5 Places to Put Digital Signage in Schools and Educational Institutions

In the past, educational institutions used bulletin boards to convey information to students, teachers, parents, and stakeholders. But, cluttered noticeboards, often with outdated flyers, don’t engage today’s digitally-conscious students.

In contrast, 96% of students notice digital signs and recall their content. Digital signs are quickly replacing paper bulletin boards as effective, attractive, and transparent communication channels. Educational institutions disseminate a lot of information to students and staff, like lesson plans, upcoming events, student achievements, and emergency alerts.

As such, schools need robust communication mediums to grab people’s attention, display real-time notifications, and enhance brand image. Digital signage does all this and more, but you need to place screens strategically for maximum engagement.

Top Locations for Educational Digital Signage

Location is key with digital signage. Ideally, you should target high-traffic areas and spaces where your audience spends time waiting. The best sites for educational digital signage are:

1. School Cafeteria

Digital menu boards bring the school menu to life through vibrant graphics, animations, and bright imagery. In schools where the menu changes daily, digital screens are invaluable tools to inform everyone of their food options.

To this end, you require powerful digital signage software to program your menu for every day of the week. The software automatically changes the menu depending on the day, so employees don’t have to feed menu items manually. School menu boards also shorten cafeteria queues as students see everything on offer.

Currently, elementary and high schools across the country are promoting healthy eating among their students to address obesity. As it stands, about 17% of children and adolescents are obese. Sharing nutritional information on digital cafeteria boards is an excellent way to encourage students to make healthier food choices.

For instance, recommend a star vegetable or fruit and list its nutrients and how they help the body. Digital screens also highlight the sources of the cafeteria food, whether from the school’s garden or farm-to-table vendors. Further, promote healthier alternatives to popular food choices such as apple chips instead of fries.

In addition to menus, digital cafeteria boards display school photos, scheduled events, extracurricular activities, and entertaining videos. Use memes and funny clips to grab attention as most students are social media enthusiasts.

2. School Hallways

School hallways are prime areas to install digital signage in schools to attract students and faculty as they move across the campus. One of the major benefits of educational digital signage is providing wayfinding information to ease navigation.

New students and staff members find it difficult to navigate large school campuses without proper signage. Traditionally, schools used static wayfinding signs to direct traffic across campus grounds. However, school administrators wasted a lot of time manually updating these signs to reflect changes. With digital signs, a few clicks do the trick to send people to the right departments, lecture halls, and school amenities.

School hallways receive consistent traffic, making them great locations to highlight upcoming football games, classroom timetables, school calendars, holidays, and image galleries. Furthermore, showcase the school website and promote your values to enhance the school spirit. You can embellish the digital signage content with your logo and colors to create a strong sense of belonging among your student body.

Many educational institutions that want to invest in digital signage are concerned about the time and resources involved in curating content for school signs. Fortunately, most digital signage software platforms have content apps that show different content like news, weather, social media feeds, event listings, calendar, movies, and image galleries.

3. Break Room

Employees congregate in the breakroom to catch a break and interact. If you still use static signs to inform staff in break rooms, you miss out on the ability of digital signs to inspire and captivate audiences. Already, only 36% of workers are engaged in the workplace, and a drab break room does little to boost employee engagement in your institution.

Break room digital displays have many uses for staff communication, such as displaying training videos, tracking your school’s goals, and updating HR notices. Another great idea is to recognize employee achievements and anniversaries.

Everyone loves to be recognized for their efforts. Thankfully, a digital signage solution makes it incredibly easy to spotlight exemplary achievements. For example, highlight the football coach after a historical game with snapshots of the event and a slideshow of the winning team.

Also, run a teacher of the week contest, where you celebrate each educator’s milestones and impact on the school. By celebrating staff accomplishments, you boost morale and enjoy better retention rates.

Additionally, break room digital signs are great for entertaining your workforce. Your teachers work hard, and videos, social media feeds, and movies help them relax as they re-energize for the rest of the school day.

4. Entrance Directory

Digital signs modernize school entrances and lobbies and provide critical information to students, parents, and visitors. Typically, new students are anxious when they join a new school. Without good signage, such students wander around large campuses looking for the right classes, dorms, and departments.

Some schools have the acreage of a small city, not to mention the entire wings of lecture halls, libraries, athletic centers, and labs that students must transverse. In addition, classes constantly change locations while educators often postpone classes.

Digital directories keep up with this ever-changing landscape by displaying real-time listings and updates. Interactive kiosks are remarkable because they let visitors interact with school campus maps.

For instance, a student can quickly check the library or the engineering department’s location and get turn-by-turn directions on their phone. Entrance kiosks perform additional functions, such as scanning student IDs, signing up for classes or activities, or paying for purchases.

Digital directories offer unparalleled convenience because school administrators update real-time class changes from anywhere. Accordingly, students are always updated with lesson plans and lecturer availability.

5. Outdoor Campus Enclosure

Outdoor digital signage for schools is an excellent tool to engage your institution’s community. Previously, schools pasted flyers on outdoor notice boards to announce events and intakes and advertise amenities. Today, educational institutions need dynamic and eye-catching signage to attract the attention of people increasingly distracted by mobile screens.

So, install digital signs in various outdoor areas, depending on your target audience. For example, outdoor signs in an elementary school’s parking lot display welcome messages for parents en route to a conference, while digital screens near a university’s entrance promote its degree and associate programs.

If you want to attract new students, sleek digital displays help passersby perceive your institution as modern, tech-savvy, and innovative. Further, impress potential students with your facility’s certifications, activities, and alumni.

Schools increasingly use digital scoreboards to add excitement to baseball, hockey, soccer, lacrosse, and other sports events. Use the displays to show instant replays, scorer tables, and a slideshow of team members. Further, stream live social media feeds and encourage the audience to use specific hashtags for a chance to be featured on the vibrant displays.

Outdoor digital signage also serves as a revenue-generating platform since you can run ads by local companies. Many schools are hesitant to adopt digital signage because of the costs, but ad revenue offsets installation and maintenance costs.

Leverage Digital Signage for an Engaged Student Body and Faculty

Digital signage in schools enhances navigation, promotes safety, streamlines internal communication, and generates revenue. Educational digital signage has many use cases, such as digital menu boards that spotlight healthy foods. Additionally, wayfinding kiosks reduce crowds in hallways and lobbies while digital scoreboards share game scores.

In the staff break room, digital signs engage and entertain faculty and share important notices. Ultimately, digital signage in schools is a valuable investment for any modern education institution that desires improved on-campus communication.