The name fit the school perfectly, but that was just about the only place it fit.
With five words, 39 letters and 13 syllables, “Immanuel Center for Christian Education” was a mouthful to say and a handful to write. Filling out official forms, with their cramped text boxes and narrow columns, required the dexterity of a contortionist. Its acronym, ICCE, was equally a tongue-twister.
After more than three decades, school officials decided it was time for a change. Following much deliberation, a committee chose Immanuel Christian School as the new moniker. And from there, a sleek new branding campaign was born.
Few details have been left untouched as the school looks to better position itself in the competitive education market.
A unified front
School Administrator Bob Williford immediately saw a problem when he began updating information on Immanuel’s social media pages. There was no continuity. The school’s colors, red and black, appeared in various shades, depending on the medium. And the ram mascot showed a variety of faces, from strong and proud to cute and cuddly.
Though they were The Rams, and still are, they needed their own special ram — one that signified Immanuel to every person who saw it.
“We wanted to show our unity — that we are one and the same,” said Danielle Linton, president of the Immanuel Parent-Teacher Organization. “You can’t imagine how many different ram heads there are.”
Williford flipped through a binder Thursday afternoon, examining the different incarnations of their mascot’s new look. Solid red, solid black, black with red horns, red with black horns. He and the other school officials are still trying to decide which color combination they prefer.
There is another change afoot at Immanuel, offering further benefit to standardizing the mascot: School uniforms are on the horizon, with Immanuel’s six-member board expected to rule on the policy at its July 30 meeting.
If implemented, the uniforms will become part of the dress code in 2013-2104.
And more choices will have to be made, because the new apparel will also become part of Immanuel’s branding campaign.
Looking ahead
At a time when private schools across the nation are fighting for market share, Immanuel has held steady, with enrollment hovering around 300 or more for the past few years.
Settled deep on a patch of land along Military Road in Steens, it’s easy to miss the facility — or mistake it for a church.
But though it was founded in 1978 by Reverend Mike Stephens, then-pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church, it is both a ministry of the church and a fully-accredited school, educating students from three-year-old pre-kindergartners to high school seniors and holding accreditations with the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, Mississippi Association of Independent Schools and Association of Christian Schools International.
It is one of the area’s best-kept secrets, Williford said, calling the growth spurt a blessing in these tough economic times. But now, Immanuel is ready to become more visible, telling its story to the world.
The freshly-designed website, which carries the red and black ram theme, features links to the school’s Facebook and Twitter accounts.
A newsletter is regularly emailed to parents, and Williford, the man behind most of those Facebook posts and Twitter tweets, is busy writing a social media policy he hopes to have in place by the end of the summer.
He’s also considering a text alert system similar to that used by Mississippi University for Women and Mississippi State University, albeit on a smaller scale.
But at the heart of it all lies the students themselves and the Bible-based curriculum the Christian school offers, Williford said. As Immanuel grows, it’s new motto, “Educating minds, nurturing souls,” remains the focus.
“We’re competitive academically and spiritually, and we’re growing athletically,”Linton said. “We just wanted the community to realize we’re here.”
Carmen K. Sisson is the former news editor at The Dispatch.
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