Q & A Platinum Award Winner

by Christy Flores-Jones Director of Public Relations Socorro ISD

The entire SISD public relations team, led by our Chief Communications Officer Daniel Escobar and me, contributed to the winning piece. We have an outstanding team, including writers, graphic artists, videographers, a photographer, a social media specialist and an administrative assistant, that worked together to compile and produce the nomination.

The COVID-19 pandemic was not anything we had experienced before. However, the dire need for consistent, accurate, timely communication for our students and families was obvious. It was natural for us to refine our communication methods and develop reliable, systematic ways to keep our community informed as the situations changed by the minute. We knew it would be critical to plan and execute imperative communication throughout the entire school year going into the unknown.

We prioritized time to work on the nomination and worked intermittently for about three weeks to compile, write, layout, and proof our nomination. During the school year, we make every effort to archive and organize files as they are produced to be able to easily locate and reference our work, which helps in putting the final nomination together.

It was an all-encompassing, comprehensive campaign that entailed many hours of planning,

strategizing, collaborating and executing. Our coordination and cooperative work with departments, schools and outside agencies are continuous in Team SISD. With this campaign, we accomplished copious necessary and helpful materials and messages for our students, staff, schools and community in the most difficult of times.

Receiving any recognition for our work, big or small, is always rewarding because it means it helped someone, somehow. We are beyond proud to have won the Platinum Award for the second time and winning it for our communication campaign during the COVID-19 pandemic is phenomenal. It means the world to us because we have been laboring in one of the most challenging times in the education field and in an unprecedented time in history. We put in countless hours, we worked as a team, and we did it all to keep our community informed and reassured. This is always the core of our work; however, to do it during the pandemic when things change on a dime daily, sometimes hourly, was certainly something that challenged us as professionals and tested our dedication, work ethic, patience and compassion. It is truly humbling and exciting for our efforts to be recognized as exceptional.

It is helpful to stay organized by creating timelines, keeping track of drafts and final work, archiving media coverage, keeping clean files (digital and hard copies) to refer to what you have produced and to be able to readily access your examples. Be sure to follow closely the award criteria and include all aspects to demonstrate research, analysis, communication and evaluation in your nomination. Clearly identify your goals and objectives and write concisely and descriptively to answer the questions required for the summary of the nomination.

Everyone in the world has been going through the difficulties of the COVID-19 pandemic; incredible, inspiring and unbelievable work has been created because of it. We salute school districts, educational systems and communicators in all professions for their tireless efforts to serve their communities and audiences. While I understand there have been far greater roles during the pandemic, we are truly grateful to have had an opportunity to serve our community with the work that we have been trained to deliver.

Rebecca Villarreal, APR, TSPRA President Mark Saldana, SISD Public Relations Coordinator Acavius Largo, SISD Production Specialist Daniel Escobar, SISD Chief Communications Officer Andy Perez, SISD Senior Graphic Designer Aria Woodcoff, Intrado SchoolMessenger Linsae Snider, TSPRA Executive Director Cesar Ruiz, SISD Multimedia Specialist