Using Social Media

This is so "2010".

I have used Social Media for years. My AdvApp class does the SGSC and GSHS websites and does a weekly e-mail newsletter called the E-News. 5 or so years ago, we started posting delay/cancellation notices on the website (as my beloved Superintendent makes that decision around 5:30 a.m., and then calls me, that often got posted significantly before it got on the radio/tv/phone messenger service). Then a brainstorm - we started sending out an e-mail using our E-News distribution lists. Well received.

4 years ago on the alternate weeks when my daughter stayed with my ex, my daughter asked me to start texting her about delays/cancellations. That got the word out even faster (we need not consider her average of 3500 texts a month). Then a dozen or so of her friends asked me to text them as well. Then 20 or so teachers. This was fast. And the textees texted others.

2 years ago we set up a Facebook account that my AdvApps use to post corporation-wide news. I started posting the delays/cancellations on Facebook first. After all, it just takes too long to go online and check e-mail!

This year, we set up a Twitter account that my AdvApps use for just GSHS news and I tweet the delay/cancellation first. Then text. Then Facebook. Then e-mail. Holy cats! Retweets are out there before my smartphone is set down.

Admittedly, because of  all the extra in-house webwork and publishing that the AdvApps do as well as being the Tech Corps Coordinator, SADD sponsor, Bible Study sponsor, Spring Musical Conductor, and myriad other responsibilities, I do have a need to contact students frequently outside of school hours. I do not use Facebook on a personal level, but do use Twitter/texting/e-mail.

From the administrative viewpoint - is there a potential for unhappiness? Can a telephone call be a problem?
Can a letter be a problem? Can a face-to-face conversation be a problem?

Here there be dragons?Social Media works. Very well.