Missed Opportunities

Thousands of cars travel a very busy street near my home each day. A middle school sits on this street with their marquee situated in a place where the drivers of these thousands of cars have easy access to read messages from the school.

The marquee message all year has been "Check School Messenger." Obviously the school abandoned marquee postings in favor of an online communications tool. And that's the missed opportunity.

Whether you have students in that school or not, that marquee sits alone on a stretch of the road that has no distractions from billboards or retail shops. It's perfectly positioned to share information and to shape opinions, about the school, the students and the school district.

Imagine the messaging possibilities: "Congrats to 324 Honor Roll Students"; "Our Students Each Read 1 Million Words This Year": "Our Football Team Won the Championship!" "Congrats to Mr. Cameron - State Teacher of theYear". Each of these messages sends a positive message about the school to the motoring community. At no charge to the school.

And along the way, these positive messages would shape opinion about the school, its students and the school district. Posting "Check School Messenger" is a huge missed opportunity. The mistake they made was in thinking that the marquee was exclusively for school families. They forgot about the thousands.

Sometimes we miss opportunities in our own familiar landscape. Look again.