Beyond Facebook
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Social Media in International Education
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Beyond Facebook
- 1. Beyond Facebook Online International Student Communities Noah Kuchins: San Francisco State University Guido DeWilde: University of Amsterdam Michelle Hall: Hofstra University
- 3. Social Media & Our Professional Lives How Social Media Affects Us Social Media Barriers How Our Students Interact with Social Media “Beyond Facebook” How to Continue Innovating with Social Media
- 4. Foundations of a Social Network Have you seen the movie “The Social Network”? Three key ingredients for a successful online social network…
- 5. Foundations of a Social Network “The Social Network” Mark Zuckerberg, Sean Parker, Eduardo Saverin
- 6. Foundations of a Social Network “The Facebook” “Harvard email addresses” “Finding new and old friends”
- 7. Network Users A typical Facebook user…
- 8. Network Users Levels of Participation Creators Critics Collectors Joiners Spectators Inactives (Forrester, 2006)
- 9. Network Users Catering to Needs Ask participants to build a network Allow participants to suggest improvements Give an option to write a wiki or article Give an Option to Post a Photo Give an Option to Leave a Comment Give an option to vote or rate Present Information for Reading
- 10. Defining a Network’s Purpose
- 11. Defining a Network’s Purpose It’s More Important to Understand BEHAVIOR than Technology Paul Adams: The Real Life Social Network v.2, San Francisco June 2010
- 12. Defining a Network’s Purpose Often, People do not Know What to do with the Things They Build Paul Adams: The Real Life Social Network v.2, San Francisco June 2010 815,278 Likes Great! Now what?
- 13. Defining a Network’s Purpose Cited: The Real Life Social Network v.2 What are you doing? I’m social networking!I’m social networking!
- 14. Defining a Network’s Purpose Social Networking is a Means to an End… You Need to Understand What the End is Cited: The Real Life Social Network v.2
- 15. Defining a Network’s Purpose When defining a network’s Purpose, it’s Important to think about: 1.Relevance 2.Immediacy
- 16. Relevance: Who Would Join? 1.Define Your Target Market Exchange Students International Students Study Abroad Students Scholars ??? Exchange International Study Abroad Alumni
- 17. Immediacy: When are they joining? 2.How Close is Your User to the Group/Page/Message/Channel? Exchange Students: Semester-Based Group International Students: Graduating Class Study Abroad: Length of Stay, Country, or Year Prospective Students
- 18. Immediacy + Relevance = Commitment With a Defined Purpose, You Can Structure Your…
- 19. Immediacy + Relevance = Purpose Facebook Page
- 20. Immediacy + Relevance = Purpose Go Canucks!
- 21. Immediacy + Relevance = Purpose Facebook Group
- 22. Immediacy + Relevance = Purpose Twitter Feed
- 23. Immediacy + Relevance = Purpose YouTube Channel
- 24. Defining a Network’s Purpose XYZ University Page Study Abroad Student Recruitment Campus Networks International Recruitment Admissions Exchange
- 25. Feeder/Container Networks XYZ University Page Study Abroad Alumni Campus Networks International Students Recruitment and Outreach Exchange Programs XYZ University Page Feeder/Container Group: One large Group that feeds people in to other networks. Spokes: Networks that naturally occur within larger networks
- 26. Network Scaling Marketing: Outreach, Recruitment Pages Central Hubs: Office Page, Main Student Org Group (ISN, IEEC) Cohorts: International Students Class 2014, IEEC Fall 2011 Spoke Groups for Community or Special Interest: IEW Committee 2011, Sports, Music, Film, Nationality Interaction & Trust Low High >10,000 5,000 1,000 < 250 Number of Users
- 27. Building, Controlling and Monitoring
- 28. Building, Controlling and Monitoring Controlling your Network through Monitoring: Can be Challenging! You can meet the Challenge! Staff Commitment! This component has to be a commitment that you and your staff are vested in. It would be a new initiative, and may take some getting used to. The Facebook Group or any new Network is to be monitored closely. If students feel that the page is inactive, they will ignore post from your office!
