I was very concerned to learn about the social media usage habits of my classes of 48 (total) 18 – 20 year olds. Their use of social media is limited to sites like Facebook where they post on friends’ walls, update their status and, most recently, become virtual farmers of pink cows that I believe, when processed and canned, make spam. They have heard about Twitter but have no clue or interest in “knowing what people have for breakfast” (sigh). Of course, they know all about YouTube and how hilarious it is. A few of them have heard of Flickr. None of them had heard about LinkedIn… Honestly, none of this should have come as a surprise after I asked who had an email account outside of their university account and only 7 out of 48 students raised their hands.

Needless to say, all of them were simply AMAZED when I showed them the Conversation Prism.

My concern is that my students are caught in a sort of social media limbo. While they are worried about turning in papers, attendance policies, homework and exams the world outside of the university microcosm is rapidly changing. The problem is that those of us “out there” are also learning. This is where initiatives like the Social Media Club‘s “ad-hoc” Education committee (#SMCEDU) are very commendable. They are getting educators together to talk about introducing social media curricula at higher education institutions so that students — not all necessarily majoring in communication, public relations, journalisms, etc. — can catch up. However, while we might be able to institutionalize and pass on our knowledge about social media to future students (those who are currently in their teenage years or just about to start college) … what happens to those in school now?

In his post, “Revealing the people defining social networks” Brian Solis indicated that the 18 – 24 year old demographic comprises the smallest percentage pretty much all across the board. Not good.

Firs-years, sophomores, juniors and seniors of the world. I urge you to get a clue. It doesn’t matter what your major is, social media WILL affect your life WAY beyond Facebook. Don’t be surprised that your parents are on Facebook either, be surprised (and very concerned) with the fact that they might be BETTER at Facebook than you. A few more suggestions:

• Get a Gmail account and start using Google. You can forward your university email there so that you can check everything from one place. Once you are on there learn to love: Google Calendar, Google Docs, Google Reader and make sure you fill out your Google Profile
• Get smart about your Facebook privacy settings. You don’t want to be the kid who doesn’t get hired for an internship because your Facebook pictures gave a bad impression of who you really are
• Get an internship, or several! (I know, not social media-related but important nevertheless)
• Hop on Twitter and realize that it is not all babble
• Figure out what RSS means and use Google Reader to subscribe to blogs that interest you for fun, subscribe to at least a couple of others that post useful news information on a regular basis, and get comfortable with the idea that you will be a student for the rest of your life — the learning process never stops
• Create a profile on LinkedIn and start building your resume there. You may not use it as often as other networks but it will come in handy at some point
• After the “magic three” – Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn – you should take some time to see what else is out there and then make the most of all of this by synchronizing your life. For example, if you like photography, upload your pictures to Flickr and synchronize your account so that it will publish on your Facebook wall and send a tweet with a link to your Twitter account. Who doesn’t love more exposure?

I’m sorry if this sounds like homework and I’m sorry if it was an overwhelming post that I had to get off my chest. I promise that once you get to know the social media space for all the great things that it is you will actually think it’s fun.

Teachers, parents… encourage your students and kids to get our there. Heck, teach us the way… you are the fastest-growing demographic here after all.

Everyone else, sorry if I just beat a dead horse to the ground, however, it might help you to know that this is still a pervasive issue among the group of people you will very soon be hiring from.

Flickr user shutupyourface

I have a great passion for education and, especially when it comes to communications, I believe there is nothing better than when scholars’ work goes hand-in-hand with that of those who pratice the profession in order to improve best practices.

As an undergraduate I read my share of public relations and marketing text books, sat through lectures and took tests to eventually earn the degree that now lets others know that I probably know something about the Uses and Gratifications theory and the four P’s of Marketing. But theory is best learned when put into practice. My interships allowed me to truly see what I was getting myself into in context.

I know about social media because Facebook launched when I was a freshman in college and ever since then it has been second nature to me (also I am very curious). But what I think we are coming to, finally, is the inevitable – the writing of social media textbooks and the acknowledgement of social media as not only a field in communications but perhaps an industry in and of itself.

My alma mater taught courses on Web design and virtual reality games while I was still in school, Syracuse University managed to establish a New Media Studies graduate program but ended up dissolving it last semester (the courses are still available as electives) and more universities are offering new and social media courses to complement existing communications programs. Here is a description of Birmingham City University’s social media M.A. program.

Here are my questions:

1. If or when degrees in social media become widespread and standard, how will universities ensure that students get the amount of hands-on experience that this field requires?
2. Where does a master’s degree in social media leave the self-taught?
3. If social media is best learned through practice, how do we even out the playing field for future generations?
4. Will social media also lead to the reinvention of academic curricula (I must admit that’s the first time I’ve used the word curricula) with less time spent in class and on theory and more time spent “out there” and on practice?
5. Will social media degrees only be offered at the graduate level so that students can first learn a more traditional trade?
6. Can we think of the books, blogs and analytics that are already out there as the first pages of the new social media textbooks? Will they only be available to students on Kindles?
7. If Edward L. Bernays is known as the father of public relations, who is the father of social media?
8. Who is the mother?
9. And, generally speaking, shouldn’t it be mother instead of father seeing as how the mother literally births and nurtures the child? Just a thought.

If you wish you were back in school raise your hand.

Flickr image user, 100 watt dream