21 Ways Independent Schools Can Use Twitter

Independent schools are flocking to social media and with good reason – promises of improved marketing, branding, and engagement at little or no cost is pretty appealing. The problem though is once independent schools create their social media accounts they aren’t sure how to proceed.

Below I’ve compiled a list of 21 ways that independent schools can use Twitter. My list is not exhaustive and I encourage everyone to offer at least one additional way to use Twitter in the comments after this post.

1. Automatically feed your school’s RSS news feed to your school’s Twitter account using a service like TwitterFeed.
2. Post your school’s sports scores and results.
3. Tweet photos and descriptions of your new teachers using yfrog.
4. Post your daily lunch menu.
5. Tweet school cancellations due to weather.
6. Tweet articles from local newspapers that discuss your school.
7. Post changes in the daily schedule.
8. Tweet a school picture of the day.
9. Take a series of photos of dress rehearsal for a school performance and post a short animated image using Vine to encourage people to attend.
10. Tweet quotes from school meetings that are informational or memorable.
11. Tweet job openings at your school.
12. Tweet upcoming admission, alumni, and scheduled calendar events as reminders.
13. Individual teachers can post Questions of the Day for extra-credit.
14. Conduct research using Twitter Search. (Watch a screencast about searching Twitter.)
15. Create a PLN (Personal Learning Network) by reaching out to colleagues at other schools through Twitter.
16. Create a Twitter List of Alumni.
17. Create a Twitter List of Faculty and Staff on Twitter.
18. Tweet items from your other social networks.
19. Tweet new additions to your library.
20. Share educational news and articles germane to your school.
21. Follow other teachers, schools, alumni, and people in your community and listen to how they use Twitter.

Your turn

This list is not meant to be exhaustive. Please share one or two additional ways that schools can use Twitter by posting them in the comments section below.