Social Media Curation for Higher Ed Events
This post was originally published on .eduGuru on October 3, 2011.
If you’ve worked in higher ed for a few years, you have probably assisted with an on-campus event during orientation or move-in week. The excitement exuded by the new students is undeniable when they finally arrive. Many schools are now using social media to connect new students before these events, open up conversation between current students and alumni, and share coverage of orientation activities. If your audiences are social media savvy, they’ll surely follow your Twitter hashtags, find content on Facebook or check your YouTube playlists for updates. But, how do you curate that great social content and conversation from your events into a readable format for the masses?
Storify
So, you have some great tweets from students using your hashtag. You’re posting content to Flickr and YouTube. Facebook is really active with alumni sharing their memories of orientation. If you’re looking for a tool that will help aggregate this content into a linear, readable and shareable format, check out Storify. From their FAQ:
Storify is a way to tell stories using social media such as Tweets, photos and videos. You search multiple social networks from one place, and then drag individual elements into your story. You can re-order the elements and also add text to give context to your readers.
Here are some examples of schools that used Storify to create recaps of their orientation events:
Babson College
Babson College combined content from their website, Twitter, YouTube and SCVNGR for this Storify of Undergraduate Orientation: http://storify.com/babsoncollegeug/babson-ugrad-orientation-2011
Emerson College
Emerson College covered two days of move-in and orientation activities combining Flickr photos, YouTube videos and tweets using the #ECWelcome hashtag. The Storify reached over 4,000 views through a combination of social sharing and an embed on Emerson.edu: http://storify.com/emersoncollege/emerson-college-orientation-2011
Ithaca College
Ithaca College asked their current students and alumni to give advice to new students using #ICMoveIn on Twitter: http://storify.com/ithacacollege/advice-for-the-class-of-2015
They also collected Twitter coverage of move-in events in this Storify: http://storify.com/ithacacollege/icmovein-2011
University of Michigan-Flint
Tweets and photos of their Welcome Back Picnic were shared in this Storify: http://storify.com/umflint/2011-welcome-back-picnic
Webster University
Webster University’s Patrick Powers published this Storify, covering the 2011 New Student Orientation: http://storify.com/patrickjpowers/2011-new-student-orientation
Other Social Curation Examples
- Tufts University collected posts from their Facebook and Twitter communities and shared them with the Class of 2015. They also set up a great Welcome, Class of 2015! page, combining content and coverage from several sources.
- Rochester Institute of Technology used Foursquare to hold a contest for new students. The prize? A dinner with RIT President Dr. Bill Destler. They created a nice aggregation of Fourquare locations and contest promotion on this website.
Storify isn’t the only option for social content curation, but in my experience it’s the most user-friendly and publishes the best output for sharing or embedding on your website. How are you collecting content for sharing after your school’s events? Please share your examples in the comments below.
Special thanks to Rob Engelsman, Patrick Powers, Georgy Cohen, Ashley Hennigan, Vanessa Theoharis and Alaina Wiens for sharing these examples with me.
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