- 29. How Do We Monitor your Network? Link your Network to the Office Email! You will see what people are posting immediately! Have student staff review consistently! Do not allow student workers to post ANYTHING without permission of Professional Staff! You must Designate a Staff Member to Post comments at least 2-3 time a week. Send Personal messages to your Students. Building, Controlling and Monitoring
- 30. Building, Controlling and Monitoring There needs to comments on posts made by students on your page. Solicit student generated content (eg. pictures, postings, videos, event links, blog links etc.) Check to see who is online and take a moment to chat with them Have Advertised open chat times. This has to be marketed and students have to be prodded. We did this though MSN Messenger years ago and have adapted it to Facebook.
- 31. Building, Controlling and Monitoring The ways Hofstra University Office of Multiculteral and International Student Programs uses Facebook: Advertise social programs for the office. International Student questions chat line. Connect to other student groups and clubs. Build on the original Facebook page and create groups for special events. ex: International Student Leadership Conference Group. Students who went to the conference had a shared experience. Students posted the pictures that they took on the trip. The Facebook group became a forum for discussion and dialog on their shared experience.
- 32. Technology that fits your purpose A social network for the Gothic and industrial subculture Online language learning Connect with old classmates (in Russia and former Soviet republics) For general social purposes use a general technology
- 33. Top 10 Most Widely-Used Social Networks 1. Facebook 2. Qzone 3. Habbo 4. Twitter 5. Windows Live Spaces 6. Bebo 7. Vkontakte 8. LinkedIn 9. Myspace 10.Orkut …………………..640 Million Users ………………………..480 Million Users ……………………….200 Million Users ……………………….175 Million Users …120 Million Users ………………………….117 Million Users ………………….110 Million Users …………………….100 Million Users …………………….100 Million Users ………………………..100 Million Users
- 34. Technology: Registration Facebook, minimum age 13 Orkut, Google email address Flickr, Yahoo email address Mixi, invite only Tuenti, invite only
- 35. Technology: Country Specific The Netherlands 16,6 million inhabitants Hyves 10,9 million users
- 36. Did We Miss Anything? Dating Sites Specially Developed Networks Blackboard CollegiateLink OrgSync Groupspace iLearn
- 37. To Like or Unlike? Should we always use Facebook? 1. Helping international students integrate in social life on campus? 2. Facilitate psychological support for international students (culture shock)? 3. University marketing and outreach? 4. Apply for an exchange program?
- 38. Trends, Models, and Limitations
- 39. Integrating with Student Organizations San Francisco State University: International Education Exchange Council (IEEC)
- 41. IEEC Fall 2011 Group
- 42. Fall 2011 Group Timeline 0 50 100 150 200 250 Comments Questions Polls Responses Members
- 43. 30 day Breakdown of Comments Hybrids 26% Advice 8% Offering Housing 14% Seller 6% Random 3% Travel 3% Worries 3% Greeting 37% 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 Comments Responses
- 44. What Do They Ask About? First 30 Days… 0 20 40 60 80 100 120 Questions Responses Greeting/ Question 15% Acceptance Package 5% Activities 2% Classes 39% Housing 17% Nationality 3% Travel 2% Majors 12% Multiple Questions 3% Arrivals 2%
- 45. Advising Outgoing Exchange Students Blackboard Advising tool for students going on exchange Step-by-step guide Discussion boards and emailing groups for specific locations Hyves is disappearing, Facebook is Growing Why not use Facebook? Blackboard Advising tool for students going on exchange Step-by-step guide Discussion boards and emailing groups for specific locations Hyves is disappearing, Facebook is Growing Why not use Facebook?
