Middle College
and Social
Media
The University of North Dakota
John Reichert
Jessica Coombs
Doug Wagner
Social Media at Middle
College
Timeline of Social Media
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1978 - Computerized bulletin board system (BBS)
1993 - Univ. of Illinois Urbana-Champaign students develop Mosaic browser
making the world wide web available to public & Beverly Hills Internet
launches GeoCities
1994 – Internet referred to as the Information Superhighway
1997 – GeoCities surpasses one million members, AOL instant Messenger lets
users chat, blogging begins, and Google launches
1998 – GeoCities goes public, Friends Reunited (first social network founded in
Great Britain), Blogging service Blogger launches, dotcom bubble bursts and
future of internet is uncertain
2000 – Friendster launches and grows to three million users in three months
2002 – AOL has 34 million members, MySpace launches
2003 – Google buys Blogger, Linden lab introduces the virtual world Second
Life, LinkedIn a social networking site for professionals launches, Facebook
launches
2004 – MySpace outperforms Friendster in page views, Digg launches as a
social news site, Bebo (blog early, blog often) launches
Timeline of Social Media cont.
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2005 – News Corp buys MySpace, Facebook launches for high school students,
Friends Reunited is sold to a British television company, YouTube begins
storing/retrieving videos, MySpace is the most popular social networking site
2006 – Viacom and Yahoo offer to buy Facebook but both offers are declined,
Twitter is born
2007 – Facebook outperforms MySpace, Beacon an advertising system that
exposes user purchasing activity is launched by myspace, Apple releases the
iPhone.
2008 – Facebook is ranked the most used social network, Bebo is purchased by
AOL, Tumblr launches
2009 – Twitter breaks the news story about a plane landing in the Hudson River,
Microsoft launches Bing
2010 – Google launches Buzz to compete with Facebook, Apple releases iPad,
Internet surpasses newspapers
2011 – Apple introduces music-based social network Ping, 550 million people on
Facebook, 65 million tweets sent through Twitter, 2 billion video views per day on
YouTube, LinkedIn has 90 million professional users and goes public, Tumblr hits 1
billion page views per month 2 million posts per day, Pinterest launches, Google+
launches, Snip.It launches as a competitor to Pinterest
2012 – Facebook files for an IPO, Twitter reaches 12,233 tweets per second during
the Super Bowl
Our College Students, Digital
Natives
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“Our students have changed radically.
Today’s students are no longer the people our
educational system was designed to teach”
(Prensky, 2001).
Personal computers, iPads, internet, cell
phones, and much more are integral parts of
their lives.
Today’s students spent their entire lives
surrounded by and using computers,
videogames, cell phones, and all other toys
and tools of the digital age (Prensky, 2001).
Faculty, Digital Immigrants
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As digital immigrants learn, they always retain
their “accent” (Prensky, 2001).
“Digital immigrant instructors, who speak an
outdated language (that of the pre-digital
age), are struggling to teach a population
that speaks an entirely new language”
(Prensky, 2001).
Digital immigrants print out an email, print out
a document written on the computer to edit
it, and bring people to their office to see a
website instead of sending the URL via email
or text.
Interacting with Digital Natives
 “Digital
Natives can’t pay attention, or
that they choose not to? Often from the
Natives’ point of view their Digital
Immigrant instructors make their
education not worth paying attention to
compared to everything else they
experience – and then they blame them
for not paying attention!” (Prensky, 2001).
Finding a Balance
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“Many have lost the art of maintaining eye
contact while speaking in person; instead
they continually consult their phone for
updates, text messages, emails, Facebook
posts, and Twitter tweets. While faculty on
campuses of higher education struggle to
identify how digital students learn differently,
higher education professionals struggle to
identify their preferred methods for
communication” (Ratliff, 2011).
“Participation is no longer an option as Social
Media isn’t a spectator sport” (Solis, 2008).
Types of social media schools
use
 Facebook
– 98 %
 Twitter – 84 %
 LinkedIn – 47 %
 Blogging – 47 %
 Message Boards – 37 %
 Schools also use YouTube and Flickr
Types of social media schools
use
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Facebook
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YouTube
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Professional networking site
Blogging
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Instant messaging and blogging, that keeps students connected
Linked In
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Online photo site used to upload photos, sharing photos with
students, alumni, faculty and staff
Twitter
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Leader in online video, way to share original videos worldwide, virtual
tours, recruitment videos
Flickr
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A social utility that connects people with friends and others who
work, study and live around them
Online journaling
Message Boards
How schools use social media
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Classroom
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School pride
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Virtual tours, Twitter, school blogs
Professional development
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Facebook pages, free swag and materials
online
Potential students
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Twitter, blogs/networking sites
Networking
General outreach
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Social sites, contacting parents, alumni groups
How well are schools using
social media?
Successes
 Making
safe
communities
 Collaboration is
encouraged
 Invitation to
produce content
Challenges
 Lack
of
knowledge
 Lack of features
 More than a
presence
Best Practices
 Syracuse
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Integrated Twitter into the classroom.
 Students
tweet about different topics in class
which allows for community members to take
part in in class discussion
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Held a seminar for middle school students,
talking about appropriate social media use.
 “How
do you want your story to be perceived
by others”
The Rotolo Blog- Syracuse
University
Best Practices cont.
 Cornell
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University
Started a social media lab, studying how
people interact and use social media.
 Gives
undergraduate students the
opportunity to study something they are
already passionate about.
Best Practices cont.
 North
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Carolina State University
Uses Facebook to plug into a larger fan
base.
 Keeps
students, alumni, prospective students,
and community connected to the institution
in one centralized location.
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Uses Twitter as a centralized hub for many
different organizations on campus
 Sports
teams, clubs, etc.
Actions based on Best
Practices
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We will integrate Twitter into some classes in order
to expose students to ideas outside the classroom.
We will implement a program at our first-year
orientation that will require students to learn about
how they view on their social media pages.
We will encourage our faculty to do some
research with aspects of social media to become
experts in the field.
Finally, we will develop and create a Twitter page,
in order to have a one stop shop for all of our
organizations on campus.
Social Media Awareness 101
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This would be a 45 min to hour long seminar.
The subject would be social media, and its
pros and cons.
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We would be able to instruct students on the
college’s policies, about harassment, e-bullying,
etc.
We would be able to teach students healthy
ways to tell their stories online.
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Would help address how employers can view
their pages, etc.
Facebook in the Workplace
Social Media in the Workplace
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Social media is can be a
useful tool to connect
with co-workers
Inappropriate postings
can result in termination
of employment
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Snyder v. Millersville
University (2008)- student
was removed from
student teaching after
inappropriate MySpace
posts (Simpson, 2010).
The First Amendment and
Social Media
References
Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants. On the Horizon. 9
(5).
Ratliff, A. (2011). Are they listening? Social media on campuses of
higher education. The Journal of Technology in Student Affairs.
Retrieved from
http://studentaffairs.com/ejournal/Summer_2011/AreTheyListening
.html
Silverman, Matt. "How Higher Education Uses Social Media
[INFOGRAPHIC]." Social Media News and Web Tips – Mashable –
The Social Media Guide. N.p., 3 Feb. 2012. Web. 23 Feb. 2012.
<http://mashable.com/2012/02/03/higher-education-socialmedia/>.
Simpson, Mike. "NEA - Social Networking Nightmares." NEA - NEA Home.
N.p., 2010. Web. 23 Feb. 2012.
<http://www.nea.org/home/38324.htm>.
Solis, B. (2008). The Essential Guide to Social Media.