Preschool+California


 * Early Edge California, formerly Preschool California **


 * Contact Person: **  Diana Chun, Communications & Online Advocacy Associate

 ** Phone: ** (510) 271-0075 x 303

 ** Email: **dchun@preschoolcalifornia.org

 **Web Site:** www.preschoolcalifornia.org

 ** Executive Director: ** Catherine Atkin

 ** Communications Director: ** Deborah Kong

 ** Social Media Staff: ** Diana Chun


 * Baseline **

 ** CWRF Overall Level: ** Walk

 ** Overall Score: **1.31

 ** Detailed Score: ** []
 * Indicator || Pre-Program Score || Post Program Score ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Networked Mindset || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">1 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Institutional Support || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">2 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Communications Strategy || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">1 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Staffing || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">1 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Analysis || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">1 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Tools || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">2 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Sense-Making || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">2 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Brand Monitoring || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">2 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Influencer Researcher || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">1 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Content || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">1 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Engagement || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">1 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Champions || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">1 ||  ||
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Relationship Mapping || <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">1 ||  ||


 * <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Burning Questions To Be Answered **<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">: 1. How can we make measurement a regular part of what we do? 2. How can we better identify/prioritize measurable objectives organizationally?


 * <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">Social Media Presence **

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Blog:

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/PreschoolCalifornia

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Fans: 1122

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">YouTube yes

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Subscribers: 26

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Views:57000

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Twitter Consistent, Engaging with followers

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Followers: 3247

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Hashtags: #ECE #B25 #EarlyEd #ELLChat


 * Jun 25 -** So much has happened since my last post!

(Some background: **1)** We have expanded our mission to birth to 3rd grade (used to be age 0 to 5 focused), changed our name to Early Edge California, refreshed our website and created brand new materials. This also meant changing our name, profiles, URLs on social media and posting our new resources and about why we changed our name. Social media has been very helpful in keeping us connected online. The rebranding process is still in the works. We want to continue to use social media as an outreach and connecting tool. ** 2) ** We have a wonderful new Senior Communications Manager. She is both Twitter and FB savvy and is willing to engage on her personal Twitter on our issues.)

These are both exciting developments. We are in a new position, working with an expanded audience while at the same time at a position where we are still learning. There is a lot of work to do!

Here's what we've had a chance to do:
 * Updated our lists of early learning journalists and early learning advocates/organizations/champions to follow and engage
 * Analyzed editorial calendar for June
 * The beginning of June was an involved period for social media. June 5 was Early Learning Day of Action. There was a lot of activity on Twitter, and I did a recap on Storify. We posted more on Facebook that day than usual, and it was helpful to see what kind of posts work.
 * We're creating an editorial calendar for next month. We're trying to develop these calendars ahead of time, but there does seem to be something new we want to post every day and it can sometimes be hard to predict what we are posting a week in advance. We know some posts surrounding events and report releases.
 * I love this practice of measuring and analyzing. I have not yet exported FB data. I may start doing this and then modifying the "format" and "topic" a bit. It really makes you more thoughtful when posting. Great practice!
 * Developing a POST strategy involving a fairly new infographic from our website and spending about $10 on Facebook advertising to see how much of a difference this can make. We want our new materials out there and we think this might be a cost-effective way to do that.
 * Tried a free Simply Measured analysis. It was a good free tool, but I want to play with this more to really see what we can get out of it.

I still want our audience to be more engaged and willing to leave comments. I see many of our posts have a wide reach and shares, but more interaction would be ideal.

I also want to try to add Twitter and FB options onto our action alerts. Something where participants who took action could click a link and share what they did. Could be a great way to reach more people.

I can't believe today is the last call! I think I've gained a lot of good new practices from this group. I'm very happy to be in the FB group where we can share and ask question as a continue resource. I wish I had more time during the past few months, but I think I'm well positioned to take what I've learned and flesh it out more. Thank you to Beth and everyone in this group!


