According to a recent study conducted by Edison Research, 75% of Americans know what the term “podcast” means, and about half of them are listening to one – or more - each week. So it made sense to leaders at Gwinnett County Public Schools that a podcast was vital to its communication strategy.
“We’re always looking for new ways to meet our audience of students, parents and the community,” said Bernard Watson, GCPS director of community and media relations. “We already have weekly publications, a TV program and a website , but we also recognized that podcasts are a big thing. I know I’m a voracious consumer of podcasts myself, so why not do one for the school district?”
The idea began to gel pre-COVID in the fall term of 2019 when Watson was charged with creating “Teaching Gwinnett.”
“We talked about different concepts,” he said. “We knew we wanted it to be informative and digestible, and to strike that balance so it was of broad interest to whomever would consume it.”
The first episode near the end of 2019 lasted about seven minutes and hit on a topic that impacted almost everyone in the county, regardless of whether or not they have kids in school.
“We talked about the decision making around when to close the schools because of inclement weather,” said Watson. “We answered questions such as ‘Why do they wait so long? Why do they do it when the streets in my neighborhood aren’t icy?’ We were trying to get people to understand all the things that go into those decisions.”
Subsequent episodes explored the district’s community-based mentoring program and featured guests such as nutritionists and media specialists from different school programs. Those interviews garnered a modest audience, but the listening numbers soared when COVID caused a seismic shift to online learning.
“We’ve started talking about our digital learning platform, explaining how it works and the challenges we’ve faced,” the director said. “The ins and outs of digital learning have been a hot topic.”
Listeners are not only from Gwinnett, Watson noted. “We’ve had people tune in from Ireland, Germany and the Philippines. We know that 64% of the audience is female and typically between 45 and 59 years old.”
The podcast is available through links on the district’s web page and any app that downloads podcasts. But even with its easy accessibility, Watson says many people are still just finding out about it.
“We’re still in the process of getting the word out,” he said. “Even some of our guests haven’t heard of it. But we think it’s a great way for people to connect with the school district and important topics in ways they might not have thought about before.”
Information about Teaching Gwinnett is online at gcpsk12.org.
SEND US YOUR STORIES. Each week we look at programs, projects and successful endeavors at area schools, from pre-K to grad school. To suggest a story, contact H.M. Cauley at hm_cauley@yahoo.com or 770-744-3042.
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