- 46. Advising Outgoing Exchange Students Needs Assessment (206 Exchange Students) 97% Facebook account 59% favored Blackboard Personal Information should be private Blackboard is a formal tool, UvA is a formal institution Facebook is social and recreational
- 47. Advising Outgoing Exchange Students Point Out Existing Facebook Groups: Fellow Exchange Students International Student Organizations Host University Create Facebook for: Host University (per semester or year) Bureau of International Students Accommodations Abroad Scholarships Visa Applications
- 48. Student Support: Psychological Issues Psychological help No guarantee Privacy and Trust Facebook is Fakebook: Fun Information Need to Break Out of Social Isolation Blackboard: Information and Assignments
- 49. Student Support: Housing Problems
- 50. Student Support: Housing Problems Housing Problem Private room with private facilities outside of the city center “Diemen” Too far away, too expensive “we want to move” Facebook group with Dutch and International Students Making intercultural Friends and organize / announce events
- 51. Student Support: Housing Problems Limitations Only international students used the group (they felt alone and abandoned) Dutch students already had friends Frequently used in the beginning and then the group died Less complaints, except by other students
- 52. Distance Learning A little teaser… Can we use Facebook for distance learning projects? “Childcare quality, research and recent developments, International teaching series on early childhood education” University of Amsterdam - Freie Universität Berlin - Purdue University Find out more on our Facebook…
- 53. Socio-Cultural Programming & Campus Networking Clubs and Organizations International Students Multicultural Organizations Student Leaders Prospective Students
- 54. BRINGING IT ALL TOGETHER Network Building which was discussed earlier is crucial! The Strength of your Social Network is determined by how many networks you can reach out to and bring together. Example: International Students need to connect to all the categories previously mentioned. The purpose of the other categories are to connect with as many people as possible. A prospective student may based their decision to go to your institution based on how involved your current students are! Coming together becomes SOCIAL HARMONY!
- 55. Light up Your Social Network!
- 56. Marketing: Outreach and Recruitment In three months! How?
- 57. To see more recruitment examples, join the facebook group!
- 58. LETS KEEP THE DISCUSSION GOING! SEARCH: “BEYOND FACEBOOK NAFSA” Lets use social media to improve how we use social media!! Join the discussion, follow the instructions to join our group on facebook…
Notes de l'éditeur
- Opening Sheet: Introduction, Title and Presenters
- Sheet Noah: Video (5minutes) Place Holder for Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFZ0z5Fm-Ng Click on the video box to play (it will go in to full-screen mode). If you just click anywhere on the screen, it will move to the next slide. If you click it again, it will pause. If you want to move on early, hit escape.
- Sheet Noah: Premise (4minutes) Social media has become the new buzzword in many fields and industries around the country, including education. Everybody is scrambling to keep up with each other, and trying to figure out the best ways to use these new tools. We all use social media in our personal lives, whether you know it or not. Some of us use Facebook ten times a day, and some of us just read the twitter ticker daily on CNN. Social medial is affecting us, and what we understand, on a daily basis. We have Facebook, Twitter, new types of newsletters, youtube, interactive blogs, to name a few. The web is throwing so many tools at us that we need to continuously learn how to use new modes of communication, and intelligently predict how people are going to interact in the future—it is tough keeping up. We need to learn how social media will affect our professional lives, and how we can use these tools—these great resources—to enhance our understanding of what our student populations need and want. We need to know how our partner universities are using these tools to contact their students, and most importantly, how everybody in this field is using these tools to make their professional lives better while making processes more efficient. Today, we are going to talk about some examples of how social media has come to its current point, how we have been using it in our processes, where we have come up against barriers in making social media work for us and enhance our professional lives, and where we have come up to the “edge” of Facebook. We are going to talk about models, types of students and users, and how people interact with social media. More importantly, we are going to talk about how your students are going to interact with social media, how your colleagues are interacting with social media, and how you are going to enhance your professional environments. The title of this presentation is “Beyond Facebook” because we need to know how we are going to move beyond Facebook, and these barriers that have prevented us from using all of these social media tools to our maximum benefit. Then, we need to learn how to keep this discussion going. Most importantly, we need to think about the innovations that each one of us can utilize, and how we can continue innovating in the endlessly changing environment of social media in general, the constantly changing aspects of the web, and keeping track of how information is transmitted. We want to be innovative, and we want to go beyond what’s holding us back. Let’s start the discussion today, and beyond— To help us all do that, we’ve created our own social media tool—a facebook group for knowledge sharing in our field. (Explain at the end how experts can join, promising the launch)