 * Mar 19 -** Since the last call, I have unfortunately had little time to work on a fleshed out SPOT plan. We are doing major work on our website, but I see more time in sight at the end of the month. While there hasn't been a chance for a major social media push this month, I was able to read the 5 content tips for FB and try to incorporate these practices into the regular updates. I have been continuing to try to maintain and increase engagement on both Twitter and FB, and actually left the office (sunlight!) and went into the ece field and collected children's photos that I can use for FB posts in the future.


 * Feb 26 -** The coaching session with Beth helped me feel more comfortable in not "flying" or "running" as I don't think others in my organization aside from me or any potential future interns will use social media.

I've begun to refine our social media policy. Last time, I had created a new policy using the free online PolicyTool.net. Since then, I've connected with Beth and the National Center for Family Philanthropy, who recently created their policy plan, to help fine tune our own policy and tailor it to our organization. It was helpful to see a real example from another nonprofit organization. I spoke with our communications director about having a more formal policy, and she saw the value in having this for our social media practices.

We also discussed the relationship mapping, which I think may take a great deal of time, but will be very valuable. I'll be sifting through some spreadsheets of organizations that we have worked or partnered with.This will be so helpful to better engage and build relationships online.


 * Feb 20 -** Random thoughts post - Our FB page was very active following the State of the Union. As we continued to quickly post news and quotes fans wanted to see, we had more activity (likes, fans, comments, sharing) than usual. It was nice to have one of our issues discussed by the President on a federal level, which allowed us to post more and be a thought leader on the issue online. As some time has passed since SOTU, the activity has slowed. It reminded me that success comes in waves and is tied to timing, but it made me excited to get back to that level of activity and to hopefully plan for that kind of activity.

On a coaching call with Beth, she mentioned a good practice is using editorial calendars to lay out your plan for the week. I'd like to get into this practice.

__Networked Mindset__ - PC is currently at the crawling stage of "u nderstanding of networks that are connected to organization." We know our audience consists of other early childhood education advocacy groups, policymakers, journalists/bloggers, educators and even parents. We make a general effort to "follow" the first three audiences, especially on Twitter. A next step to make it to the walking stage would be to start visually mapping specific nodes and relationships, with input from all staff. Based off of those maps, I would need to separate into "lists" that we monitor and engage with more closely and more frequently.
 * Feb. 5 - Culture Indicators Review**

__Institutional Support__ - PC is in the walking stage in this arena. I have to admit that I feel we may be in the early walking stages. While our team has discussed how social media works, the kinds of posts we make, the benefits and our yearly growth on Facebook and Twitter, we do not have an in-depth or formal strategic plan or policy plan devoted solely to social media. As the Communications & Online Advocacy Asssociate, I am the only person on staff updating our Twitter and Facebook as of right now. This may change with any future potential interns or a larger rethinking of staff's involvement with social media. I follow a general set of unwritten guidelines so that our posts are appropriate and related to our issues. Currently, staff is encouraged to flag potential social media content and take photos at events for me. This happens occasionally, but this practice is not yet ingrained in the culture. The rest of the PC team would be open to giving feedback on social media policy and strategic plans, but I don't know that staff would have time to go so far as making posts themselves.

As mentioned above, PC does not have a formal or written policy plan. However, I recently created one online through the resource PolicyTool.net. I based the answers to the questionnaire on the current understood policies for my role and some hopes for how staff could use social media in the future. This is not official, as a further conversation with the Communications Manager is necessary to decide what is realistic and how "open" we can be. It's a good start.
 * Social Media Policy Plan **

The first two chapters of //Measuring the Networked Nonprofit// and orientation sparked feelings of excitement and eagerness, as well as some anxiety over how to bring about change with time and staffing constraints.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Jan. 23 - Orientation Reflection **

I particularly liked Beth's "Crawl, Walk, Run, Fly" model and how it comes replete with a scoring guide so I can have a tangible score to reflect progress - after all, we are now measuring! After the reading, I come in knowing that progress can be slow and not always consistent for any organization, so I do not expect to see progress immediately. However, I am very excited to get the right policies, culture and strategies in place for a more open, engaging social media presence that will further the efforts of our organization.