As a school administrator, an important part of your job includes sourcing external vendors to help keep the school running smoothly. It’s easy to understand the appeal of the lowest-cost option or continue working with the same vendor the person who had your job before you signed ten years ago.
In our experience, many schools searching for vendors are looking for true school partners. Any company can be a vendor, exchanging services or goods for money, but creating a partnership involves much more than a business transaction.
What is a school partner?
A school partner works with your school, not just for your school. When you work with a school partner, you’re both working together toward a common goal.
Ideally, your relationships with your school partners are mutually beneficial. Rather than simply providing your school with products or services in exchange for money, are they giving back in any way? Perhaps this comes in the form of help with a school fundraiser or resources to help you maintain a positive school environment.
When looking for a true partner, it’s important to find a company that holds similar values to those of your school. For example, if your school cares deeply about the environment, find out how your potential school partner is supporting the same cause. Are they using green materials and processes? Are they empowering youth to become environmental changemakers?
Beyond having similar charitable causes, a true school partner shares the same concerns as your school staff. They work with you to keep your students safe, because what’s important to you is important to them, too.
A vendor that fits these guidelines may indeed be the company your predecessor signed or the option that allows you to save the most money. However, this isn’t always the case. Every once in a while, it’s important to reevaluate your school’s needs and whether your current partner or vendor is still meeting these needs.
Your go-to school partner
At Edge Imaging, we’ve been in the school photography business for 15 years, so we know all about being a good school partner.
We want to benefit your school. As long as it’s permitted by your board, every photo day with Edge is, effectively, a school fundraiser. Every time a parent purchases their child’s photos, a percentage of that transaction goes back to you, allowing you to continue educating the next generation.
We prioritize giving back to our communities. Empowering youth and being environmentally conscious are important to us, and this is reflected in our own corporate partnerships. We’ve partnered with Tim Horton Foundation Camps to send kids from low-income backgrounds to camp to improve their leadership skills and with TELUS Wise to educate and encourage youth to be their best digital citizen and stay safe online. We also support EcoSchools Canada and have been inducted into the Burlington Hydro Hall of Fame.
We keep your students safe. After photo day, we provide each school with a number of practical products meant to keep students safe: pictorial directories so school staff have a photo identifier of each student, easy allergy and bus lists for admin, and more. We also provide parents with Child Safe cards free of charge.
In addition, we make data security a priority and invest in cyber-resiliency on an ongoing basis. We realize that, as a school photography provider, we’ve been entrusted with housing images and personal data of millions of students nationwide, and this isn’t a responsibility we take lightly. Learn more about the importance of planning for and mitigating cyber risk with your school vendors in our white paper, found here.
To top it all off, we’re 100% Canadian owned and operated.
High school graduations may not begin for a few months, but grad photo season is already upon us! It’s one of our favourite times of the year, but we know some school staff can find it a bit stressful.
Luckily, we just so happen to consider ourselves experts at graduation photography. We want to make grad photo days feel like a breeze for our school partners, so we reached out to our professional graduation photographers to find out their best tips for running a smooth grad photo day.
Keep Reminding Students About Photo Day
This is one tip all our photographers agreed upon: Repeatedly remind students when and where grad photos are being taken and how they can sign up for their session.
“I get a lot of students saying ‘I didn’t know grad photos were happening’, especially toward the end of the week after their friends had them done,” says one of our photographers. “Run announcements, make use of the flyers we provide, and ask teachers to talk about it in homeroom classes.”
Senior year is busy for graduates – they’re focusing on postsecondary applications and keeping their grades up. It’s easy for details to slip their mind. By talking about grad pictures frequently, hanging up posters, and handing out hard copy reminder notices, students are more likely to sign up for their photo sessions early and avoid any last-minute chaos.
Encourage Students to Come Ready
Encourage your students to come to school ready for pictures – maybe this means they’re already wearing their favourite tie or they’ve already made sure their makeup is on point. This way, only touch-ups are required before they sit for their photo session.
When students are ready to go as soon as they get to the camera, it keeps the day running on time for everyone.
However, sometimes students aren’t certain what “ready” means when it comes to grad photos. We’ve put together a video for your grads with answers to every question they might have around photo day.
Stay Informed
Just as it’s important to ensure students stay informed, make sure your admin team is up-to-date as well.
Stay in touch with your photographers and your school representative from your photography company. Make sure you know what the students’ options for posing are, as well as where the photographers are set up so you can easily answer any questions from your students.
Your photographer will also email you a schedule of all the appointments for each day so you’re always in the loop.
Looking for a new grad photography provider? It’s not too late to switch to Edge. Contact us today!
Who doesn’t want their hallways bursting with school spirit? You want everyone to be proud of where they spend most of their time during the school year. In fact, a high level of school spirit has been shown to help students perform well academically and makes them happier in general.
Unfortunately, a lot of students may have a hard time feeling particularly excited about coming to school every day.
Luckily, raising school spirit may be easier than you think. With just a bit of planning, your school can have a stronger sense of community in almost no time. Here are some of our favourite ideas:
Hold a Pep Rally or Spirit Day
You know this from movies and TV shows: pep rallies never fail at getting staff and students together to cheer on the school’s sports teams before a big game. Pep rallies aren’t just for high school students, either, and cheerleaders or football teams aren’t necessary ingredients.
A spirit day may be better geared toward elementary and middle schoolers. Encourage students to wear school colours, organize some intramural sports games that everyone can take part in, and offer a pizza lunch. Go big and rent bouncy castles or just pick an easy theme for dressing up. Have you ever met a kid who didn’t love a PJ day?
Pep rallies and spirit days are great ways to raise school spirit. The students get a break from classes for the afternoon, have a chance to socialize with their classmates and cheer each other on while having fun. Including a unifying activity is always a win; you could make it a day of service in the community or host your own colour run. The options are neverending.
Start a Yearbook
Document how fun this year was with a school yearbook. Help your students remember their classmates and teachers, their teams and clubs, and even incorporate candid shots from school events.
If you have staff members that are willing to supervise, start new clubs and teams to encourage students to get more involved with the school!
Have teachers survey their classes to find out what the most in-demand activities are and look into implementing one or two of the most popular ideas. Maybe it’s a lunchtime intramural basketball “league” or an after school language club.
Check out this list of school club ideas if you’re in need of a little inspiration!
