Match Cut Magic for a Meaningful Moment

Link to watch: Dropbox link here

Role: Producer, Writer, Director

Backstory: This major health education client's events team wanted to create an impressive video for their first big commencement ceremony after the pandemic's virtual ceremonies. Our crew fleshed out a match-cut concept and I wrote the script. The client selected one student for each of their six schools, which I pre-interviewed to work their stories into the script and location selection. We filmed for one half-day per student, going to a minimum of four locations in a day.

Challenges: Matching shots in tight locations made things a little difficult for our crew. Good communication and lots of pre-production helped us overcome these hurdles, and any complications that arose from scheduling all of these people and spaces.

Successes: After the success of this one and another video I produced for the client’s 2021 gala, the development department engaged us in the production of a long-term series of videos highlighting their pillars. We were able to re-use some of the footage and a few of these same techniques for other videos.

A recent video for the development department utilized this same match-cut concept: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTMUyPYpDFs 

Dramatic Video for a State-wide Organization

Link to watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKs7lGjFBPc

Role: Producer, Writer, Director

Backstory: "Winter is Coming", but for Texas Public Schools. Our dramatic "Public Schools Are Under Attack" video won a National School Public Relations Association (NSPRA) award for a state-wide education advocacy organization.

Challenges: Trying to represent a the entire state of Texas, and all age groups, is always tough. We were able to find very helpful school admin and got creative with b-roll, filming some of it during summer break.

Successes: We went out on a limb a little with the style of interviews, trying to give the audience an uncomfortable feeling. The client was very happy with the video and it went over well at their event, driving attendees to action. They have hired us many times again.

Centralizing Control Over 54 Separate Websites

Visual note: Due to my lack of usable visual documentation from this project, I made this nifty graphic.

My Role: Project manager, Assistant Director of Communications

Backstory: I began working at Harmony in 2014 in the central administration office. This fast-growing network of 48 charter schools in six districts all around the state of Texas was struggling to keep up brand and messaging consistency. Each campus and district had its own website and individual URLs, all managed locally on their own servers. Administratively, installing security certificates and adequately complying with ADA accessibility on each site was also difficult to manage. Central oversight had become critical. After our chief officer convinced stakeholders it was time for change, my communications team created a plan for migration and began the process.

Working with my IT/web manager, we researched current sites, performed surveys to gain insight and built a campus website shell for testing. We listed all of the must-haves alongside the nice-to-haves, and analyzed ways to allow the campus sites to be consistent but still maintain their unique features while meeting basic standards.

Using Wordpress, we created accounts at different security levels for everyone involved. I oversaw the creation of training modules as a prerequisite for accessing their accounts, to ensure everyone knew how to use the new platform before logging in. The central admin IT team worked alongside our communications team, as each campus IT person and most principals were trained on the new system.

Challenges: Pushback from campus administrators was the primary issue, with two major concerns. First, they worried that parents would not be able to find the websites, since we were changing urls to subdomains. We agreed to keep all current URLs active, with a plan to redirect traffic to the new subdomains well into the future. We also made sure that Google business and maps listings were up to date, and incorporated good SEO techniques to help our schools move to the top of searches.

The second big concern was maintaining the local staff's ability to update content on their sites. We added API widgets into the sites that connected to specific Google calendars, spreadsheets and documents that, when updated with the usual simple means would automatically update information on the website. We also embedded social media feeds, so that urgent posts would be visible to anyone who visited.

For the communications team, our big concerns were accessibility, consistency and branding. To address accessibility, we focused on having alt text for all images, increased font readability and contrast for use with text-to-speech readers and added a Google translate plugin for non-English speaking parents. Since we were able to properly employ brand and messaging standards across the sites easily with the new structure, our time was freed up to help departments and campuses with other brand and messaging needs.

Successes: After the (to be expected) change management hiccups were overcome, the new sites not only looked slick, but served the needs of the campus employees, students and parents well. Accessibility became a priority, with training and quality checks built into regular website management schedules.

During Hurricane Harvey in 2017, the update proved successful. All over Texas, campuses were dealing with power outages, flooding, damaged schools and students in crisis. We were able to take advantage of the centralized features by posting much-needed weather and school closing updates so that the local administrators could take care of their families and focus on other important things. We even used these new features to post information on where students and families could find help.

Current menu example below:

Note: Some of the stock photography I took while at Harmony is still in use on the site. The photo featured above is one. I left there in 2019. See more of my photography here.