In an effort to address the constantly changing communications landscape, the Wright City R-II School Board was recently updated on changes to the district’s communications plan.

At the board’s February meeting, Morgan Kohr, who oversees district communications, provided the board with updates to the plan.

Kohr stated that she and Superintendent Dr. Amy Salvo refined the plan to develop a written communications strategy that outlines multiple methods for two-way, reliable communication with all district stakeholders.

One of the larger areas of emphasis, Kohr said, was through social media.

“This is one of the biggest communications platforms we have as a district,” Kohr said. “It’s pretty important that we gain perfection there with our community. We're going to look at increasing our social media footprint as we look at pushing out communications. As we look back to showing and sharing our story, we want to review this plan and ensure we’re using it as our roadmap.”

Some key tenets of the updated plan include employee communications with the media, communication during emergency situations, use of the district's website and social media platforms, sharing information within the district, and sharing information with the public.

During Kohr's presentation, Board President Austin Jones raised a concern about technical issues with the online broadcasts.

“A pet peeve of mine when we want to broadcast these board meetings, there are a lot of technical problems that continue to occur,” Jones said. “Would the communication plan be appropriate to address that, or would that be a facilities issue? Right, wrong or indifferent, the city does a better job of broadcasting its meetings. That’s been one of my sore subjects when it comes time for someone to participate remotely.”

Kohr said that the district has adopted a team-effort approach to communications upgrades.

She thanked executive administrative assistant Elisabeth Thompson for her work.

“Elisabeth has worked hard with IT on getting new speakers and new cameras and making sure that YouTube is our steady platform,” Kohr said. “It has definitely been a team effort. Communication is an area where we can always (improve).”

Board member Beth Dean lauded Kohr and the communications team for its work.

“You guys have done so much work over the last couple of years, thank you,” Dean said. “With our online communications, the newsletters, we’ve seen so much growth.”

Salvo added that the evolution of the plan is easy to chart.

“You can see on the plan when new things have been implemented and added,” Salvo said. “We’re definitely working to strive to increase our communication.”