End of semester survey

Well Benson – it’s been real!  I have enjoyed this class thoroughly and am inspired to utilize social media in my personal endeavors in ways that I had not imagined I would.  It certainly is not as simple as it seems.  Perhaps the hardest thing about the course for me was knowing how to actually get content onto the web using my phone.  I definitely think it is time for an upgrade if I plan to keep using it for social media.

The concepts that were presented were all wonderful but could use a little tweaking on usability – making actual use of social media aside from the blog mandatory.   Like everyone has to set up a twitter account and at least one other alternate social media method.  Being one that is not a twitter user I was not inclined to set up an account or send any tweets since it was not mandatory but I think I would have benefited from it had I been incentivized to do so.  Or maybe one huge class blog for the topic of the week posts and then each person have their own blog for personal interest.  Another suggestion is to have the organization used for the final project be the topic for the personal interest posts throughout the course with a culmination of finesse coming at the end.

I enjoyed reading the posts of my classmates – and yes I even enjoyed your videos!  Most of all I think I really enjoyed finding out how much I did not know about this business behind business (personal and commercial) and how effective use can really change the players.

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thoughts on final project

I think the concept behind the final project was really great – isn’t that what social media is really about? Being able to communicate with the world on the fly, having technology at your fingertips that can make this happen, and being in a constant frame of mind where you are able to capture those moments that the rest of the world wants to see? Well yes and no. The first thing I discovered (and I have been discovering throughout this course) is that I am not really one of those people that feels the need to be linked to the rest of the world at all times. I am pretty much a homebody and only get on the computer at home on an occasional basis – perhaps because I work on the computer all day so I don’t really wnat to mess with it when I get home. Plus my new laptop has windows 8 on it and I have to struggle and fight with the darn thing, spending half the time I’m online wondering where in the heck I went off to and trying to find my way back. If you’ve never used Windows 8 is quite an experience. Another thing I learned is that I really don’t know all that much about technology – namely the capabilties of my phone. In a sense it can do a lot more than I thought but some of the things I assumed it could do, well, it just can’t. So I often found myself stuck between a rock and a hard place with getting content off of my phone and onto wordpress. I posted several things to facebook but I don’t know how to get them from facebook to here!
Since this was sort of the “pilot” class for this course I think all-in-all it went fairly smooth with the exception of an occasional hitch. Also with the change to Blackboard for online courses there were a few hitched there as well. I think if we had started working on content for the final project – or making all of the content we produced about the organization we are examining it might have been easier than changing subjects from our personal topic to this one.

lets get Masada out there

field trip trip

Well today was the last field trip of 2nd grade. Unfortunately i think it was also the 1st field.trip of 2nd.grade. Apparently the opinion of the present regime at my daugjter’s school is that field trips are not in themselves enough if they merely are learning expeditions. After all this takes away from all if the tme spent practicing taking tests that actually mean nothing and teach my child little. Anyway i digress on this subject… Let’s get back to the field trip.
On to the yellow bus we went and it was off to the planetarium. Now when i was a kid we went.on.field trips several.times throughout the year. There was the library, the bowling alley, swimming, planetarium, roller skating, the list seems endless. And yeah it was Great! Apparently the the planetarium does not seem to be the most interesting place for 7 and 8 year olds to spend their one and only field trip. Now don’ t get me wrong it was pretty interesting pace – to me anyway i – but i don’t think an explanation of how the zodiac works and the cycle of the.moon was quite what these kids had in mind. Aside from that the absolute kicker was the awesome video circa 1980 that explained how we get to space, how we stay there once we’re up there and how we get back. I’m fairly certain i saw the same movie when i was in elementary school. There were some graphically… Sort of… Think Oregon trail ( if you’re old.enough to remember that you can see what I’m working with here – if not think maybe the video game that tom hanks played as a kid in the movie big). yeah i think you can see how interesting pace this was to the kids who are used to box, dvd’s, and 50 inch tv. They lost interest before it even started and i even felt a little sorry for the guy giving the presentation. I’m pretty sure the best part of.the field trip was the bus ride!

Topic 13 – editorial calendar

Editorial Calendar For Your Final Project:

“In this week’s final class blog post, I want you to develop a basic editorial calendar for the organization you will be covering in your final project. If you need to, look back to our earlier modules on blogging and content creation and refresh yourself on the best practices for an editorial calendar.

You don’t need to give me exact dates and final topic headlines right now, I want you to give me an idea of what topics you would like to cover during each week for your final project.”

