Jamestown Public Schools Public Relations Specialist Cameron Hurst updates the school board on the district’s Strategic Communications Plan. P-J photo by Michael Zabrodsky

Jamestown Public Schools is updating its Strategic Communications Plan.

School board members heard Tuesday about the plan’s first phase from Cameron Hurst, Jamestown Public Schools public relations specialist.

Hurst said the district works to communicate inspiring stories, achievements, and initiatives by keeping district families engaged and involved. Through Facebook postings, JPS website postings, the district’s budget newsletter, press releases, and the JPS Schools page in The Post-Journal are some of the ways the district communicates with residents and families.

“Our aim is the first step to family-community engagement,” Hurst said. “And over the last several years, our schools have worked really closely with Scholastic (Books) and they have challenged our schools to really question, are we informing our families? Are we engaging our families, or are we empowering our families?”

Hurst said the same mindset guides the district’s communication and public relations practices.

“The more clearly and consistently we (JPS) communicate, the more trust we build with our school community,” Hurst said.

In 2023, Hurst noted, is when the district began to find ways to strengthen its communication. It was done through the platforms Class Intercom and Smore. Class Intercom is a social media management platform for educators to teach, lead, and mentor students while Smore helps teachers and administrators to create newsletters.

Hurst said Class Intercom has centralized the district’s social media management which allows JPS to extend controlled access to principals and staff to contribute to the district’s social media presence. In the future, Hurst said, students may have the ability to contribute to the district’s social media platforms.

Hurst added that Smore is used by principals to help inform families and staff.

“Some principals are using it to inform their staff as sort of an intranet,” Hurst said. “It’s a really great tool. We (the district) internally have used this tool to create our own internal newsletter to inform our 1,100 employees and keep everybody updated on a regular basis.”

The newsletter was a quarterly publication which has moved to a weekly publication for 2025-2026 school year, Hurst said.

Included with the plan is updating the district’s website to a modern, user-centered, that reflects community input, supports how families search for information, Hurst noted.

Board President Paul Abbott asked are there steps in place to inform residents quickly about any emergencies the district may face.

“We’re always evaluating how we do that, and how we not only get accurate information out there (to district residents), but also prevent the spread of misinformation from being out there too,” Hurst said.

In other business:

The board approved the creation of a building maintenance supervisor. Superintendent Dr. Kevin Whitaker said the position helps the district with streamlining the work of the maintenance group and making work orders more efficient.

The board approved the renewal of authorization to negotiate data privacy agreements with BOCES. Whitaker said that BOCES puts together a consortium to vet software providers who have access to private student data instead of the many school districts across New York State taking on the task themselves.