In case you've been living under a rock for the past week, the H1N1 (swine flu) virus has taken over our area. The school district I work for was the first in the state, and the country, to shut down because of the virus.
You would think I'd be relaxing poolside with a cold one in my hand, but you'd be thinking wrong.
Being part of the tech staff means that you get to help in spreading the word when there's an emergency. I have become, in this past week, part of the PR team for our district.
Now understand, I'm not complaining one bit. I'm actually enjoying the challenge this change in routine has brought on. I'm able to use my understanding of the tools out there to help our district spread the word about anything and everything related to this closure.
It started on Sunday, when I got a call from my boss. "The Superintendent wants to do a podcast," he said, "and was wondering if you could come up and help her do it."
I had heard Saturday that we'd be closing one high school, but on Sunday, it all changed when the Department of State Health Services shut down our entire district. Word needed to get out quickly, and in as many ways as possible. We'd updated the web site, and put out an auto-call, but there were more ways to get the message out, so I opened up my arsenal and started asking permission.
The two things that we've done this week, based on my suggestion, was to start a Twitter account for the district, and to live stream the Superintendent's daily press briefings on UStream. Sunday and early Monday, I was tweeting district updates on my own twitter account and on Facebook, but it got to be a bit much, and I didn't want "official" word coming from me. I wanted it to be something that people could look at and say, "Yes, this belongs to the district." So up went the district's twitter account. In just over 48 hours, we've gained almost 100 followers, including several of the local news outlets and reporters. Several of the names I recognized as district teachers (and I was surprised by how many of them are on twitter), and several more are students - it's easy to tell the students by their user names or profiles.
The UStream of the press briefing got its first trial today. While the audio was off a bit, I think if the Superintendent just speaks up a little it will be fine. Unfortunately, UStream is having recording issues, so there was no way for us to have it available for playback. We embedded the stream on the district home page for the duration of the press briefing, and I also put the URL for the UStream page on Twitter. At one point, we had about 20 people watching, which was way more than I expected. Only one question came in via Twitter, although I expect more tomorrow.
Every evening, I get the audio for the podcast from the Superintendent, edit for about 20-30 minutes and post it to the district home page, as well as her podcast page. If she sends me the transcript of the podcast, I post that to her blog page as well.
Luckily, our web site has been holding up incredibly well under the strain. Before this week, our normal, weekday average was 2500 hits per day, and that's with students in the district opening the web page any time they open a browser.
On Saturday, we had almost 4000 hits. Sunday, we broke 10,000. We had another 10,000 Monday, and dipped to 7300 yesterday, but as of this posting, we're at 11,500 and will probably hit 12,000 before midnight this evening.
Our district has gotten national attention because of this outbreak, and I hope that the information we're putting out has been able to keep people informed. We're doing as much as we can, as best as we can. Our Superintendent has been doing an outstanding job, and has been interviewed by major news outlets all over the country, from the Wall Street Journal to NPR. And every night, before she goes home for the day, she sits down and records audio for me to edit for the podcast. With everything else on her plate, I'm proud of her for sticking with it.
Hopefully, when all of this is over with, we'll continue to put our information out there using Web 2.0 tools. Hopefully, this this a turning point for our district in information distribution!
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Sunday, April 26, 2009
A little break
So, in case you haven't heard, there has been a little outbreak of swine flu here in Texas. The two confirmed cases were both at one of the high schools in the district where I work.
Since nobody knows exactly how far this is going to go, the Texas Department of State Health has decided to close down our district for the week. Which means, I get a little unplanned vacation.
Maybe I'll get some things done around the house.
Since nobody knows exactly how far this is going to go, the Texas Department of State Health has decided to close down our district for the week. Which means, I get a little unplanned vacation.
Maybe I'll get some things done around the house.
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Two years, ten months
Dear Rachel,
This week, you turned 34 months old. This past month could be described as the "Month of a Million Questions." You've hit that questioning phase in your life, where you want to know the who, what, when, where, why, and how of everything. "Daddy, where are we going? Are we going to turn left? Is Mama's school that way? What's it doing there? Why is it just sitting there?" The only time we got a reprieve from the questioning the entire month was when you were sick.
