Examples of How I Use Twitter In Student Affairs

September 14th, 2009 | Author:

Since my last blog post about connecting with students over Twitter, I’ve had some wonderful responses and conversations. Jeff Lail and I have been having a great on-going conversation regarding practical uses and examples of Twitter in Student Affairs and I thought, why not share it them with all of you?

1. Use Twitter Search to Find Students Who are On Twitter

Every day I do “Twitter Searches” for “Bridgewater
State” and “BSC” in them and try to reach out to students who “tweet”
about anything regarding the school. It’s like a living “Customer
Service” line that I want to answer and follow up on. I also follow those users for future tweets and if they follow back, then I send them a Direct Message thanking them and seeing how they are doing at school.

2. Create Opportunities for Conversation

On Facebook, our Campus Center fan page
tries to engage our fans by asking questions and looking for
responses. For example, last Friday, Sept. 11th, we asked “Where were you 8 years ago” and we had 10, very honest and real responses. Remember, while sharing information is important, Social Media is about the conversation.

3. Ask for Opinions

We also will post polls to our followers to gather information and opinions. Our latest poll asked our fans and followers
what our Campus Center “Tag Line/Slogan” should be and it linked them
our online poll, which brought users to our website. The response has been
great so far!

4. Connecting with Faculty

I also reach out to classes using Twitter. For example,
the latest class I found was a Communication class being taught by professor Nancy VanLeuven that is using the hashtag #BSCPR and I try to connect with those students and Nancy. She is a great resource who is using Twitter very well. It reminds me of another great example from the University of Texas at Dallas from professor Monica Rankin. I wish all professors would at least consider doing this!

How are you using Twitter in Student Affairs? I hope this list is helpful, and keep Tweeting!