1. Utilizing the Web and Social Media
in Student Affairs and Higher Education
Integrating web 2.0 and cloud services into student affairs can be an exciting and
innovative way to connect with your students. Below are some useful sites,
apps, and services that you can use and some examples of how to use them.
Have other ideas? Please share them in the comments on Slideshare here:
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Poll Everywhere www.polleverywhere.com
Poll Everywhere allows you to set up online polls that can be displayed in real-
time in a web browser or embedded in a PowerPoint or Keynote presentation.
Participants can txt their answers to a poll-specific phone number and results
will be displayed instantly. Poll Everywhere allows you to set up multiple choice
or free response type polls. Basic level access is free even though it limits the
number of responses.
Facebook www.facebook.com
Creating a Facebook group and inviting students to join is a great way to
communicate messages, allow them to share and post common group photos,
and comment on almost anything. You can also integrate it into icebreakers
where groups need to take team photos or videos and post them to the group.
It’s also a great way to collect quotes or photos for later use in program
recruitment materials.
Twitter www.twitter.com
Establish a hash tag for your program and advertise this at the start. Hash tags
are basically common search terms that you can establish that allow you to set
up your own virtual “chat room” of sorts. Searching for that hash tag produces
an entire threaded conversation from your community. Avoid using something
generic like to avoid confusion with others that may be using that term. You can
use this to start conversations, allow students to submit questions, and, for
presentations, even stream the results on a projector at the front of the room.
Apps like hootsuite.com allow for constantly updated streaming.
You Tube www.youtube.com
(alternative sites: vimeo.com)
YouTube is a great way to engage students in videos over the summer or during
the year. If you find videos you want to include in your presentations, you can
also use a site like keepvid.com to download them and embed them in a
presentation to be able to show them without needing an internet connection.
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2. Google Docs docs.google.com
(and related Google products like Google Sites and Calendars)
These online collaborative tools are excellent resources for creating and sharing
calendars, sign-up lists, program tracking, polling, and many other collaborative
projects. Docs allow you to change sharing preferences so students don't even
need an account to edit them. Two often-overlooked features include the ability
to distribute surveys (Google Forms) and create staff-specific web portals
(Google Sites).
GroupMe www.groupme.com
GroupMe is a group SMS txt messaging service. Add your students, staff or
leaders into a list and it creates a virtual text chat room. Members can send txts
to a common number and they get sent to all members of the group. Services
like this are great for keeping in touch with a student conference delegation or
for a staff or executive board to share timely information and coordinate during
critical times. This can be used with or without a GroupMe smartphone app
(although the app enables many additional features).
SlideShare www.slideshare.net
SlideShare is an online repository for different presentations and documents.
You can easily upload PowerPoint, Keynote, and PDF presentations and tag
them so others can easily search for them. This offers a great way for students
to review presentations later. You can also do a search for presentations
designed by others.
Prezi www.prezi.com
Prezi is an online app that allows you to create interesting “zooming”
presentations. It’s a great alternative to the standard boring PowerPoint and
can be accessed online at anytime. Another alternative is to use Apple’s
Keynote (available only on the Mac). Keynote is similar to PowerPoint but was
built with much more cinematic transitions and the ability to more easily
integrate multimedia.
A Note About Social Media Social Justice
When engaging in any of these technologies, it is important to think about
universal design and the ability of all of your students to participate. Although
many of these sites allow increased accessibility for some, they can create new
barriers for others. Additionally, the socio-economic status of your participants,
and the cost of smart phones and txt messaging plans can also present a barrier.
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The original of this PDF can be found here: slideshare.net/paulgordonbrown
© 2011.08.11