Your school might be on summer break, but that doesn’t mean its social media channels should take a vacation! From alumni stories to summer reading snapshots, there are dozens of ways to keep your feeds fresh, even when school’s out.
To keep the algorithms fed and your audiences engaged, we’ve rounded up the very best ideas from schools just like yours into one handy (and totally free!) PDF download. These suggestions are designed to keep your online community delighted all summer long, without adding too much to your plate.
Grab your copy now, so you can put your summer content calendar together right away!
Summer Social Media Made Simple
Here are those same 25 summer social media post ideas broken down with more explanation and a couple of examples thrown in for good measure. Enjoy!
1. Staff Summer Adventures
Ask your staff to send you photos and updates from their summer adventures, such as staycations, family reunions, road trips, and even vacations abroad. Posts like these help humanize your staff to your greater community and can even create unexpected connections.
2. Summer Reading Challenges
Ask families to submit photos of reading in fun locations or reading specific book genres. The sky’s the limit for how you want to run these challenges! Work with a school librarian to come up with fun themes or challenges.
Keep in mind that sometimes, simpler is better. The goal is really just to encourage reading, right? Here are two very easy ways you could do this post:
Idea 1: Ask families to share a photo of their kid(s) reading a book, a couple of times throughout the summer. Change this setting on Facebook so you can accept photo responses in the comments of a post:
Idea 2: On a regular basis, perhaps weekly, share a question like this with Facebook’s colored background: “Name a book that one of your kids read this week!” Here’s how to do it:
3. Post Building Maintenance / Construction Project Updates
Take before and after photos of any building maintenance and construction projects happening at your campus(es) this summer. No matter how big or small the project is, these types of posts tend to garner a lot of interest.
Fountain-Fort Carson School District 8, CO
McCracken County Public Schools, KY
4. Publish #ThrowbackThursdays
If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it 52 times – #ThrowbackThursday photos using old school yearbooks are always homerun social media posts!!
Did you know that nostalgia is one of the top emotions that inspires people to share content on social media? Tap into that power and make TBTs a staple of your summer content. Here’s a fun example:
5. Share Summer School Stories
Many schools offer summer classes, so why not show your followers the wins from inside those classrooms? It could be a math class or a fishing course (check out this fin-tastic example, below), but no matter what those kids are up to, people will love to see them learning!
Pittsville School District, WI
6. Start a “Countdown to the First Day of School”
Now, this doesn’t have to be a daily post (your followers would tune you out pretty quickly), but even an Instagram Story every couple of weeks or a fun graphic every once in a while would build excitement. Countdown those days and get families excited about being back in school!
7. Tell Alumni Success Stories
Many private schools have development teams that stay in touch with alumni and feature them in their newsletters and magazines. That would make great social media content, too! If your district doesn’t have a system in place for collecting alumni stories, you could start by creating a simple survey on your website.
It could be as simple as “We want to hear from our [School Name] alumni! Where are you now?” and ask a handful of questions. Other schools get stories through word-of-mouth and reach out to get permission from each graduate to share their stories. Collect a photo or two, get a yearbook snapshot as well (of course!), and now you have compelling content to add to your summer line-up.
8. Highlight Sporting Events
What sports camps, events, or trips are going on in your district, this summer? Share photos and updates from your athletes at all levels! Get in touch with coaches or involved parents, to collect photos and updates that you can share.
Moss Point School District, MS
9. Introduce New Staff Members
As you batch your work this summer, make sure you work ahead on “Meet the Staff” posts. Your school is likely making new hires for the next school year, already, and your community is eager to meet them!
Every Friday – or whatever frequency makes sense for your district – introduce a new staff member on social media. Here are a couple of ideas for what those posts could look like:
10. Show Behind-the-Scenes Deep Cleaning and Prep
What goes on in and around your school buildings, during the summer? Are your floors getting waxed? Does furniture get moved around? Are the lawns getting mowed and the shrubs getting trimmed?
These might not seem like glamorous ideas for social media, but people love the opportunity to thank the people who are doing the “dirty work” to keep the buildings and grounds looking beautiful and functional for students and staff!
