Updated - UIS Freshmen Social Network

Time for an update! I wanted to update last Friday, but didn’t have the chance. Things have been really busy this summer, something that I didn’t expect. But it’s been good, so please don’t take that as a complaint.

Overall, the project is going very well! The students are logging in all the time to check statuses and post on people’s walls, etc. We fell just short of my hope for 60 members before the third orientation - we only had 56 - but that’s still not too bad. One interesting trend I saw was within the first 12 hours of emailing out the invites, 10 people joined after the first and second orientations. I had some issues yesterday and was unable to pull up a lot of the students email addresses in order to send them their invite so I couldn’t do that until this morning. I decided to email them at 11:15 the day after, so we will see how that works out. Maybe it will be better to wait a day before emailing them. I’m sure a lot of students go home and rest up after their long day on campus and checking their email is probably the last thing on their mind. So I’m turning a problem into something good and testing the adoption.

I also posed the question “Who has Facebook and/or MySpace?” to the students in a large group to see what type of response I got. I was surprised that a little less than half of them raised their hands. We only had 52 students in attendance, and I would say maybe 25 raised their hands. So that will be interesting to see how many students join from this last group that came in. If you remember, the first group had 29 out of 59 (49%) members join and the second group fell off tad, only logging 27 out of 64 members (42%). At the posting of this blog, a mere two and a half hours after the email went out, five members have joined. Some people must not have summer jobs, haha.

UIS is somewhat unique because of our honors program. Not because we have one, but because sometimes there is a separation between the students. It’s an honors vs. traditional feud sometimes. Perhaps it is the treatment that each class gets (the honors being more babied perhaps?), or the fact that they are separated in the residence halls. Ever since freshmen started coming to UIS there has been this issue. It’s certainly been worse in years past, so we’re making steps in the right direction. Anyway, the students in the honors program get to come down the night before orientation and stay in Lincoln Residence Hall. Due to the honors courses they have to take, they meet with advisor’s that evening so that when they register on orientation day, they pretty much know what they will be taking (they still have to choose electives, etc). Afterwards, many of the students play sand volleyball, watch movies, or what else. But they are able to form a relationship with each other which gives them an advantage on orientation day. A lot of the students already know one another before the traditional students even arrive. The same can been seen on blue.i.s. The honors students are typically friending each other and commenting more on one another’s walls. It would really be nice if we could offer something for the other students so they don’t feel so left out. So that is in the works.

I posted a question asking what features they would like to see either added or removed. One person said that it is a little slow and that I need page optimization. Unfortunately, the calendar and the blog aggregate run slower due to the fact that they are pulling in a bunch of RSS feeds. So every time the page loads, it has to repopulate. Other than that, the students are happy with it. Personally, I wish there was a wall-to-wall feature like there is in Facebook. I think that would be really cool. I also wish the Flickr photo gadget worked better. As it is right now, if I want to update the photos, I would have to reload all my photos into ning which takes quite a while. That’s alright though because I am going to delete most of them anyway now that people are posting photos. Since the first posting, the students have added over 100 photos.

First posting - 50 photos (the rest are mine)

Today - 110 additional photos added

My final complaint is about video uploading. I know it takes storage space, but I would like it if you could upload videos more than 100 mb. I know that’s still an alright video, it’d always be nice to have the option to post more. To remedy this, you can upload to YouTube and then pull the video in via embed code. Other than that, Ning rocks, and I am very happy with their services. I’ll blog more specifically about them later, but this is a pretty good testimonial to what you can do with them.

So far, I am very pleased with how people are using it. I do wish people had more questions, but you know what, if they don’t, then they don’t. Maybe we’ve been doing a good job delivering info to them. I’ll post another update in a couple of weeks.

 

A social network for freshmen at UIS

One of the projects I have been working on in the past three months was aimed at bridging the gap between MySpace and Facebook. It is often considered that MySpace is what high schoolers use and Facebook is what college students use. In every group, there are early adopters and there are late adopters and that leaves a gap between graduation and the start of their freshman year in college.

At UIS, we have summer orientation days, usually about 5 or 6. Unfortunately, because we have so many, the incoming class doesn’t get to meet each other until they arrive. Now I know at larger schools most students don’t meet everyone in their class, but at UIS, we are that right size so that the students do have that opportunity. We are also pretty flexible when it comes to assigning housing. It’s great if you already know who you are rooming with, however many students have fears of getting a roommate that is not compatible. And for these people, there usually isn’t a good way to get to know their classmates.

