, Skull Studios uses Adobe products for things like layout design and video production. Being able to include “proficient with Adobe products” is a huge boost to any resume. 

So how do you even go about determining if, then how you can involve students in marketing at your schools? 

1. First, Mind the gaps. Lytle ISD wanted to expand job training for students while increasing the capacity of their comms team. But doesn’t every school want to expand training for students and increase the capacity of their employees? To narrow things down, list the specific needs your comms team has and the specific gaps that exist in your students’ education related to communications. For instance, Lytle ISD was missing a graphic design career pathway and they had a lot of printing needs. The fix for both was obvious. 
2. Second, look at your comms team's needs and compare it to the skills students are already learning. Maybe you don’t see gaps in your kids’ education in fields related to communications, although I doubt it. But, If you want to hire a professional photographer for football games and don’t have the budget, but your high school does offer photography classes, then you might have a talented student who is already trained, and who may be interested in doing it to build their resume and portfolio. It doesn’t hurt to ask. 
3. Third, determine your bandwidth. If you are your district’s sole communications pro and starting something like Skull Studios would rest squarely on your shoulders, maybe you can’t pull it off right now. Can you pull anyone in to help you run it? Who else might benefit from their services? If there is already an art club or photography club, can you combine forces? Does Yearbook have too much material on their hands? Can they share excess photos with you to post on social media? The point is, you don’t have to start by setting up an entire printing and studio in your schools. Start by talking to that one photography student and slowly build a system and a case for involving more students in your marketing efforts. 

By the way, none of these tactics apply to small teams alone. Every communications team can benefit from inviting other hands and other voices to contribute. After all, a large team with many campuses might struggle to cover all of the events at their schools as much, if not more than in a small district. If something we say might be helpful to you, then it’s for you. 

Thanks for joining me.