- Part 1 Hello everyone, I am Guido de Wilde, I work for the University of Amsterdam where I am coordinating the university wide student exchanges, both outgoing and incoming. Part 2 Who has seen the movie, the social network? Maybe youve seen it in the theatre, or on your flight coming to Vancouver, but if you have seen the movie, you will know the three key ingredients of a succesful online social network
- Of course, Mark Zuckerberg, Sean Parker and Eduardo Saverin - click Or as they look in real life... - click
- No no no, of course I am joking. Although, the ingredients are pictured in this movie. You will need a network of members/participants, you will need a purpose for the network to exist, and the online technology to facilitate. Or as was the case for Facebook, a network of Harvard email addresses, with the purpose to find old and new friends, and the created technology called "the Facebook". As a structure for the first part of this session, this is what we will focus on. So lets start with the first ingredient, network. - click
- In particular, network users. How can one describe a network user? - click
- In order to understand, and to increase the effectiveness of a network, one needs to understand its intended users. Forrester identified users, based upon the level of participation, the ladder of participation. Creators are at the top of the ladder with the highest level of participation. They are creative, influential, and have a vast knowledge of a topic. They actively write blogs, make websites, music and videos. Critics like to discuss about the input of creators, they add perspective and write comments. For instance, rating restaurants on websites. Collectors are social networkers, they like to be informed and share knowledge with their network. They are reading RSS feeds and twitter posts and will share this with their friends. Joiners do not so much share, but mainly build a network and maintain a profile. They will easily add people as friends for instance. Spectators, a large and rather passive user category, they just read blogs, websites, watch videos or listen to podcasts. And inactives, well they are not doing anything of the above, but will have an online presence. Probably created a profile once without actually maintaining it. - click
- An online network of users, may consist of several types of people. Several user categories. It is therefore smart to include a form of communication, that will match the level of participation. Here is a list of building blocks with an increasing level of participation. It is extremely important to research and understand your target audience, knowing the user categories in your audience. As an example, university of amsterdam exchange students (going on an exchange) are mainly spectators and joiners. So, for the spectators we should create an online platform that provides enough information. And to trigger our joiners, we need to have a visible network with an option to contact other students. This way they can add them to their own network. But also try to accommodate the other smaller groups, for instance the occasional creators in our group, can be asked to help us build a website or facebook group. Also, maybe someone in the audience has created a facebook that did not have a lot of commenting going on, do not be afraid that it is not used. It may simply be the case that your target audience are spectators just reading information.
- Defining what you want to use social media for is the first all important step. Whether you already have an extensive footprint in social media, or are just getting started, defining the purpose is something to constantly take into account. The purpose of respective social media outlets may change over time, may evolve and adapt, branch, so constantly ask yourself, what is the most accurate definition I can to my use of social media? What is the purpose?
- Its not necessary to be a technical genius to define your purpose. Social media is very much centered around human behaivor. Technology changes fast, and in very unpredictable ways. Human behavior changes slowly and is more predictable. Focus on the way individuals will relate to your network. With this in mind, its easier to choose the technology that will best suit the purpose of your network. Twiiter, facebook, youtube, groupspace, they all serve different types of behaviors differently. Define your purpose around behavior, not a certain technology.
- An important example of understanding behavior is that people often don’t know what they are going to do with the things they build. There are so many Facebook fan pages with hundreds of thousands of followers yet with very little happening. So 100,000 people become a fan of yours on facebook. Great! Now what? You need to look at things like Facebook fan pages, and think, “How is this going to fundamentally improve my work processes, student experiences with my office, or the programs I am trying to promote?” How with the individual benefit from this tool, this group, this message? People are very casual in their online interactions. Activity is a better measure of success than pure numbers. If people aren’t active in your network, page, group, or following your messages, they’re really just dead weight.
- Another example of understanding behavior is simple… Its quite rare that someone would say “What are doing?” “I’m social networking!” I’m on facebook means something particular. I think most of us use social media for a specific purpose, and often quite narrowly. We don’t stray from our online habits, or try new things easily. Click More often, the response, “I’m commenting on what my friends did last night,” or, “I’m checking out photos from last weekend,” or, “I’m checking out what my friends in London have been up to.” The technology may be changing fast, but the underlying human motivations are changing very slowly, and in many places, not at all. To quote Paul Adams, Global Brand Manager at Facebook, “We need to first understand what is motivating people to use these services before jump on the latest social networking bandwagon.”