I really wanted a way for the students to be able to get connected prior to their arrival here in the fall. I wanted them to be able to build friendships with each other so that when they did arrive, they wouldn’t feel as lost perhaps. They can post on the forums and customize their own pages (though not to the extent of MySpace - thank goodness). They can also post photos and videos of themselves or of things they like or find funny. I really turned all the controls off and am letting them do what they want with it. It’s really for them, not for the university, so unless there is something really offensive, I’m not going to intervene. And the benefit to being only 23 is that I can get away with telling them something without it seeming like it’s coming from an authority figure.

So anyway, for some stats. I designed some cards to hand out to them during their orientation day. I hand delivered one to each of the 59 students in attendance at 11 a.m. (right after the traditional circle video). That afternoon, I went back to my office and emailed everyone their personal invite to their new UIS email account. This not only insures that their invite reaches them, but also gets them into the habit of checking their UIS email account early. Just as the card promises, by the time they get home, they will have a personal invite in their email. By 11:15 p.m. on Friday we had 10 students join (10 of 59 = 17%). On Saturday, another 8 joined (18 of 59 = 30.5%). And on Father’s Day we had another 5 join (23 of 59 = 39%). At the writing of this post there are 29 members (49%). Not to shabby numbers if you ask me.

They have also uploaded about 50 photos (2 per person/avg) and have been posting questions. I have uploaded the others from my Flickr account. The site has three moderators including myself. Other than Courtney and myself, any other moderators will be students (the Admissions office Student Ambassadors).

These are the things that we, as professionals working for the university, like to see.

And then this conversation.

And things like this. It’s like we paid him!

So far, they are using it for what it’s meant for. I hope that the rest of the students from the first session join at some point, and I look forward to continued success in the remaining orientations. Our next orientation day is on Monday the 23rd. So by the end of that week, I’ll be able to present some more data.

 

What makes a good photographer? What makes a good photo? What makes them great?

This should be a very discussion based post. Although the answer might seem simple at first, I really want you to think hard about what it takes to make a good photographer or to make a good photo. Then, I want you to tell me what makes them great.

I’m very curious to see what higher ed (and non-higher ed) people think about this. Please share this with people or start a conversation amongst the people in your office.

Here are some samples to get you thinking.

Is this a good photo?

What about this one?

How about this one?

Finally, this one? One person calls this one a “favorite” on Flickr.

Are the photos themselves good, or are there only aspects of each one that are good? Do the technical elements (composition, bokeh, focus, exposure, color, etc.) make them good or great (or bad)? Or are these photos just snapshots?
Final question which will take some stretching of your imagination; would you use photos like these (some with different subject matter of course - obviously the father/daughter photo wouldn’t be that appealing, but what about two soccer players embracing each other after a goal) when marketing to high school students? How do you think they would rate these photos?

 

The benefits of high-quality photography in recruiting efforts - Part One.

First off, let me start by saying my apologies for not having blogged in such a long time. Finding that balance between full-time employee, student, and friend has been difficult this semester. The last three weeks have been particularly crazy and have seen me virtually disappear from the social media world (aside from Twitter). But I’m back now and ready for the final semester push that includes final projects and commencement.

Anyway, this is a post that I have been working on for quite some time, and I’m not quite sure that I am done with it yet, but I’m throwing this initial piece out there to start some discussion. I’ll give you some background as well since this is really where this post started.

I’ve been trying to think of what to do for my final in graduate studies. I have three choices: comprehensive exam, thesis paper, or a project. I am not a paper person, so I immediately ruled that out, and I really don’t like taking tests. Not only that, I love working on projects, so that was really the only choice in my mind. The more difficult choice was choosing what to do for it. I wanted to do something that would not only benefit me, but something that I could use in my job. My first idea, however, did not go over so well. So, I talked to one of my professors about doing a tutorial with me this summer that would be the prelude/beginning of the project and he has agreed.

I will be working with my photography professor on a very intensive research and building project. The research will involve studying good photography and really breaking down why the photographs are good. I want to pay particular attention to higher education photography and portraits since that is what I will be shooting most often. I think I have a good eye for getting good shots, but sometimes I feel like my technical knowledge is not put to use. I can explain photography to people all day, but then I don’t always illustrate it in my photos.

Building may or may not be the right word to use here, but it’s all I can think of. I will be building a new collection of photos for the campus for use in admissions recruitment purposes and for marketing. I will be primarily photographing students because we already have plenty of campus scenery shots that are good. And the students are what a university is all about right?

The reason I am doing this is because students nowadays don’t want to see those setup shots. And believe me, they can tell. I’ve co-hosted some focus groups recently which we asked the students a variety of questions, one of which was whether they felt we portrayed the university accurately. Most said yes, but the no’s all referenced our brochures. And that my friends is why I decided this would be the perfect project.

