This page provides an outline for how to build a Merit achievement about students who participated in orientation. In order to personalize the achievement for your students you will need to prepare a spreadsheet of student data to use as placeholders throughout the achievement. Here are the placeholders used in this story:
- FIRST NAME*
- LAST NAME*
- HOMETOWN*
- ZIP CODE*
- EMAIL ADDRESS*
- HIGH SCHOOL - The name of the high school the student attended (eg. Albany High School)
*= Data required by Merit
Achievement Title & Summary
Your achievement title and summary will be used for the online version of your story and shared across social media. They will also appear on your school's Merit page.
Your summary should act as a comprehensive overview of the achievement. After your summary, readers will see a list of students who are part of the story.
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Achievement Title: New Students Visit Campus for Merit University Orientation Achievement Summary: The newest Merit University students, and their families, attended the New Student Summer Orientation held on Aug. 5-7. MU staff and orientation student leaders welcomed students and families to campus. |
Individual Story
Your Merit achievement will create personalized online stories for each of your students. Throughout this story you will insert placeholders for the data from your spreadsheet. These placeholders are in [BRACKETS] in the text below.
This version of your story can also be sent to newspapers interested in just one student. Merit will automatically turn it into an individual press release for you and add your saved boilerplate.
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Headline: [FIRST NAME] [LAST NAME] Attends Orientation at Merit University Body: [FIRST NAME] [LAST NAME], of [HOMETOWN], joined members of the incoming class as MU hosted Summer Orientation on Aug. 5-7. [LAST NAME] is a graduate of [HIGH SCHOOL]. Incoming students, and their families, became familiar with the campus and attended informational sessions including academics, student development and financial aid. Students were also able to receive academic and career counsel from faculty and register for their fall classes. Welcome to the Badger family, [FIRST NAME]! |
Note: The spreadsheet used in this sample story includes a placeholder for the student's high school (eg. Albany High School).
Group Press Release
This is the version of your press release that will be sent to newspapers interested in multiple students from your spreadsheet. It's a local story that will include a list of only the students from a paper's coverage area.
Your group press release will have an opening, repeating and closing section. The opening and repeating sections will be the same for every newspaper. The repeating section will contain all of your placeholders and will be the only part of the press release that varies from paper to paper. Use the last sentence of your opening to introduce your list of students.
Please note, we recommend that all orientation stories are online only. Most media outlets will NOT print these stories, but here is a template you can use if necessary:
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Headline: Local Students Attend Orientation at Merit University Opening: The following local students attended the new student Summer Orientation at Merit University on Aug. 5-7. Repeating: [FIRST NAME] [LAST NAME], of [HOMETOWN] is a graduate of [HIGH SCHOOL]. Closing: Incoming students, and their families, became familiar with the campus and attended informational sessions including academics, student development and financial aid. Students were also able to receive academic and career counsel from faculty and register for their fall classes. |
Note: Merit will automatically add your saved boilerplate to the closing section of your group press release.
Add Images and Publish
Achievements are at their best with images included. If possible, include a photo with your story. Get a picture of the achievement in action or a group shot of the students involved. If you're unable to include a photo, instead consider using a school or department logo. The image(s) you choose will appear on your online stories and also go to media recipients.
Use this template as inspiration to publish your next achievement. Log into your Merit account here. If you’re looking for more details on how to build this template into the Merit achievement workflow you can follow the step by step tutorial here.