- So to reiterate this point, focus on what motivates people to use your socail media resources, whatever they may be. Technologies will come and go, but the fundamental social behavior patterns of people will remain the same. A better long term strategy for using social media is to understand people’s motivations for using new technologies, and not the technologies themselves. Remember just 10 years ago, many of you probably had AOL accounts, and Mark Zuckerberg was in high school…
- When defining a purpose for your use of social media, behavior can often be broken down to to two essential things that will help to build a network with active members and effective outcomes. 1)Relevance, meaning how connected is the social media tool (group, page, video, blog, etc.) to an individual’s identity. 2) Immediacy, meaning why is it important to them right now, at that moment, at this time in their life?
- A good way to achieve relevance is to simply define your target market. This is a mantra in business and marketing but it applies equally well to social networks. In many cases, you want the most narrowly defined target possible. How specific is the nature of your group/page/message/network to the individual’s identity? (A group for a family as an example) Are they: (Click for each one) scholars, exchange students, international students, or study abroad students, partner university colleagues, departments, people from a specific region or country?
- Immediacy is somewhat abstract, but a simple way to understand this is to think of social networks as dynamic, not static. Students 5 years from now will not have the same level of interest in a specific university related group. The active members will change based on the stage of life they are in, and how close that relates to your group/page/message or youtube channel for example. (Aix example) Linked-in is a good example of a network based on immediacy. Students will often join linked-in as they realize they are graduating and need to find a job. Additionally, many linked-in members will become much more active as their interest in a career change grows. This applies in many different ways and is something I think many people are experimenting with. For example, instead of creating groups for international students, creating a specific group based on a graduating class, a study abroad class. More and more international office have discovered this is a very effective way to generate interactions and activity. A simple example on this slide is the University of Virginia International Students Class of 2015. This group will have an applied relevance and immediacy to the students now and throughout their time at the university.
- With a defined purpose, its makes it easier to create or make adjustments to your social tools. Its important to understand that social media is not static, much like the web is. You must be dynamic in defining your purpose, because the purpose may evolve, or mutate over time. But its helps give a clearer structure to your Click
- I’ll make a shameless plug for our group that you can see on the little handouts. We created this group because we know there is too much related to this subject to be covered in one session, and there are too many of you out there who have great ideas and innovations to present to all of us, so please use this resource if you have further questions, and especially if you are an advanced user of social media to help all of us adapt as things change.
- A common issue many of you may have confronted is that many universities, organizations and international offices have a catch-all approach, meaning there is a single social media presence on each tool. You have one facebook page for your office, one twitter feed, one flickr account for an entity, or office that handles many different things and may be working with different types of student populations. Is it wrong to have a facbook page for your whole office? Absolutely not, to the contrary its essential, but its important to offer more specific social media resources for your various student populations, and try to get more specific groups related to the relevance and immediacy of the individuals.
- There are many ways to accomplish this, and it will depend on the size, type and location fo your institution, and the types of students you serve. Again the point of the Beyond Facebook group is for all of us to share the the successes and failures we have had in our different approaches. If this example wouldn’t work for you, I’m hoping another one of us here in this room will have a similar enough situation to yours that they will be able to offer their advice and example through the group. Anyway, an example solution of getting students to be active and effectively create real world connections from their virtual world interactions is by narrowing the purpose of pages and group. If you have one main office page, it may be necessary to create other pages/groups that are more specific to those individuals, and use your main page as a gateqay to those other resources, not as the resource itself. In fact, usually students will do this themselves if you don’t take initiative. I use the term spoking, meaning that people will naturally filter themselves into more relevant, immediate, defined networks if given the option. If you page has more than 1000 likes for example, they will often get lost, lose interest or not see the utility is using a resource that infrequently speaks to their speficif needs or activities. Use Your Group/Page as a Gateway Feeder/Container Group: One large group that feeds people in to other networks Spoking: Networks naturally occurring within larger networks
- This bring us to the relative size of your network…you sould consider that the size of your network is also integral to the purpose. A natural inclination is to think that bigger networks generate more activity and participation. A page with 500,000 likes for example. The reality is that for most purposes, its more effective to have a narrowly defined group that builds trust and personal interactions. For many purposes, we are trying to translate our virtual networks into real-life interactions, and bigger networks without defined relevance and immediacy dilute the ratio of active participants. For outreach and marketing purposes, bigger can be good, if you are maintaining the interest of your large network and targeting your message. Activity is the best measure of success, including posts from the members, not just posts from the top down. Cheerios has 500,00 likes on their page, but do we need to aspire to this and how will it be effective to what end we are trying to use our social network for? Instead of Being Specific, Create a Connection Ex: International F1/J1 Students and Study Abroad Students = “Global Students Fall 2011 at SF State” “SF State International Class of 2014” So with a defined purpose, and understanding of the types of users, all you need to do is build, control, and monitor your networ.
