News You Can Use: Writing Your School Newsletter

By Francesca BarociocloseAuthor: Francesca Barocio Name: Francesca Barocio
Site: http://www.oc-tutor.com
About: Francesca Barocio (M.S.) thrives in seeing students getting better grades. Very early in life she began to realize her life-long dream and destiny as an educator. She has been an educator and role-model for 10 years. She assumed her initial educator and role-modeling persona by helping her moonlighting parents raise and teach her 5 younger brothers and sisters during their after school hours and weekends. In her first year as a student at UCLA, she served as a volunteer teacher for an after school community-service program for "at-risk" elementary school students. Here, she realized that teaching and learning truly belonged to everyone, regardless of his/her position in life. Francesca Barocio was formally recognized and named as one of the "top 1% of tutors" while teaching astronomy, anthropology, and political science for 3 years in the Athletic Tutorial Department and Academic Advancement Program at UCLA. She continued her streak for 2 more years in the Athletic Tutorial Department and University Tutorial Department at Michigan State University. While attending Michigan State University and University of California, Irvine as a M.S. and Ph.D. student, respectively, she also undertook responsibilities as sole-instructor and teaching assistant. In Spring 2008, she had the pleasure of teaching Criminal Justice Research Methods at Cal State Los Angeles, accomplishing one of her dreams. The rest of her dreams as educator, public servant, and leader alike are yet to be fulfilled. 10 tireless years of passion and commitment during her teaching career have provided her a solid grounding for her recent role as vice president of OC Tutor, LLC. She now thrives in seeing in the hearts of her team of tutors and proofreaders the same qualities of passion, dedication, and commitment that she had during her teaching career. Francesca Barocio fosters these qualities in the core of OC Tutor, LLC. Since her introduction into the company, she has increased OC Tutor, LLC's reach and scope by 50%. Within this 50% larger scope, struggling 'C' students have become 'A' students; worried English Language Learner (ELL) and foreign students have submitted better essays in their United States university classes; nervous college and scholarship applicants have submitted better personal statements; young small businesses have provided better newsletters; and burgeoning specialty/niche magazines have provided better articles. These OC Tutor students achieved these goals in the same way that Francesca Barocio's former students had done so. Because of Francesca Barocio's role modeling, public servant attitude, and leadership charisma that she shares with OC Tutor, LLC, the company's students are able to experience the equivalent role modeling and teaching that Francesca Barocio had provided her younger siblings and former students.See Authors Posts (2)
 

By Francesca Barocio
www.oc-tutor.com

If you are considering publishing a school program newsletter, do it! Well-written articles build students and parents’ trust. Make certain your facts and figures are accurate and your suggestions are timesaving.

For your newsletter to create a real impact, it must connect with your students and parents.

Professional newsletter writers study their students and parents’ needs very carefully before making suggestions. However, these recommendations are tried and true:

1. For a professional look, do not use more than two font styles.
2. Design your newsletter around three major articles—only!
3. For a good blend, consider a technical piece with easy-to-follow tables, charts and three reference links, a biographical interview, and a public interest highlight, which covers your school’s participation in the local community.
4. Calendars are very helpful but they require very special considerations. They must be easy to read, their content must be well thought out, and their elements must be uniform and consistent. They also must be posted at least three weeks prior to the date of the event.
5. Use sidebars very sparingly. They are meant to quickly summarize a long article, list pertinent references, or to include time-sensitive information.
6. Photos or illustrations must be very, very carefully selected. In fact, they must be able to tell your story without your words.
7. Time-sensitive content, such as special offers of goods or services, must be placed in a prominent space with good exposure. This is usually on the last page of a 4-page mailer newsletter, flipped, opposite the address when folded.
8. Let your students and parents dictate the tone. Ask how they wish to learn more about your school program.

Although print is expensive, the additional cost of printing a hard copy newsletter is well worth the expense. Newsletters serve as superb marketing collateral pieces. Remember, however cost-effective online publishing may be, it is not capable of reaching a very significant segment of the population. For best results, it is wise to prepare both soft and hard copies. Make sure to include a link on your school website with easy access to your archived issues.

RECAP
Successful communication between you and your readers occurs when you have captured their interest by selecting topics of concern, using an engaging tone, keeping your voice consistent (either active or passive), providing relevant images, and presenting the information in an uncluttered format.