Never miss an opportunity to thank your custodial staff – trust me on this one. Just look at all the amazing comments on this post:
11. School Spirit Photo Challenge
“We’ve got spirit, yes we do!” I wrote an entire blog about school spirit-themed social media posts, and many of these ideas work great as filler content in the summertime. Scroll to the end for a user-generated contest idea:
12. Share Summer Professional Development (PD) Stories
Summer is rich with in-service events and education conferences. Take time to celebrate them! Most of your community probably doesn’t know about all the work that your staff puts into their professional development, especially in the summertime.
Glendale Elementary School District, AZ
13. Guess Where This Is?
I thought this was such a clever photo contest idea from Jacksonville North Pulaski School District! You could make it your own by taking close-up photos around your school campus (“Where was this photo taken?”) or posing your school mascot around the city. Ask your followers to guess where the photos were taken!
Jacksonville North Pulaski School District, AZ
14. Feature Students Working
How neat would it be to spotlight your hard-working teens working at their summer jobs and internships?! You could work with your student services team to identify young people who would be good candidates. Or, ask your social media followers to nominate students that you could feature.
15. Share Band, Theater, and Arts Programming Updates
Your followers would love to see a short video from a rousing marching band parade or some behind-the-scenes photos from your theater club that meets in the summer! Grab those arts calendars and swing by rehearsals, or ask for photos and footage from those involved.
Those posts could even spread awareness about programs that some people in the community didn’t even know you offered!
16. Summer Gardens and Grounds
Someone maintains your school gardens and grounds, right? Seek them out! Show your followers who keeps the gardens growing:
17. Top 10 Moments From the School Year
One of the easiest social media series that you can run, this summer, is the “Top 10 Moments.”
Below is how Winona Area Public Schools repurposed school year content by packaging it into graphics. This district chose to choose the “Top 10 Posts,” but you can also choose “Top 10 Moments” so you’re not bound by the posts that performed the best (in case you had some controversial posts or Snow Day posts that took the top spots!)
Winona Area Public Schools, MN
18. Summer Athletic Training Updates
When your football team gets back into the weight room and your cross-country team starts hitting the trails, social media can be right there with them! Celebrate what your young athletes are doing before classes start by asking the coaches to send you photos and updates.
19. Unveil New Technology or Equipment
Pop into your school library or media center and ask if they have anything new coming in this summer. Chances are – they do! Wouldn’t an unboxing video be fun!?
This would also work great with new books or new classroom supplies. Can’t you just smell those new crayons? Bring your followers into that experience, too!
20. “Did You Know?” Fun Facts
Here’s another fun, easy-to-batch idea! Gather some fun facts and stats about your district, and sprinkle them throughout the summer as #TriviaTuesday posts. These could be done on Facebook’s colored background or branded graphics.
This school turned it into a mini quiz!
School District of Onalaska, WI
21. Back-to-School Tips and Reminders
As the school year looms, families are going to start looking to you for information. I love how this school principal used social media to inject humor and personality into an Open House reminder:
Barrow County School System, GA
You’ll have no shortage of back-to-school reminders to make! Social media is one of your communication channels, so head over to my handy blog for everything you need to do to get organized for back-to-school communications on social media:
22. Share Yummy Recipes
Ask your school nutrition team if they have any easy, family-friendly recipes that they could have you share on social media this summer. Pair them with a compelling photo, and you’re set for more evergreen content throughout the summer months!
23. School Mascot Adventures
What does your school mascot do in the summertime? You get to decide!
Take that symbol of school spirit out on some summer adventures, capturing photo and video footage along the way. Here are some resources to spark your creativity:
24. Post Links to School Supply Lists
Now here’s a post that’s highly shareable! Post links to your school supply list(s) when they’re ready (make sure you have an attractive, branded graphic), and families will appreciate you making them so accessible.
25. Celebrate Volunteerism
Identify students and staff volunteering in the community, and celebrate those stories on social media! Similar to the posts about students working at their summer jobs, you can work with your student services team or request nominations from the wider community. You can also ask your staff members where they volunteer and ask for photos.
What other fun summer ideas did we miss? I would love to know what else you’re posting this summer on your school accounts! Send me an email to let me know what you’re celebrating at your school. I can’t wait to hear about those stories.