- Sheet Michelle: Building, Controlling and Monitoring the Network (5 minutes)
- Part 3 And, the last ingredient, choosing a technology for the online social network. Many already exist, and if you don't have the funds to create your own network, you can choose out of the many free online networking technologies. Here are some pointers. First, try and match the technology with the purpose of the network. Do you have a group of Goth students, use Vampire Freaks. Want to connect with classmates in Russia, use Odnoklassniki. And for general social purposes, use a general social tool like Facebook.
- Want to include many participants and increase the chance for your network to expand, use a technology that is widely used. Many will already have a login account and probably experience using it. - click
- Do pay attention to limitations in registration. Not everyone has a certain email address, and some only work on invitation only. - click
- And, a really important aspect in our international workfield, some networks are only used in specific regions or countries, and some are restricted in certain regions. Want to start a general Facebook site, it will be difficult to reach Chinese and Vietnamese students. And in a small country like The Netherlands, Facebook is rather new, most Dutch students had a Hyves account, fairly similar to Facebook. Except that it is in Dutch. Things are changing, ever since Hyves is used by young children and Grandparents, we see a change happening. facebook is growing and at least at the UvA now, 97 % of the students have a Facebook account. This also shows, it is a quickly changing environment and you will have to stay on top of it. Your purpose might not change, but in two or three years, your users and technology could change. - click
- And I did leave out certain things. Dating sites of course, simply not our target audience. And the especially developed technologies, too many to pick out one and discuss, but very very helpful for a network as you can influence the set up to match your users and purpose.
- Part 4 Well, enough talking for now, I know its early but now I want to learn from this network. From you. Internationalization is an ever changing field, and we are always trying to stay on top of trends. And if you are anything like me, you probably also wondered. Would it be possible to use Facebook for this, could it help? Well, I am curious what you think will work. I will show you a couple of trends and activities in our field, and I would like to know whether or not you think Facebook could help. And , we will do this Facebook style. You have all received our Facebook comment sign, like and unlike. - click As for the first topic. Do we need to create a Facebook page in order to help international students integrate in social life on campus? Show me your sign! - ask opinion of like and unlike person - click facilitate psychological support for international students (homesickness) - click university marketing and outreach - click apply for an exchange programme
- Sheets Noah: Trends, Models and Limitations I mentioned in the introduction the edge of facebook. This is something we have often come up against. It means simply that possibilities don’t translate to the realities. For example, I remember the first facebook event I created that had more 200 attending, and another 200 maybes. 300 to 400 expected. How many actually attended? About 150…Half of the attendings and ¼ of the maybes. This became a rule that works pretty well to predict attendance. So now in this immense topic, we are going to speak quite specifically about some experieinces we have had. Again, we will be elaborating more in the facebook group in the days and weeks, or even months ahead, and we hope you will join the discussion and tell us your successes, trneds, and limitations as well.
- At SF State, one of the ways we have evolved social media to fit our specific needs is through facebook groups. Now I’m not going to discuss the details of how pages and groups function, so if you don’t know the difference, well then its more incentive to join our group and get answers. But basically if you prefer a page, or a group when using facebook, its less important again than defining your purpose. I’ve found that the new facebook groups are currently generating much more activity, personal interactions, student generated content, and real-life interaction, so this is the format we prefer because our purpose is to forment student-to-student connections across cultures… Our office has the luxury of having a student organization directly affiliated with us. I’m their advisor and I also provide oversight for many of their facebook resources. The organization is called the International Education Exchange Council, and whether or not you have similar organizations on your campus, many of the principals can be done very simply by you, and not student asistants or inters, and not necessarily a whole student organization.