Alright, I think that is it for this post. Over time I have realized that this is something that is really going to take multiple posts, so I’m going to split it up. I’ll bring you along in my progress and hope that you enjoy the ride. I have some other drafts started that will give some examples, etc. of the old verses the new. I will also go into more detail about HOW it will help.

 

When is technology too much?

I subscribe to a blog called Faces of Web 2.0 ★ 21st Century Teachers and over the weekend they posted a very interesting video called 21st Century Classes. Recently, there have been a couple of universities that have decided to give iPhones to their incoming freshmen. I thought at first the idea was absurd, but then I realized when I came to UIS, they were “giving” us laptops as freshman. I mean, come on, a LAPTOP!?! Who could really turn that down… Little did we know that we had to pay for them through our fees for being in the honors program, but none-the-less, it wasn’t a $1500 lump sum that we would have to pay prior to starting college. It was nice to be able to take them to class for notes and blackboard and discussions and whatnot, but really…did they think that we wouldn’t mess around on them? I wasn’t much of an IM’er, but a lot of my friends were. The thing about college though is that while teachers want their students to succeed and will do whatever they can to help them, if a student just doesn’t care, then there’s not much ANYONE can do about it. Don’t get me wrong, the laptop was an awesome feature, as were the scholarships I got, but would I have chosen one school over another just because of the free perks? Not me, but others might.

Anyway…back on target…how would you feel about your university giving you a laptop upon entering as a freshman? Or an iPhone? Or both? Would students really use them for good, or is it just another tool for them to access the internet at all times and pay no attention during class? I believe if the students are truly interested in learning, they will use them the way the universities hope (plan?). It is a very interesting concept though. iPhone cost < Laptop cost…or is the long run, iPhone Bill >Laptop cost. Depends upon who pays the service bill? I love my iPhone, but I’m definitely glad I got a real computer.

 

In my spare time.

**WE ARE LIVE**  It took a couple of days, but now we are officially LIVE in Google Earth!  Check it out by downloading Google Earth 4 and fly to “1 University Dr, Springfield, IL” and we will be there!  Make sure you enable 3D Buildings as well in the lower left hand “Layers” box.

**My Jing account only has 1GB of bandwidth that apparently I reached after 5 views yesterday…I’m going to work on fixing that today, but if you cannot view the video, my apologies.**

I’ve had something lately that I haven’t really had for a while: spare time. I’ve decided that I wanted to put some of that time to good use. I stumbled across a video on YouTube about the University of Colorado in Boulder, CO.

So I thought, why not do that for my campus?! I really enjoyed my 3D design class, so I told myself, “Self, you’re gonna do this!” I went to Google Earth to figure out what to do. They have a program called Google Sketchup which I downloaded, and after a couple days of testing and trying to figure it out, I was able to construct something that I thought looked pretty good. Watch the video below that I made using a service called Jing, something I had forgotten I was able to get. @Joe, Jing allows me to do screen captures for free! *Shakes head…

For now, I cannot embed my screencast video. Click here to view the screencast of my Google Earth Video.

I plan to be able to complete all the buildings within a month or two (it took me about 4 days to do UHB). It may not be a very widely used service, but I think some students will enjoy going in and playing around with it. Plus, it gives our online population the ability to see our campus without having to actually travel here. 2D photos can only do so much. So go download Google Earth and type in our address “1 University Plaza, Springfield, IL” and play around with it. Let me know what you think!

 

Housing Virtual Tours

So for the past two months, I have been working off and on on complete 360 degree virtual tours for housing. It’s been a slow process because I have been working on a lot of other projects, but also because it hasn’t been a huge priority. After meeting with our Web Services people, we discussed having them done in time for unveiling with the newly redesigned Housing website. I will be using the ones I created along with some/all of the ones Brad created when he was here.  So of late, I have been trying to get them all put together. I have been using a program called Cubic Converter which has been working great! I’ve been using Photoshop CS3’s photomerge feature along with some of my own editing. To shoot the panos, I have a Panosaurus head mounted to my tripod (which is weak and has caused me to have to do A LOT of post-processing). I am shooting with a Nikon D200 with an 18-70 mm f3.5 at 24mm and manual exposure controls. I will be writing a how-to later about this detailing the process in full. It’s been a lot of fun, but it’s also been a lot of work. The results have definitely paid off though! Now, I need to figure out how to convert from outdated QTVR to a Flash file for the website…if you have any suggestions let me know. Here’s a little sample:  *WordPress does not allow embedding of videos into posts due to security reasons.  So for now, I’ll link to it.  It is in it’s full screen version here, but it is undecided how large the final will be.  Use your mouse to control the scrolling and shift and control zoom in and out.

