Storyteller: A day in the life of Mountain Brook Schools communications specialist William Galloway

William Galloway isn’t accustomed to having the light reflected back on him. The communications and public relations specialist for Mountain Brook Schools spends his days shining the light on others. 

It’s something that seems to come as naturally as his broadcasting voice, which he also puts to good use. The only thing typical about each day for Galloway is the fact that there really isn’t a typical day. 

A single recent day included meetings with MBS Athletic Director Andy Urban and Superintendent Dicky Barlow, discussion of a new podcast with football leaders, coordinating nighttime events at Cherokee Bend Elementary, responding to a media query about a National Merit finalist, sending out reminders about Career Tech Month and helping coordinate state basketball credentials. 

Galloway is the point man on communicating to more than 4,300 students and 750 school employees through a variety of channels. 

“I operate between 20 and 30 social media accounts, but I monitor over 100,” he said. 

Getting to the point 

Galloway said he is only lucky in the sense that he knew what he wanted to do very early on in life. The rest came from hard work. 

His father, Trip, has a picture of his son in 5th grade interviewing his maternal grandfather for an NPR-sponsored program about his service in Korea, where he rescued a soldier from a minefield. 

By the time Galloway got to Mountain Brook High School, his path was set. Broadcasting, interviewing and reporting was his passion. He began covering athletics on a regular basis through live tweeting and other channels. 

“I had many opportunities to cover sports in high school,” Galloway said. “And they allowed me to miss classes to be a student reporter for all the school’s teams.” 

He also began broadcasting football games on the radio in 2014 and 2015 with cohost Jack Royer. As Galloway tells it, “Jack was older and more into news and I was more into sports. But he helped me get started. 

“Jack was still the recorded voice of the Junior High pledge of allegiance 10 years after he graduated,” he said with a laugh. 

Galloway graduated from Mountain Brook High School in 2017 and headed to the University of Alabama, where he majored in sports media. He also worked in the athletic department and interned for a TV station. A professional broadcasting career seemed logical and attainable. 

Yet one day, a broadcasting mentor gave him some advice that stuck: “If you want to have a life outside work, get a professional communications job. You can scratch the itch to broadcast sports on the side. You will be a lot happier not constantly traveling, not being in the middle of the grind and not trying to just survive in a cutthroat industry.” 

Though determined to follow that advice, Galloway had no inkling of what that kind of job might be. Then, two weeks before graduation, he got a phone call. 

“God’s timing,” Galloway said. 

It was Barlow, who asked, “William what are you doing?” Galloway said, “Dr. Barlow, I’m in bible study.” 

“I don’t mean right now,” Barlow said. “I mean when you graduate.” And that was that. 

The job

Galloway is the second person to fill the role of communications and public relations specialist for Mountain Brook Schools, which was created in 2020. He came into the job in May 2021.

“Year one was a come in and learn things [year]. See how people do what they do and soak it in,” Galloway said. “Year two and three, I’ve been able to show what I can do with my skillset. I go to monthly PTO meetings, I follow social media accounts, I take recs from community members and parents. I’m plugged into groups like the Mountain Brook City Schools Foundation and All In Mountain Brook. I keep my finger on the pulse of the community.” 

When Benny Eaves retired as the athletic director last spring, it was about a month and a half until Urban came along. With spring and so many things going on like tennis, golf, baseball and softball, Galloway jumped in and helped operate the schools’ athletics social media on top of the school side. It was a lot.

“Really, I try to stay informed about what’s going on and keep an ear to the ground, and if I can’t help people tell a story, I try to empower them to tell it themselves,” he said. One example of this, he said, was a story about the school system’s sign language program.

“I didn’t even know we offered sign language. I was blown away by this. People need to know that our kids are learning and helping and teaching sign language in class. So three years into this job, I’ve got systems set up where each school has social media operators, and I don’t have to be at every school all the time.”

And next

As if things aren’t busy enough for Galloway he has also gotten into fundraising with Urban. 

“We are trying to take things we have seen at the college level and see if they will work at the high school level. Selling video board ads, more ad sales content on social media, those type things. Trying to come up with ideas beyond just having parents write checks every time we need money,” Galloway said.

He is also scratching that broadcasting itch with play-by-play broadcasting for high schools and colleges on the side, freelance public address announcing, emceeing events and doing voice work. 

And he is getting married this summer to Anna Sager, a seventh grade history and civics teacher at the Junior High. 

They met at new teacher orientation after Galloway had been on the job about three months. Barlow was the one who pushed him to attend the orientation, despite his busy schedule getting ready for the start of the school year, telling Galloway, “You never know who you might meet.” He met Sager on the first day of orientation.

“William worked very hard to keep our proposal a secret. I thought we were going to dinner to celebrate his graduation from his master’s program and had been convinced by my friends to wear a white dress that night,” Sager said. “I was so unaware of what was about to happen that while driving to the proposal, I looked at pictures we had just taken and said, ‘This is a little embarrassing because people are going to think I thought we were getting engaged!’ He kept his cool, and about 5 minutes later, we were engaged!’ 

The pair have a dog named George, and they enjoy attending sports events and theatricals. “I did have to convince him that he’d enjoy the theater,” Sager said. “But I do think he has seen the light.” 

You can find Galloway’s work on the Mountain Brook Schools homepage, under “MBS News.” To listen to some of his school podcasts, visit mbschools.podbean.com.