If you are considering preparing multi-language content, we suggest you study the in-flight magazines prepared by major international airline companies. American Airlines’ American Way and Delta’s Sky publish very well written articles for a multi-cultural public. Air France Magazine boasts of an annual readership of over 4.5 million. It is an outstanding example of bilingual, French-English, print with gorgeous photography and highly engaging personality profiles.

TECHNICAL CORNER-CALENDAR OF EVENTS
Because a calendar of events must deliver a time-sensitive message in a succinct manner, abbreviations are widely used. To expedite an accurate preparation of all of the details, gather all relevant information first. Then, transfer the information to a document (.doc) format.

• If your space is limited, it is best to use a monthly planner-style format to announce events. Events requiring copy and multiple elements are best displayed in a columnar format.

• In English, days of the week and months of the year are capitalized. In Spanish, they are not, unless they are placed as the first word in a sentence. In addition, in Spanish, as in many other European languages, the month follows the numerical calendar date.

o Example:
(English)
Today is Tuesday, January 24, 2009.
(Spanish) Estamos a martes, 24 de enero de 2009. Hoy es martes, 24 de enero de 2009.

• Always include the day of the week when posting the date in columnar format.

o Example:
(English)
Friday, January 23, 2009
(Spanish)
viernes, 23 de enero de 2009

• When abbreviations are necessary, remain consistent. If you abbreviate the day, abbreviate the month; and do so with all dates within your calendar. In the same manner, abbreviation of the word boulevard requires the abbreviation of the words road, street, lane, avenue, and court. Be aware that in Mexico the building number follows the street name. In addition, each building is within a colonia (geographic community/neighborhood), which must be included with the address. Do add zip codes. They simplify searches on Google Map and Mapquest.

o Example:
Mon., Jan. 23, 2009
Wed., Aug. 30, 2009
Location:
2383 Mockingbird Blvd., Santa Ana, CA 92607
Location:
28 Riverdale Ln., Santa Ana, CA 92604
(Spanish)
Río Neva 42, Col. Cuauhtémoc, México, D.F., C.P. 06500

• A note about accents: They really must be used. If you plan to publish the newsletter online in Spanish, accents may not be neglected.

• You may post ante meridiem and post meridiem in several ways. Whichever you choose, you must remain consistent. The hyphen to use is an N-dash. The N-dash represents the word to. Leave no space between the hyphen and the characters it is placed between.

o Example: 11:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m.; 11:00 A.M.–12:00 P.M.

• You do not have to repeat the assignment of time if it is within the same 12 hour period; however, do remember that 12:01:00a is one minute after midnight.

o Example: 7:00–11:00 PM; 11:45 pm–12:01 am

• In English, each word in a title of an event is capitalized with exception of the prepositions. If you choose to prepare the title in all caps, do not forget to capitalize the “s” after a contracted word. In Spanish, it is now common to capitalize each word in an event title.

o Example: Family Night; Hike and Bike; IT’S A KID’S WORLD

• Always include a contact phone number. Do include the number “1” as part of the area code. In many areas of Orange County: Anaheim, Fullerton, Huntington Beach, Orange, Santa Ana, and Yorba Linda, the additional digit is required, even when making local calls.

o Example: 1-714-333-2828
• The use of hyphenation in compound words is a bit more complex. In English, do hyphenate the prefixes pre- and post-; in Spanish, do not.

o Example:
(English) Pre-registration required
(Spanish) Preinscripción necesario

• Keep the use of periods consistent in each block of copy. Do not end short phrases with stops.

o Example:
Saturday, January 25
Battle of the Bands
5:00–10:00 pm
Orange Coast College,
Moody Theater
2701 Fairview Road
Costa Mesa, CA 92928
(1714) 358-3899

$20 per person/all ages

This event is sponsored by the City of Irvine in cooperation with the Target Stores.

OUR REFERENCES
The Writer’s Digest Flip Dictionary by Barbara Ann Kipfer. This is one of the best references to use when you have a broad idea and you need to bring it down to a small group of words.
The Chicago Manual of Style published by The University of Chicago Press. The Chicago Manual of Style is in its 15th edition. It is the most widely used language reference book by the writers and editors in the magazine industry. Its online Question and Answer section is very helpful. It covers a wide range of issues referent to writing.
Gregg Reference Manual: Basic Worksheets on Grammar, Usage, and Style by William A. Sabin. A very simple book to follow, the Gregg Reference Manual states grammatical rules clearly and offers many excellent examples.