Working with the Media

As we learned last week from working with Jane and Allison, you all have the opportunity to be great spokespeople for your children, youth and families. While it is the ultimate goal to have the issue of afterschool covered in your local media markets, it can even be more critical to reach those stakeholders who can actually do something to support your worthwhile endeavors such as school committee members, city council members, Mayors, selectmen, school superintendents among others.

Of course, it can help when approaching them to share your success stories that have appeared in your local newspapers even if they are part of a packet you hand them during a meeting or presentation.

To that end, the Afterschool Alliance has put together a great section on their website about how to work with the media. This includes a variety of tools including a searchable database on all the media markets in the country. Just type in your zip code and all the newspapers, TV, radio and magazine outlets pop up in your local area. This combined with writing guides and other tip sheets can help you craft your message.

Using Jane's powerful framing tools and information, you should have all the basics to make an effective pitch about why afterschool is important.

Make sure you tell us your success stories!

Deb