A lot has been and continues to be written about colleges and universities increasing their use of social media to attract and recruit students to their programs. I haven't seen as much about retention — keeping students on your campus once they enroll. I thought this article from University Business was very good and touched on a lot of ways that schools can seize opportunities for reaching students that didn't exist in the past. Not only can they react to a situation, but they also can be proactive, through social media.From assisting struggling or homesick students and answering basic questions from incoming freshmen to offering career services for graduating seniors and encouraging successful students to share their dean's list news, social media can be a vital link between colleges and universities and their most important assets. Some may think social media is too impersonal for such a role, but once you make a connection, the impersonal quickly can become personal, as anecdotes in the article attest.
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The article that is linked to is very well written and very informative. I agree with you, universities and colleges do not use social media to retain their students very well.
ReplyDeleteI also do not think they use social media for all that it can be used for.