All right – as you all know (and for those of you that don’t) the organization I am exploring for my final project in CJ 393 is called Masada House. Since we have three weeks for the duration of the assignment I will post one new “topic” each week and break it down from there.
Week 1 – Introduction to Masada
Goal – create Project Masada to have dedicated area at WordPress for Masda content
Goal – Create blog 1 – Introduce Masda to the world – who are they, what do they do, how does it all work?Goal – publish content on how to donate, volunteer, etc.

Week 2 – What’s happening at Masada
Goal – Video 1 – create content that explains the need for Masada, past accomplishments
Goal – Video 2 – Run for Recovery
Introduce fund raiser and post content to you tube (?)

Week 3 – The faces of Masada
Goal – video interview with Karen Chenault program director
Goal – interview some participants current and past

Family night and websites

Last week my daughter’s school graciously held what they affectionately call Family Night – you may have heard of something similar in your areas. It’s a night hosted by the school where the family of students is invited to explore, participate in some sort of assembly-type presentation (topics vary), and then visit various classrooms that have games and activities for the children. I’m sure you all get the premise here – let’s make an effort to get parents and students involved with learning outside of the regular classroom. GREAT! Except… well it’s never so great. We go to nearly every event like this – I am a firm believer in parent involvement in education and think the more we support our schools the better off our children will be. So on these occasion when I am handed an invitation from a very excited 7 year old I take the opportunity to strut my parent stuff. This invitation (as well as the sign board outside of the school that displays reminders on upcoming events) stated that family night would begin at 5 pm. So being a punctual person we showed up right at 5 pm. Apparently that was more of a suggestion than an actual start time. Now in an effort to make sure we were on time and there was nothing we need to bring, etc. I consulted the schools website. There again – Family night starts at 5 pm. So when we arrived there were some other punctual parents there wandering aimlessly around and wondering, much as I was, were we in the wrong place? Had the time changed and no one told us? The few teachers and volunteers that were there simply stared at us and offered little encouragement or explanation of what was going on. So we went out to the playground and played for a bit – periodically coming into the building to see if perhaps anyone else was going to show up. Eventually they did – 1 hour later. Nothing was even started until 6 pm. Now I don’t know about you but poor planning and tardiness are huge pet peeves I have. If you invite some one somewhere at an appointed time – please note none of the time information I received said 5-ish or around 5 or somewhere between 5pm and the next morning – then I believe you need to be there and ready to roll at said time. Now I wonder why parents don’t want to get involved with school activities? Hmmmm… There was a complete lack of direction, very poor planning, no enthusiasm from the staff and teachers participating. It was pretty much just a humdrum event with all the wonder of a deflated balloon and I was very sadly disappointed – again. You may be wondering why I have websites listed there in my title and by golly I’ll tell ya. Isn’t the goal of a company – in this case the school – having a website to relay information about the organization? Upcoming events? Important things you might want or need to know about the organization? Have you looked at your school’s websites? I do believe there will be an interesting post following to discuss the lack of use of social media to relay information to parents. Do any of you have (or are) teachers that tweet? Update your personal teacher websites on your school’s webpage? Stay tuned…

Topic of the Week 12

So this is the TOPIC OF THE WEEK for CJ 393:
Look at the organization you’re thinking about working with for your final project. Write a short social media strategy for the organization that you have selected for your final project. I don’t expect a full social media audit and strategy (these can take weeks if not a couple of months to develop), but I do want the following in this assignment:
>One goal
>One measurable objective to achieve this goal (and what are you measuring?)
>One strategy that will achieve this objective.
>Two tactics for this strategy (one has to be content-focused, the second has to be engagement-focused)

Goal:
I think perhaps the most important goal right now in partnering with Masada House is to make them a visible presence in the community.
Measurable Objective:
Increased funding via donations, volunteers, and grants. Because most of the grants that Masada would apply for on a large scale are invitation only it will be interesting to see if invitations increase as a result of increased social media presence.
Strategy:
Join the Farmington blog – this is a blog hosted by members of the Farmington and San Juan County community that focuses on things that are going on in the community and gives community members a chance to voice their opinions. Giving Masada a presence here will increase awareness of the program.
Content-focused strategy:
I guess I don’t really understand the difference between the two strategies – by creating content do we not increase engagement. Right now Masada is getting ready to do a 5k un called the Run for Recovery which will take place in May. Adding content to the Farmington blog regarding this can increase awareness of the fundraiser. Masada may be able to recognize those community members who engaged with the blog during the ceremonies surrounding the race. I’m not quite sure here – does anyone have some suggestions?