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DANIEL GROSS
News Editor
LAUREN SLAVIN
Arts Editor
It's standard in most syllabi to include an
addendum about student use of social media
during class. Students shouldn't Tweet from
their cell phones or computers, shouldn't be
chatting or growing virtual crops on Facebook or
showing their classmates the latest remix of the
“Scarlet Takes a Tumble" video on YouTube.
Now Towson University is faced with what pol¬
icies they should hold themselves to in regards to
administrative use of social media Web sites.
Since late August 2008, TowsonU and
TowsonUNews have been Tweeting event
times and locations, school closings and press
releases on new University initiatives such as
Recyclemania or campus growth.
As of Sunday afternoon, TowsonU is following
415 students, professors, alumni and University
organizations and has almost 1,000 followers.
TowsonUNews has closer to 2,000 followers and
is following more than 500 Twitter users.
Pam Gorsuch, communications specialist for
the department of administration and finance,
currently runs the TowsonU Twitter account.
“It’s a really accessible means of communica¬
tion and it has the ability to reach a fairly wide
audience," she said.
Senior economics major Sam Breschi said he
feels that starting social media profiles are very
important for the University to keep up with
students.
“It seems like today you have to. It’s a compet¬
ing University and they’re trying to draw in as
much attention as they can,” Breschi said. "You
have to make information more appealing to the
average student or to the general masses."
There are numerous studies that have been
made public regarding the transition of universi¬
ties into marketing and promoting information
via social networks.
According to a report developed by the
National Association for College Admission
Counseling, more than half - 53 percent - of
colleges monitor social media for "buzz" about
their institution.
The study also revealed that a majority of col¬
leges maintain a presence in social media, as 33
percent of colleges maintain a blog and 29 main¬
tain a presence on social networking Web sites.
The purpose of this presence varies between
the two Twitter accounts the University main¬
tains.
Stu Zang, media relations specialist, runs the
TowsonUNews Twitter account as a means of
communicating with local media. He described
the TowsonU Twitter as more engaged with
student life, whereas the TowsonUNews Twitter
is more of a means of maintaining information
in a similar fashion to the Towson Web site’s
Newsroom.
“I noticed that an increasing number of
reporters and producers are on Twitter,” Zang
said. "I decided that might be a good way to find
things they're looking [to report on]."
Gorsuch and Zang recognize the trend of
social media use by students as a means of
obtaining information and they hope to both add
to that information and engage in dialogue with
their audience.
“People 1 think gravitate towards certain
tools," Zang said. “They find the tools as a way
of expressing themselves; the/ re not necessarily
looking at the tools themselves, but thinking
how can I [use them to] accomplish a task."
According to Gorsuch, there are no policies
or specific guidelines that are followed when
running the Twitter and Facebook accounts to
communicate with students and community
members.
"Most organizations don’t have organized
social media divisions," Zang said. “I think the
beauty of social media is that it sort of comes up
on its own."
Gorsuch agreed that social media is still very
new and more defined procedures will come as it
is used more often.
"I think it’s a trend that you’ll see continue to
grow like Facebook and MySpace. It’ll continue
to evolve and people will fine tune the way they
use it,” Gorsuch said.
Since 2009, universities across the coun¬
try have been working to "fine tune" their
policies for social media use by faculty. Kansas
State University, the University of Michigan and
Rochester Institute of Technology are three insti¬
tutions with recent official social media guide¬
lines, while other institutions have had working
policies about online etiquette for years.
The University of Maryland, College Park
has had an office of Internet communication
for eight years, and a Web and new media
strategies division for three, according to Linda
Martin, executive director of web and new
media strategies. While they are still develop¬
ing official guidelines for social media, including
their Twitter account UMDNews, other divisions
of their online department are regulated. UMD’s
FYI calendar, which is similar to Towson’s Daily
See MEDIA, page 8
В У
THE numBERS
@TowsonU
Following: 415
Followers: 939
@TowsonUNews
Following: 546
Followers: 1,703
(as of Sunday, Feb. 21)
Illustration by Battsengel Lopez/
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