Principles of School Operations in Public Relations Perspective

Principles of School Operations in Public Relations Perspective Educational public relations is the application of public relations in the field of education, specifically the institution's efforts to manage its relationship with the community so that the institution's goals are achieved. Educational public relations can also be interpreted as all activities that are realized to create harmonious cooperation between educational institutions and the public through efforts to introduce educational institutions and all their activities to the community to gain their sympathy and understanding. The field of work of educational public relations is related to the affairs of educational institutions, both academic and administrative. Therefore, practical educational public relations activities are always related to academic and administrative policies of educational institutions such as socialization of educational services, delivery of curriculum or financial policies, seeking cooperation with potential partners, and organizing ceremonies or protocols of educational institutions. In fostering school relations with the community, one should always adhere to the principles that are used as the basis/guidelines in taking action or policy. In carrying out its activities, public relations needs to pay attention to the following principles: 1) Integrity (integration) This principle means that all school relations activities with the community must be integrated, in the sense that what is explained, conveyed and presented to the community must be information or information on non-academic activities. Usually, schools often do not inform or cover up something that is actually a school problem and needs help or support from parents. Therefore, schools must anticipate as early as possible the possibility of misperception, misinterpretation of the information presented by completing accurate information and complete data, so that it can be accepted rationally by the community. This is very important to improve the assessment and trust of the community or parents of students towards the school, or in other words, school transparency is very much needed, more so in this era of reform and the information age, the community will be more critical and dare to give direct assessments about the school. 2) Continuity (continuous) This principle means that the implementation of school relations with the community must be carried out continuously. So, the implementation of school relations with the community is not only carried out incidentally or at any time, for example once a year or once a semester, only carried out by the school when it will ask for financial assistance from parents or the community. This is what causes the community to always assume that if there is a call from the school to come to school, it is always associated with money. As a result, they tend not to attend or simply delegate someone else to attend the school invitation. If this is conditioned, it will be difficult for the school to get strong support from all parents of students and the community. Information development, school progress development, school problems, even student learning problems always emerge and develop at any time, therefore it is necessary to provide continuous information explanation from the school to the community or parents of students, so that they are aware of the importance of their participation in improving the quality of education of their children. (Mulyasa, 2004). 3) Coverage (comprehensive) Information provision activities should be comprehensive and cover all aspects, factors or substances that need to be conveyed and known by the community, for example extracurricular programs, curricular activities, remedial teaching and other activities. This principle also contains the meaning that all information should: a) Complete This means that no information should be covered up or withheld, even though the community or parents of students have the right to know the existence and progress of the school where their children study. Therefore, information on school progress, problems faced by the school and achievements that the school can achieve must be informed to the community. b) Accurate This means that the information provided is indeed appropriate and in accordance with the needs of the community, in this connection it also means that the information provided should not be made up or is objective information. c) Up to Date This means that the information provided is information on the latest developments, progress, problems and achievements of the school. 4) Simplicity This principle requires that in the process of school relations with the community, both personal communication and group communication, the party providing information (the school) can simplify various information presented to the community. Information presented to the community through direct meetings or through the media. It should be presented in a simple form according to the conditions and characteristics of the listeners (the local community). This principle of simplicity also means that the information presented is expressed in words that are friendly and easy to understand. Many people do not understand very scientific terms, therefore, the use of terms should be adjusted as much as possible to the level of understanding of the community. 5) Constructiveness The school-community relationship program should be constructive, meaning that the school provides constructive information to the community. Thus, the community will respond positively to the school and understand and comprehend in detail the various problems faced by the school. If they can understand this, it will be one of the factors that can encourage them to provide assistance to the school according to the school's problems that need attention and joint solutions. This requires schools to make a list of problems that need to be communicated continuously to certain community targets. 6) Adaptability The school-community relations program should be adjusted to the conditions in the community environment. Adjustments in this case include adjustments to activities, habits, culture and information materials that exist and apply in the community's life. Even the implementation of community relations activities must be adjusted to the conditions of the community. For example, in agricultural areas where people work in the fields every morning, it is impossible for schools to conduct home visits in the morning.