You got really sick for the first time in your life this month. We've had little bouts of diarrhea, a little food poisoning, but nothing like this. You were out for the count for almost a week. I couldn't believe that this vibrant, talkative little girl had turned into this quiet, tired little thing that could barely sit up to watch TV. You ate almost nothing for three days. The first day, you couldn't even hold down water, but you got really good at throwing up in the toilet and waste basket. We were very worried about you. Luckily, after 4 days, you finally were able to hold some food down. Now, a week later, your appetite is voracious, like you're trying to make up for lost time. I don't know if that has anything to do with you being sick, or if you're just going through another growth spurt (and God help us if that's the case!)
You decided this month that we should call the baby "Mater" after Tow Mater from Cars, but you also understand that we're going to name your baby sister something different when she comes out. You're still sort of hot and cold about the whole baby thing, but you did decide that she could have your room, and you'd take "Nana and Dod's woom!" I think it's going to be very interesting to see how you react to having a baby in the house.
You are struggling with growing up a bit. At one moment, you are a very stubbornly independent little girl. Two seconds later, you're wanting us to pick you up, or help you put on your shoes, or brush your teeth for you. Again, it will be interesting to see what happens with this behavior when the new baby arrives.
We've been practicing with you writing you letters, and you do OK with a few of them, but you already know how to find all of them on a keyboard. You spend a lot of time "typing yike Nana" on Mama's computer, and you really love to make smiley faces. Mama's word processor will change :) into a smiley face. Sometimes I wonder if you'll learn to touch type before you can write.
You have really gotten into watching videos of yourself this past month. You will ask us all the time if you can watch the one with Mommy eating "bef-kest," which is the video of your first week in the world, of which 1/2 second is your Mommy eating breakfast, but that's how you identify it. Any video of yourself is accompanied by the barrage of questions (see the first paragraph).
We've been skyping with your grandparents a couple of times each week, so you get to see them and talk to them, which is really cool for all of us. You like to have them hide from you (leave the view of the camera) and you always want to see Rhett and his medicine. I have no idea why. I'm glad that your grandparents have a computer that can handle the video now!
As always, we can't wait to see what the next month will bring (hopefully less of the terrible twos!). We love you very much.
Love,
Daddy
This week, you turned 34 months old. This past month could be described as the "Month of a Million Questions." You've hit that questioning phase in your life, where you want to know the who, what, when, where, why, and how of everything. "Daddy, where are we going? Are we going to turn left? Is Mama's school that way? What's it doing there? Why is it just sitting there?" The only time we got a reprieve from the questioning the entire month was when you were sick.
You got really sick for the first time in your life this month. We've had little bouts of diarrhea, a little food poisoning, but nothing like this. You were out for the count for almost a week. I couldn't believe that this vibrant, talkative little girl had turned into this quiet, tired little thing that could barely sit up to watch TV. You ate almost nothing for three days. The first day, you couldn't even hold down water, but you got really good at throwing up in the toilet and waste basket. We were very worried about you. Luckily, after 4 days, you finally were able to hold some food down. Now, a week later, your appetite is voracious, like you're trying to make up for lost time. I don't know if that has anything to do with you being sick, or if you're just going through another growth spurt (and God help us if that's the case!)
You decided this month that we should call the baby "Mater" after Tow Mater from Cars, but you also understand that we're going to name your baby sister something different when she comes out. You're still sort of hot and cold about the whole baby thing, but you did decide that she could have your room, and you'd take "Nana and Dod's woom!" I think it's going to be very interesting to see how you react to having a baby in the house.
You are struggling with growing up a bit. At one moment, you are a very stubbornly independent little girl. Two seconds later, you're wanting us to pick you up, or help you put on your shoes, or brush your teeth for you. Again, it will be interesting to see what happens with this behavior when the new baby arrives.
We've been practicing with you writing you letters, and you do OK with a few of them, but you already know how to find all of them on a keyboard. You spend a lot of time "typing yike Nana" on Mama's computer, and you really love to make smiley faces. Mama's word processor will change :) into a smiley face. Sometimes I wonder if you'll learn to touch type before you can write.
You have really gotten into watching videos of yourself this past month. You will ask us all the time if you can watch the one with Mommy eating "bef-kest," which is the video of your first week in the world, of which 1/2 second is your Mommy eating breakfast, but that's how you identify it. Any video of yourself is accompanied by the barrage of questions (see the first paragraph).
We've been skyping with your grandparents a couple of times each week, so you get to see them and talk to them, which is really cool for all of us. You like to have them hide from you (leave the view of the camera) and you always want to see Rhett and his medicine. I have no idea why. I'm glad that your grandparents have a computer that can handle the video now!
As always, we can't wait to see what the next month will bring (hopefully less of the terrible twos!). We love you very much.
Love,
Daddy
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