Podcasting helps form community at Lovett

Late in the COVID-19 pandemic, The Lovett School tested out a tried and true way to connect to their audience – podcasting. 

On March 24, the Buckhead private school launched the first episode of a podcast called “Living Lovett: Stories from the Riverbank.” On the podcast, you’ll hear from a variety of voices related to the school – from teachers to students to alumni to parents – addressing topics such as college counseling, philanthropy, art, and more. 

According to Chartable, “Living Lovett” consistently ranks in the Education for Kids podcast category, and has even been heard in 23 countries outside of the United States. The podcasting endeavor has been a community effort, according to a press release. The podcast’s cover art was created by 2022 Lovett graduate Stewart Key, and the music featured throughout the show is performed by Lovett’s Ellington Jazz Ensemble, under the direction of Dr. Tim Pitchford, director of Upper School Bands and head of the Upper School Fine Arts Department. 

The podcast is hosted by Jessica Sant, Lovett’s chief engagement officer. Sant, who grew up in East Cobb and attended Lassiter High School and the University of Georgia, has been with Lovett for 12 years. Reporter Newspapers spoke to Sant about the school’s reason for starting the podcast and how to create a cohesive season of podcasting.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity. 

Reporter Newspapers: What was the reasoning behind launching the podcast?

Jessica Sank: My role did not exist at Lovett, and really doesn’t exist as far as we can tell in many school settings. One of the charges for me was to consider different ways that we might better connect with families. People are so busy, and a lot is asked of families in terms of time. So we wanted to create pathways where we could facilitate an understanding of community and connections to community without asking them to come and sit in a theater, or come and listen to a speaker, or something like that. It was still in the middle of COVID, where we actually couldn’t have parents coming into the building. So we were struggling to find ways to make those connections. 

I was actually talking with my husband, who happens to work at another independent school in the area, and he was the one that started thinking about a podcast. From there, I did a little bit of research on how we might go about creating something like that at Lovett and found a producer who has been wonderful, Catherine O’Brien. And we tried it out. 

The pilot was meant to be really just a test run, to see if we would generate any interest. And we did. We’ve gotten so much positive feedback, and it’s just a great way for people to get to know so many different teachers and parents and students in our community that they may not otherwise have a chance to hear from. So it’s been fun – a fun way to celebrate all the folks that make this place so special. 

Were you always going to be the host?

JS: Yeah, I think so. Because of my role, one of my major responsibilities is connecting with families and educating families, and so the plan was to be the host.

I want to talk a little bit about the process of putting an episode together. How do you go about choosing the topics for each one?

JS: We map out an entire season before we start inviting folks to be a guest on the show. So that’s the first step. We’re really trying to create a broader narrative around what types of messages we want families to walk away with. And not just our current families, but also prospective parents. So we time them based on the different events that may be occurring in our community. 

From there, for an individual episode, I’ll sit down with Catherine, the producer, and we’ll form a list of questions that we think will help facilitate that conversation. The great thing about a podcast is that it’s not live. What we have found with guests who obviously don’t have a ton of experience doing something like this is that it removes the pressure for them, to not feel like they have to get it right the first time. If they need to stop and restate something in a different way, they can do that because we can edit it so it’s true to their message without them feeling like they’ve fumbled through a response. So that’s a nice way, I think, of disarming guests who may be reluctant to do it if it were a live conversation. 

Is it just you and Catherine who work on the podcast? Is it something that students would ever get to be involved in?

JS: Right now, it’s just Catherine and me. But … Lovett is talking about putting together a broadcast program. We currently have a newspaper and yearbook class, but we don’t have anything that’s formalized around broadcast. We have some clubs that kids participate in, particularly around broadcasting our athletic events. We’d like to expand that a little bit. So we can see a future where students are involved with the production and even the hosting of some of the episodes. There have certainly been a lot of student voices on the episodes. We try to leave in as many kids’ voices, K-12, as we can.

What are some of your favorite episodes that you’ve done?

JS: This season, there were a few – and my producer, she kept poking at me because I kept saying after every episode, “That was my favorite one!” For me, it’s about celebrating so many people that are a part of this place. It’s just fun to hear these voices that are doing such great work and get to honor that. 

I did an episode with the Class of 2012 – it’s their 10 year reunion this year. We ended up capturing nine different alums, which was a huge undertaking to edit all of that and make a cohesive episode out of it. But many of those students were kids that I worked with in the college process, and so it was personally rewarding to be able to hear what they were up to and to know that they were doing so well. As an educator, it’s why we get into this work. You get to play a very small part in somebody’s life trajectory, and to know that all of those now 27 and 28 year olds are doing so well, it was pretty cool to put a nice, neat ribbon around their experience here at Lovett in that way. 

I know the podcast is doing fairly well on some charts. How does it make you feel to know that people are connecting with it?

JS: It’s meaningful. Lovett has done a great job of promoting it with our prospective families. As we’ve gone along, I think that has been a really rewarding aspect of this effort, is to know that we are helping families who are considering Lovett clarify whether or not this is a great fit for them. Because it’s hard – if you’re just coming in for a tour or you’re doing an information session, something like that, you only get so much context from a place. Certainly, in that environment, people are putting on their best effort and that’s understandable, it’s what you would expect. But the great thing about a podcast for a prospective family is that they get to hear from people who are going to be directly interacting with their students on a daily basis. I think, while that was certainly a part of the overall plan, I think that’s an even more rewarding aspect of this work than I anticipated – just knowing that we’re helping so many of our families that are considering Lovett know whether or not this is a good match for them.