Let me know of any changes you would make or do before the final cut.  I think they look pretty good, but then again, I may be biased…

 

Emergency Alert Notification System

In light of the NIU tragedy on February 14th, I wanted to give coverage to UIS’ Emergency Alert Notification System. Andrew Careaga posted a link to the CNN news story on his blog yesterday just after we both posted it on Twitter virtually at the same time. What’s crazy is that I heard from a student that something had happened at NIU, but it wasn’t until an hour later that I read anything about it anywhere, and Andrew was one of the first. Just goes to show you the power of blogs.

I was just talking about our emergency alert notification system with our Director of Marketing the other day. We both thought it was interesting how a Springfield news station aired a report about our larger sister campus unveiling their new emergency alert notification system the other night. Funny thing is that they unveiled that system around last September…funnier yet, my campus, the one located in Springfield has never been mentioned for implementing our own notification system. Anywho…just a little rant with a lack of coverage from our own hometown news station.

My main point is to express to people to sign up for our alerts. UIS is a very safe campus and I have never felt as if I was in any harm or danger. I have been in contact with our Web Team and they assured me that an extensive plan is in place.  Here is what the NIU homepage looked like.

Regardless of how safe any campus feels, they should have a Notification system in place. Details of the UIS policy can be found here. Do yourselves a favor and sign up. The tornado season is coming, and that is covered under the policy as well.

 

A little bit about me

Per Matt’s request, I thought I would give you guys a little background into who I am. I will tell you that I have probably been working in higher ed for the least amount of time (7 months) out of all the people involved in BlogHighEd, but I am extremely passionate about what I do and therefore always wanting and willing to learn about the ever changing field of Higher Education.

I am officially the Marketing/Recruitment Specialist for the Office of Enrollment Management for the University of Illinois at Springfield. I work for the smallest of the three U of I campuses, but still get all the benefits. This position was created last year for UIS graduate and co-creator of BlogHighEd, Brad J Ward, but he moved on to a position at Butler University in Indianapolis, IN. I spend my time researching trends in the current and potential student market for recruitment and retention. I also implement ideas that I present to the directors on our websites. I also have some web experience, but desperately want to learn more! I also do campus and event photography.

I look forward to learning with and from everyone who contributes here and I am very thankful that I was chosen for bhe. And here’s a better photo of me and my wonderful girlfriend.

 

Weekend Re-Cap

Superbowl Weekend! Not gonna lie, I was really getting sick and tired of all the “perfect” talk accompanying the Patriots. I am a hardcore Patriots (and Jets) hater! And that can only mean one thing: I am a Dolphin’s fan. Flame me for their horrible season last year, but the Tuna’s in charge and has revamped practically the entire coaching staff. Anyway, something else the superbowl brings is usually awesome and memorable advertisements. While I have always enjoyed watching the commercials, I found myself not only viewing them, but really looking for the next big idea in any one of them. But more on that later! I’ve got to tell you about the events that led up to Sunday first.

Thursday night, we were predicted to get a TON of snow. I really don’t like snow that much. Sure it’s pretty, but it makes such a mess of things. Classes got canceled for the evening in preparation for the worst. Come 5:30 a.m. friday morning, word came down that the campus was closed! Woohoo, three day weekend! I look outside and this is what I saw.

That’s right…A TON of SNOW! 10 inches to be exact…19+ from drifting…

And here’s my poor car…Look at the snow on the mirror. I had to dig out the bottom of my door so that I could get it open.

My buddy T and I spent some time digging our own cars out as well as a couple of our friends, and even some people we didn’t even know. We even pushed one girl out of a snow pile she drove into, later admitting that she’d never seen snow like this before…crazy.

The next day, I came down with something awful…I mean, I have been out of commission for the last three days…I don’t usually get sick, but when I do, it’s bad news…I’m feeling better today, but I wouldn’t have minded another day off to relax.

On Superbowl Sunday, my friend Chad held a get together at his place so we could watch the game on his 52″ plasma (thanks to me and SD). Let me just revisit what I said earlier about me really not liking the Patriots. I just wanted to make sure that was fresh in your mind. The game was full of a bunch of great plays on both sides, but one play stands out above all…This scramble by Manning and ensuing catch by Tyree…INCREDIBLE!

I am sorry for jumping around so much, my mind is still recovering from the medicine…back to business. So of the commercials that were played, there were a couple that stuck out in my mind. Some in a good way, and others in a bad way. First: Winner for the night…The Tide talking stain commercial. Congrats to their marketing team for that video. They did it all right…entertaining, made me remember their product, and drew me back in with an interactive website at the end mytalkingstain.com

Other winners for the night included Budwiser/Bud Light, Bridgestone (maybe a surprise?), Coca-Cola, Diet Pepsi Max, and Sobe. You can view them all on MySpace’s Superbowl ad site.  Line of the year:  “Suck One.”  Wait for the T-Shirts!