Planning a Transition Night

Grant Wood Area Education Agency

Transition Services

Plan far in advance of the event

Be sure that the venue for the event is available.

Give yourself time to:

  • plan
  • review progress
  • revise plan
  • update progress
  • final thorough review of event

There are always last minute issues that arise, so be sure to have a plan on how those will be addressed.

  • Is there one person that should be in charge of those issues?
  • The first one notified of the issue will be in charge of the issue?
  • Is there a plan in place in case someone, speaker or booth presenter, does not show up?

Committee

One person cannot do it all. A committee is a great way to divide the duties involved in a Student/Parent Transition Night. Depending upon how comprehensive your night will be, you should delegate at least one committee member to each area (i.e publicity, speakers, booths, etc.).

Establish goal/theme

What is the goal that you have for your event?

  • Is it the number of people present?
  • Involvement with the presenters/booths?
  • Attendees make so many contacts during the night with support agencies?

Will there be a theme?

  • Overall transition for students?
  • Middle school transition to high school?
  • High school transition to college/work?
  • Assistive technology needed for the transitioning student?

Whatever goal and or theme that you might choose, be sure to have some measurement device in place so that you can determine whether or not you met your intended goal.

Publicity

Publicity is key to a successful Student/Parent Night. If no one knows about it, how can you expect anyone to attend? You can rely on your students to invite their parents, but that usually is not the most reliable method. Some publicity opportunities could include:

  • Local Newspaper
  • Local Radio Station
  • Printed flyers posted in restaurants, gas stations, recreational facilities (Be sure to ask permission first.)
  • Teachers
  • Service providers such as IVRS, Goodwill, REC
  • Penny Savers or free community periodical
  • TV
  • Social media (Facebook, Twitter)

Personal contact is a simple way to publicize your Student/Parent Transition Night.

You can set create a calling tree where one person calls 3-5 people to personally invite them

to the event and, in turn, they invite 3-5 people, etc. Personal hand or electronic written

invitations can be done in the same manner. Doing this an few months prior to the event,

with a follow up just before, will increase your chances for a good attendance. Remember, people

still like that personal contact. Finally, IEP meeting is a perfect time to personally invite parents,

teachers, administrators and others to your event.

You might want to consider if you would like someone to take pictures or video tape during the

Event. If you decide to do this, check with your district policies about video and film

releases. Remember to check for spelling and grammar before publishing anything.

Technology

Technology is another critical area to consider when planning for Student/Parent Transition Night. It is always a good idea to

ask each of your speakers what type of technology they might need for their presentation such as computer, white board, or

ELMO and then have that available to them that night. Some speakers do not require any while some request a variety.

If you are having booths, be sure that you include them on any technology requests. Many exhibitors have computers that are used to accentuate their information, such as those displaying assistive technology, and power cords are a necessity.

Will participants need to have access to technology for the evening or only for certain

presentations? If they do, will they need to bring their own or will it be provided to them? If they are to bring their own, how will this be conveyed to them? Be sure that you talk with the IT person at your venue to insure that there is enough band width available to accommodate everyone.

Booths are effective methods to get information out to more people in a short period of time so it would be good to include them, if at all possible. Once again, keep your goal, theme, and audience in mind when deciding what booths to include.

Printing

Printing costs can add up, so you might want to get creative on your signage.

You can either print flyers for your event or you can have one made up and send it out electronically to your audience and they can print it off. The electronic version also allows for it to be sent by recipients to others that they feel might benefit from this event. You can easily make postcards with information on it to hand out.

Program:You will want to print a program. It is suggested that this program include:

  • Time schedule
  • Room assignments
  • Summary of sessions
  • Booth participants
  • Biographies of guest speakers (if part of your event)
  • Acknowledgements

Some items you might also want to include, but are not necessary:

  • Intended audience for speaker sessions
  • Booths that correspond to speakers
  • Speaker strands

Special considerations (disability, language, baby sitting)

Food/Door Prizes

Let’s face it, we all like food and presents.

Food can be simple or complex. It should also match any theme, audience, and time of day. Cookies, cupcakes, muffins, and brownies are easiest to eat while standing, walking, or sitting with a small plate or napkin on your lap. They are also easiest for attendees to ‘grab and go’ Pies and cakes can be served, but they will need to be cut placed on plates, which means that someone might need to be at the refreshment table during the entire event. This can cause congestion at a refreshment table as well as taking time from networking. For cookies, cupcakes, muffins and brownies you would only need napkins for serving whereas with cake and pies, you would need to budget for plates, forks and napkins.

Even if you do not choose to serve refreshments, it would be a good idea to have bottled water for presenters and attendees, if possible. It can be placed in a central location at the event for participants to take as needed. Coffee is a popular beverage at events. You can have a one cup coffee maker available with K cups or you can make large amounts of coffee and then put them in carafes or other coffee dispenser. Just as with pies and cakes, if you choose to serve punch and/or coffee, you will need to plan for preparation time as well as how it will be refilled on a regular basis. Water will only require displaying or, finding a way put the water in some container with ice. Punch and coffee will require cups, serving utensils, as well as ingredients. Soda can be served, as well, with minimal oversight, but can be costly. Cups would also be necessary. It might be possible that a local store or bakery in your community might donate food for your night. Always consider this option. You never know unless you ask.

Door prizes are a nice feature, but not a necessity. If you have a budget, you might want to consider purchasing some door prizes. Otherwise, you might ask some of your local businesses of they would be willing to donate something from their business to be used as a door prize. Gift cards, a certificate for a service, tote with the store’s logo, book, candle, and shirts are usual door prize donations from businesses. Businesses might request that you complete a Request for Donation form that will need to be submitted to an owner or manager of the business. Also, consider asking presenters or booth participants if there is anything that they might like to donate for a door prize. They might have a product or book that they can donate. Where ever or whatever you get door prizes or other donations from, be sure that you recognize them in some way, either including their names in the program, announcing it during the presentations, or list them somewhere during the night so that all attendees can view.

Evaluation

After the Student/Parent Transition Night is over, you will need to evaluate it in some manner to determine what did and did not work, what participants liked the most, what suggestions were given, and what attendees would like to see in the future. This can be done through a simple questionnaire included in the program or having participants complete a paper or electronic (computer) questionnaire before they leave. If you decide to use the electronic questionnaire, be sure to have a location equipped with either computers or iPads where participants can complete them.

You might also want to gather information on the demographics of participants. Items to consider include:

  • Parent, teacher, student, administrator, service provider, other
  • School district
  • Teacher
  • IEP/504
  • How did you hear about the event (teacher, social media, publicity, other)?

Finally

Whether your Student/Parent Transition Night is a huge or simple event, take time to look around and watch it unfold. Look for the connections that are taking place. Watch the interactions between participants and attendees. See that look on a parents face when they get some new information. Find that one special moment that makes it all worthwhile.