District plans targeted marketing push to regain students; board OKs six-month campaign starting March

Dr. Katherine Cost told the board the district aims to boost enrollment by 150 students by next fall and described a targeted marketing effort to reach prospective families.

Cost explained administrators considered several vendors and recommended contracting Plum Good Marketing for just over $12,000 to run a six-month campaign focused first on kindergarten recruitment and then career/CTC and high school outreach. She described a program that uses targeted social media to capture contact information and a staff-led follow-up process: "what that means is that we are going to target families with children that are school-aged... once they see people connecting on Facebook or Instagram, Facebook and Instagram will capture their contact information, put it into a fillable form which we will get the next day. We are going to train staff members to reach out to these families," Cost said.

Board members welcomed the proposal and framed it as a small investment that could quickly pay for itself. Dr. Weaver noted the cost-return math: "It only takes getting two students to pay this back." Several members urged aggressive timing; administration said the campaign is scheduled to start March 1 and will include radio, direct mail, billboards and targeted social posts in addition to the digital follow-up component.

The marketing contract was presented as a short-term experiment that will produce data to show whether the campaign increases inquiries and enrollment; staff said they will report results back to the board. The board did not take a separate vote on the presentation; it was discussed as part of committee reports and planning.