Schools produce a remarkable amount of design work. Prospectuses, open day materials, newsletters, signage, letters home, uniform guides, social media, websites and reports to governors all need to look professional. Yet budgets are tight, and the work is often spread across busy staff who are not designers. The result can be a patchwork of different logos, fonts and styles. Here is how to fix that without overspending.
Start with simple brand guidelines
Brand guidelines do not need to be a 60-page document. For most schools, a few pages covering the essentials is enough:
- The correct logo files and how to use them (and how not to)
- Your colour palette, with codes for print and screen
- One or two fonts, including free alternatives for everyday documents
- Tone of voice: how the school sounds in writing
- A few examples of it all working together
Share it with every member of staff who creates materials, and keep the logo files somewhere easy to find. Many inconsistencies come from people simply using whatever version of the logo they could find.
Create templates for everyday documents
Templates are where schools save the most time and money. Once designed, staff can use them again and again without needing a designer for every task.
- Letterheads and letters home
- Newsletters
- Presentation slides for assemblies, parents’ evenings and governor meetings
- Social media posts
- Posters and event flyers
- Certificates
Invest where first impressions count
Not every piece of material needs the same investment. Focus your design budget on the items prospective families and the wider community see first:
- The prospectus, printed or digital
- Open day and open evening materials
- External signage and wayfinding
- The website homepage and admissions pages
These shape how parents perceive the school before they ever walk through the door.
Think about multi-academy trusts
For trusts, the challenge is balancing a shared identity with each school’s own character. A flexible brand system, with a shared structure and templates and room for each school’s name, colours and imagery, keeps the trust joined up while respecting individual schools.
Plan around the school year
Design work in schools is seasonal. Open days, admissions deadlines, sports days, performances, results and the start of term all bring predictable bursts of work. Mapping these out at the start of the year means materials can be prepared calmly rather than in a rush.
Design support for schools and education
Design Shake helps schools, colleges and trusts with everything from prospectuses to newsletters and signage, for one predictable monthly fee that makes budgeting simple. New to the idea? Find out how a graphic design subscription works.
