In the corner of Korhummel, three offices tucked away on Lake Forest Academy’s campus are home to three people very important to the community—the communications office—and they just got a much deserved expansion. In charge of telling the stories of LFA, the communications office may not be known by all, but they make sure everyone else’s messages are heard.

Alex Stevenson is the only employee currently working for the communications office that isn’t new this year. With a background in graphic design, Stevenson mainly works on the school’s website. He explained the struggle of the workload communications had on all fronts before the expansion, “It has been an extremely busy experience, with little to no downtime between projects. Generally, it has felt like the number of plates that need to keep spinning continues to increase instead of decrease.” With two new employees and one new position, the communications office’s burdens hopefully will subside. 

Greg Greenwell became the Director of Marketing and Communications in July of 2022. He works alongside Stevenson on cultivating the school’s website while also making sure the collaboration between the three employees of the communications department stays on track. Greenwell is also looking forward to the department’s expansion into social media. On the topic, he commented, “We’re starting to wrap our arms around the idea that there’s a lot of enthusiasm for social media here, and we definitely welcome and encourage it.” 

An entire new position was created, Digital Engagement Specialist, to manage social media, the primary reason the communications team expanded. Emmy Schwerdt was hired to fill this new position in the fall. She has a bachelor’s degree in communications from Carthage College and started her love for content creation in high school journalism. Schwerdt can be seen capturing content around campus for LFA’s social media pages, trying to revitalize this asset that has recently been underutilized. “I think that we’re at a high caliber here, and people really care about it here, and I’m making sure that our content matches that energy,” Schwerdt explained. 

There are no longer various people running social media, and, with a sole person in charge, the communications office is centered and run more efficiently. Efficiency is one of the biggest goals for the future with the numerous amount of work the communications office has had to manage in the past. Schwerdt remarked, “The goal of pretty much any communications platform is you want to be proactive, you don’t want to be reactive.” With the social media under new reins, the website being constantly updated, and even a weekly newsletter being sent out to the community by the team of three employees, the communications office is learning to take a hold of the work while also continuing to find new ways to keep the community of LFA connected. The biggest goal of the expansion is to carry on telling LFA’s stories just like Greenwell said, “Our job is to let the world outside of this campus know what’s so special about this place.”