- Since 2007, we have had a defined purpose for our facebook resources… we wanted to use social media as a way to connect our international students to our domestic student population. The IEEC is a student organization made up of both domestic students interested in study abroad, study abroad alums, and international students so it was easy to translate this goal to social media. Initially, IEEC had one of the very first facebook pages when they became available, but it wasn’t very successful at generating interactions even with 800 likes. We decided to focus on groups, because they allowed us to monitor who joined closer, prevent spamming or predatory behavior to our student populations. And we began creating groups based on semester since in helped define the relevance and immediacy to each student. Eventually, groups were created within groups, as students became specific about their interest in film, sports, parties. Until last November, the groups were quite messy, didn’t differ much from a page in their layout, and really became a top down resource. The limitations were that there was too much scattering, people were posting in four different places, and there was no reliable source for communication. Then facebook did something– they changed the way groups work. I was personally very very skeptical of the change. Nonetheless, I decided to experiment with it and created our Spring 2011 group in the new structure. I have to admit, I was wrong and facebook was right, though there are still many limitations. But what I would like to talk about quickly is how our Fall 2011 group is working…
- To define how we’ve evolved in the way we create groups, its very much like baking a cake. It about adding the right ingredients at the right time. In this example, we’re bringing exchange students together with study abroad students after many groups, and many semesters, I’ve stumbled onto a great recipe. This is example is so fresh, it deals with students who will be arriving at our university next semester.
- This is a graph of a timeline of the first 30 days of the group. Activity is steady even as the group grow. We averaged 4 new postings per day, and an average of 7 responses per posting. 32 distinct interactions per day is more than double anything we have experienced in the last 4 years. Why the increase in activity? It goes to the recipe– seeding it initially with exchange students, and adding the current overseas study aboad students built the foundation. trust is at a level where almost all of the different types of facebook users Guido mentioned are posting. Instead of being generated by creators and critics, there were posting from 2/3rd from the actual group members. Activity Highlights April 21st – Inception: We began with two members (IEEC and SF State) April 25th – Group Announcement sent out to all J-1s, added 74 students the first day May 3rd – Major activity spike corresponds with the J1’s course registration date May 18th – The first and only poll received 20 responses, and six comments
- Interesting fact: Though rarer, most comment/question hybrids start out with someone introducing themselves before asking a question. Those students are more likely to get reply comments, and have them in larger numbers. Straight comments get much less attention.
- Dynamic. The group evolves, but its clear in the beginning students are trying to make connections based on common interests. Nationality, interest in a language, and surprisingly, field of study are the most common links that students are searching for. Many interactions lead to extended discussions about specific classes and professors. More and more students are going to the group to get essential advice. Visa applications and interviews have been quite popular and the students are very happy to share their experiences.
- Part 5 As I am the student exchange coordinator I deal with the advising part of our students going on an exchange. In order to prevent getting 500 emails with the same questions, we developed an online community using the Blackboard technology as an advising tool for our students. All UvA students automatically have a blackboard account. Our professors are using Blackboard for their class assignments, providing handouts and contact details of the professors and the participating students. Therefore it seemed rather logical to use blackboard and create our International Student Affairs Blackboard group. In the online environment students will find a step-by-step preparation guide with lots of information, we have specific groups per destination, have discussion boards where students post their questions to each other, and they can easily find the email addresses of other outgoing students and even incoming exchange students.
