Comments on: Never too late for school closings http://merandawrites.com/2008/01/04/never-too-late-for-school-closings/ curious by nature, journalist by trade Tue, 02 Dec 2008 03:23:50 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.0.5 by: Meranda http://merandawrites.com/2008/01/04/never-too-late-for-school-closings/#comment-12041 Sat, 05 Jan 2008 15:42:55 +0000 http://merandawrites.com/2008/01/04/never-too-late-for-school-closings/#comment-12041 Shawn — We only have one TV station based here. The rest of the stations are out of Indy, but some of those carry our local cancellations as well. We also have several radio stations. (Though, personally, the idea of waiting to hear it on the radio sounds crazy. Who would do that?!) We have an e-mail address set up that we're using exclusively for breaking news from schools/police agencies. And we're working on setting up a form online for other cancellations. I know a lot of stations have code words, etc., which is something I brought up with my editor. But we're trying to keep it simple and will simply dial back to confirm. I don't know about those TV stations sharing a single list — if they do it's likely pilfered, not shared. But I could be wrong and have never worked in broadcast. Our biggest challenge, other than getting people to call us, is that we don't always have the same person on those shifts. So we needed something centralized so that no matter who happens to come in that morning, the information gets there. We also need to train our staffers to take the calls, not just say "OH, it's schools! Well, Meranda's not around." Or leave me messages that I don't see for two hours when we should have gotten that news up immediately. As I said, it's a process. We'll see as we head into winter/school closing season how successful my hours of tracking people down has been and will be. And I'm sure we'll find some hiccups and work them out as well. Shawn — We only have one TV station based here. The rest of the stations are out of Indy, but some of those carry our local cancellations as well. We also have several radio stations. (Though, personally, the idea of waiting to hear it on the radio sounds crazy. Who would do that?!)

We have an e-mail address set up that we’re using exclusively for breaking news from schools/police agencies. And we’re working on setting up a form online for other cancellations. I know a lot of stations have code words, etc., which is something I brought up with my editor. But we’re trying to keep it simple and will simply dial back to confirm. I don’t know about those TV stations sharing a single list — if they do it’s likely pilfered, not shared. But I could be wrong and have never worked in broadcast.

Our biggest challenge, other than getting people to call us, is that we don’t always have the same person on those shifts. So we needed something centralized so that no matter who happens to come in that morning, the information gets there. We also need to train our staffers to take the calls, not just say “OH, it’s schools! Well, Meranda’s not around.” Or leave me messages that I don’t see for two hours when we should have gotten that news up immediately.

As I said, it’s a process. We’ll see as we head into winter/school closing season how successful my hours of tracking people down has been and will be. And I’m sure we’ll find some hiccups and work them out as well.

]]> by: shawn smith http://merandawrites.com/2008/01/04/never-too-late-for-school-closings/#comment-12040 Sat, 05 Jan 2008 15:15:31 +0000 http://merandawrites.com/2008/01/04/never-too-late-for-school-closings/#comment-12040 This is something we've long thought about as well but have yet to pull off. I think some of the TV stations in our area have a hotline that the schools call and they all share that one hotline. Do the stations in your area have those? We haven't yet approached anyone on this, but it's a big project that would be incredibly important to readers. good luck! This is something we’ve long thought about as well but have yet to pull off. I think some of the TV stations in our area have a hotline that the schools call and they all share that one hotline. Do the stations in your area have those? We haven’t yet approached anyone on this, but it’s a big project that would be incredibly important to readers. good luck!

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