David Lin

Staff Writer

Students often enjoy the practice of daydreaming about summer vacation and in the process of becoming inundated with responsibilities may not pause to appreciate the people who help organize various projects in the district. Meet Kathy Bonetti, an eager, dedicated individual taking on multiple tasks for the entire district while balancing other tasks in addition to being a mom.  Many people can’t begin to define what her line of work really entails. In a system that relies so much on communication and building reliable relationships, the role of public relations is extremely important. Serving mainly to bridge connections between groups and their audiences, people working in public relations oftentimes work as a team in order to solve multiple issues in the workspace they are serving.

Kathy attended school in the Milford public school system starting at Kay Avenue Elementary School in Milford (which eventually changed to be popularly known as West Shore Middle School today) for her K-8 education. She attended Jonathan Law High School, and went on to receive her Bachelor of arts degree in the field of English at Wheaton College, a liberal arts college in Massachusetts. Pushing a positive image across an entire district and projecting that image onto multiple different locations is key to her success and she aims to do this in a variety of ways. According to Kathy herself, “Every day is different for me.  Depending on the time of year, the amounts and types of work I do each day will shift. During certain parts of the year, I will be out in the district, taking pictures, attending special events – while at other times I’ll be in the office for a majority of the day, working on statistics or creating powerpoints for presentation at an upcoming board meeting. The common thread, though, is that I get to use my skill every single day – that being the creation of messages and reaching people in the best way possible.”  Utilizing her English background, Kathy mainly aims to influence people through the use of media, personal writing, editing and design experience.

Kathy started began her career as the editor-in-chief for the Subway World Headquarters which is located here in Milford, CT from 1981-2001, as well as working with local news media. On top of promoting short term projects and events that are occuring in the district through flyers and posters for various different programs, she creates promotional material such as handbooks and guides as well as more serious policy documents and news sheets for the district. She even helps out many administrators in the district refine and perfect their presentation quality.

While writing press releases and working with local news networks to produce printed material is very important, the evolution of communication methods over time has forced the new age of communication to be entirely digital. In 2018, Kathy Bonetti worked with a small team to bring a new online video series called Milford Super News which explores the districts events featuring  Dr. Anna Cutaia Milford’s new district superintendent as the host. These videos can be found online and can be easily accessed through the district website. Interestingly enough, Kathy is also tasked daily with the maintenance and updating of the district website. This gives her access to promote her personal projects and resources that may end up being a benefit to student, parents, and administrators in Milford. Kathy has had to learn a fair bit of coding in order to maintain some of the web-based scripts present on the website. Colleague, Louis Giancola, director of IT for the Milford Public Schools states, “ Kathy Bonetti is the Communications Coordinator. She is responsible for all press releases, weekly what’s happening around the district, and other general communications for the district especially the superintendent’s office. She also develops all fliers or at least proof reads and formats them. She truly is the voice to the public of the Milford Public Schools.” Kathy is starting a new initiative within the school district integrating technology into the learning environment. Kathy calls this plan the “Communications Strategic Plan” and it involves increasing the use of the internet in order to help stay interconnected with today’s youth and parents. Kathy’s best advice for people joining the workforce is to, “STAY CURRENT on the ‘next new thing”.  Implementing technology has been proven to be one of the most important steps in elevating the productivity of a professional setting as seen in a SAP Successfactors article, “To meet business goals today and be ready to digitally transform for the future, your organization must be able to attract, develop, and retain the best people — tapping into their full potential”.

Utilizing a wide variety of strategies to aid people in achieving their best work is the way that teams in public relations aim to achieve the professionalism people look for when dealing with a communication barrier between them and their clients. The fact that many people are unable to explain what people in the public relations do is a testament to their hard work, dedication, and versatility. Kathy Bonetti isn’t only an experienced writer, she has experience in editing and layout, she works on a professional scale, maintains the district website, and also works with a crisis management team that aids in resurrecting businesses and organizations that have fallen into unexpected hardships with their teams.  Bonetti will continue to build a platform for all parents and students in order to best advertise the many happenings and events in Milford. Just one peek at the website or upcoming events emails will show the amount of juggling it takes to maintain numerous activities.