- As I told you, Hyves is slowly disappearing, the use of Facebook is growing, and since you can also create a group on Facebook that could help provide information, advise students, facilitate discussion and contact between students. We wondered if we could replace Blackboard with Facebook - click As I explained in the beginning, you need to investigate your target audience, so we conducted a needs assessment, and found that most students have a Facebook account, but that 59 percent still favored Blackboard as the advising tool. Why? Well, students indicated that their personal information should remain to be private. The university of amsterdam does not need to be involved in their personal life. They are afraid for instance, that a selection committee for outgoing exchange could use their personal information in the decision making process. Also, blackboard is seen as a formal tool and the UvA is a formal institution. Formal communication about exchange programmes, like deadlines or news of their acceptance, should not be communicated through Facebook. Facebook is a social and recreational tool, not an academic. So this covers the topic of providing information. According to our assessment 44% of the UvA students were spectators, and expect to receive a lot of information. However, 40% of the students were joiners, and needed to build their online network. And this is where students saw benefits for Facebook. - click
- They thought Facebook could be a great tool in addition to Blackboard in order to expand their network. Find other students that were in a similar situation. Therefore we asked them to rate a couple of existing and non existing facebook groups and pages that they thought could help with going on exchange. In terms of existing facebook groups and pages most students valued the personal pages of fellow exchange students, then international student organizations and also the page for the host institution. So in order to help them, we must point out to newly selected students, the existence of these three facebook pages and groups. But they were also missing a couple of pages / groups that did not exist yet, and we should create. They wanted a page for the host institution per semester or year, monitored by us. This way they could connect with other uva students going to the same destination in a specific time. Also they wanted to know all students going on exchange through our office, and students who are dealing with the similar issues or problems like finding accommodation, applying for scholarships and visas. So, this is what we will be creating very soon. - click
- Another topic where Facebook did help was our problem with housing. Amsterdam deals with a housing shortage, so the UvA works together with housing companies to arrange and reserve accommodation on several locations throughout the city. Here are some examples, and students a placed randomly in any of the locations. However, everybody wants to stay in the top (rather cheap) location in the city centre. Well, of course, wouldn't you? This led to a lot of complaints from the location that was the furthest away, in a place called Diemen. This location is rather new, specifically for students who wanted private accommodation with private facilities. And yes, it is more expensive than the city center location. So students complained it was too far away, too expensive like they were being dumped outside amsterdam. To tackle this problem we thought it would be wise to create a facebook, to pull students outside of their private accommodation and experience the student environment they were in. The Dutch students staying there were really happy as they knew you need to be on a 8 yea waiting list to find accommodation in the city center, and that this was a really good accommodation option. So we created the Facebook, included the Dutch and International students and hoped it could help in making friends and organize events. - click
- Another topic where Facebook did help was our problem with housing. Amsterdam deals with a housing shortage, so the UvA works together with housing companies to arrange and reserve accommodation on several locations throughout the city. Here are some examples, and students a placed randomly in any of the locations. - click
- However, everybody wants to stay in the top (rather cheap) location in the city centre. Well, of course, wouldn't you? This led to a lot of complaints from the location that was the furthest away, in a place called Diemen. This location is rather new, specifically for students who wanted private accommodation with private facilities. And yes, it is more expensive than the city center location. So students complained it was too far away, too expensive like they were being dumped outside amsterdam. To tackle this problem we thought it would be wise to create a facebook, to pull students outside of their private accommodation and experience the student environment they were in. The Dutch students staying there were really happy as they knew you need to be on a 8 yea waiting list to find accommodation in the city center, and that this was a really good accommodation option. So we created the Facebook, included the Dutch and International students and hoped it could help in making friends and organize events. - click
- And it did help, complaints went down drastically that semester. But it also had limitations. Now other international students were complaining that they did not have a Facebook page. And Dutch students did not really use the Facebook page, as they already had friends so there was no need for them to actively use this group. And we saw that this group was only used in the first couple of weeks. As soon as they made friends, the need of this Facebook stopped. Which made us realize, that you should not always frantically try to promote participation on a Facebook. Sometimes Facebookpages have a short lifespan. - click
- I think we can be talking about Facebook for hours. At the UvA we have had so many trials and errors that are interesting. But as we have limited time for this session, we would like to keep a couple of interesting topics, like Distance Learning Projects for our Facebook page Noah mentioned. So please sign up. For now I think it is time for one final exercise!
- Sheets Michelle: Social/cultural programming and campus networking—Hofstra Model
- Sheet exercise Michelle: Light up your social network! Michelle, can you explain what you will do with the glowsticks?