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There are many passionate and talented professors across the world pioneering social media education.
With social media education being a new and emerging field, it is vitally important that those of us teaching social media connect to discuss best practices, experiences, tips, and talk content and curriculum. Here are a few quick ways to join the conversation:
The Web-Savvy Professors List
It may be the definitive guide to social media educators. The The Top 100 Web-Savvy Professors of 2012, put together by BestOnlineUniversities.com, profiles – well, you guessed it: web-savvy professors. Many of these are champions of social media – whether teaching social media, using it to teach, or both.
Social Media Professors on Twitter
There are many social media educators on Twitter. You’ll find many of them on the Best Web-Savvy Professors list mentioned above. A few other ways you can find them are:
Twitter lists
Education By Kerry O’Shea Gorgone (@kerrygorgone) – A list of higher ed folks, some of whom are active members of the Teaching Social Media Marketing & Management LinkedIn group discussed below.
Edu by Modern Journalist (@ModernJourno) – List of 196 educators and trainers on social media.
Academia by Ph.D. student at UT Austin Curt Yowell (@curtyowell) – 419 academics listed!
WVU professor John Jones’s List (@johnmjones) – One of the most comprehensive list of academics I’ve seen with 500 folks (Maybe that’s why it has 37 subscribers!).
Academia: Academics that Rock – My own personal list (@mjkushin) of social media professors and related Tweeters.
Hashtags? Here’s 1 to get you started: #teachSMM for teaching social media marketing.
Join a LinkedIn Group
There are a few great LinkedIn social media educator groups I recommend:
Teaching Social Media Marketing & Management group – Great group that has just started a monthly Google+ Hangout to discuss social media in the classroom.
Higher Ed – this group that is not for educators, per se. It is aimed at connecting “professionals employed by a higher education institution who are actively engaged in social media planning, strategy and execution for a college, university, technical college, community college or college system.” But an interesting group and one I enjoy staying up to date on to get a sense on how universities are using social media in their marketing.
Teaching Public Relations – This group is aimed at public relations professional. Given the increasingly vital role of social media in PR, discussion of social media is common. However, there are many other subjects discussed here and social media is not the main topic. May not be of interest to some.
You’ll be surprised to find just how many educators are on social media. And while universities may be failing on the whole to teach social media, there are plenty of people who are changing that.
How have you connected with other social media educators? Have other tips and resources? Please share in the comments section below. Thanks in advance! ☺
photo creative commons by Fora de Eixo