Tejal Patel will serve as Executive Officer of Communications for the Houston Independent School District.
Patel is the first Indian American to lead the district’s communications department in the nearly 100-year history of HISD.
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Houston ISD announced the selection of its Chief Engagement Officer, Max Moll.
Moll will lead a department that includes communications, board services, family and community engagement, government relations, and community partnerships, along with HISD’s Parent Center.
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Sherry Williams has been selected as press secretary for the Houston Independent School District.
Williams, an Emmy-winning journalist whose career spans three decades, joins HISD from Houston’s KHOU 11 news team, where she anchors the Saturday morning news from 7 to 9 a.m. She previously anchored the 9 p.m. news at CW 39 and reported for Fox 26 Houston. She also has worked in broadcast markets in Dallas, Detroit, and Bryan-College Station.
Williams grew up in Houston’s Third Ward near the Texas Southern University campus and attended HISD’s Turner Elementary School, Lanier Middle School and Lamar High School. Continue reading
District wins 5 NSPRA Golden Achievement Awards and multiple honors for print and digital communications
The Houston Independent School District Communications team was honored for its crisis communications to families, staff, and the community during Hurricane Harvey – the worst disaster in Houston history – with a Golden Achievement Award from the National School Public Relations Association (NSPRA).
HISD’s Communications team, under the direction of Chief Communications Officer Rebecca Suarez, worked day and night to keep families and the public informed before, during, and after Hurricane Harvey. In addition to local communications efforts, the team also facilitated the dissemination of information on a state and national level.
“Harvey did not stop us, but it made us stronger. Despite the difficulties from the hurricane, we found creative ways to communicate critical and timely information to our students, parents, employees, and the community during one of the worst disasters in local history,” Suarez said. “I’m very proud of my team for the hard work and commitment to putting students first in everything we do.”
Golden Achievement Awards recognize exemplary work in all aspects of school public relations, communication, marketing, and engagement. HISD won a total of five Golden Achievement Awards for the following work: Continue reading
The Houston Independent School District’s Communications Department picked up 25 Star Awards, as well as a Platinum Award Certificate of Merit and three Crystal Commendation Certificates of Merit, during the 2018 Texas School Public Relations Association Annual Conference in Frisco.
“We have a team of highly qualified individuals who are committed to doing exceptional work that supports and informs our schools and communities,” said HISD Communications Chief Rebecca Suarez. “It takes teamwork and dedication to tell the stories of HISD in an effective and compelling way, and I couldn’t be more proud of our department.” Continue reading
The HISD news blog recently was named by Feedspot as one of its Top 30 Houston Blogs and Websites.
The HISD news blog ranked 9th overall, just after the Houston Museum of Natural Science and one spot above Swamplot: Houston’s Real Estate Landscape. Read the entire list here. The best Houston blogs were chosen from thousands using search and social metrics, including the following criteria: Continue reading
Editor’s note: This is the first in a weekly series of articles designed to highlight the work of HISD students, particularly as it relates to developing global graduate skills, connecting learning to careers, or preparing for higher education. In this inaugural feature, we take a look at the communications program at Yates High School, whose students covered the district’s State of the Schools luncheon on March 3 as a part of their project-based assignments.
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More than 150 students currently participate in the communications program at Yates HS, and several of those young people got to attend HISD’s recent State of the Schools luncheon. While there, they applied what they are learning in the classroom to real life, honing their skills in photography, film-making, interviewing, and story-telling.
Dr. Grier honored by NSPRA for effective community partnerships, engagement practices
The National School Public Relations Association (NSPRA) has awarded HISD Superintendent Terry Grier the 2015 Bob Grossman Leadership in School Communications Award. The award recognizes a practicing superintendent of schools for outstanding leadership in school public relations and communications. The award will be presented on July 14 at the NSPRA National Seminar in Nashville, Tenn.
“From the multi-channeled communication program that has been established in Houston ISD to the authentic engagement, transparency, and accountability at all levels, there is no question that Terry Grier leads by example and ‘walks the walk’ in supporting strategic communication as a management function,” said NSPRA Executive Director Rich Bagin.
Students in the magnet communications program at Yates High School recently launched a massive archiving project that will one day result in the digitization of more than 30 years of video footage.
Phase one entails the ingestion of hundreds of video tapes from the Yates magnet program dating back to 1980, containing footage of the school and its history, events, faculty, and students.
The ultimate goal of the project is to produce a digital archive on Blu-Ray discs that can be displayed at the school’s new facility and will be ready in time for the 40th anniversary of the School of Communications in 2018.
Yates’ new chapter of the Student Television Network is using the latest in digital content acquisition technology to ingest the legacy analog video into an updated iMac system. Students involved are acquiring skills that can be used in the media archiving industry, film and television non-linear video editing, and metadata management, which is an introduction to meta-tagging and understanding aggregate data for social media careers.