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ongoing feedback to supplement the less frequent, if more ostensibly authoritative, snapshots provided by, for example, the National Student Survey. The availability of analytical tools that can monitor different types of activity, from individual conversations to collective trends via ‘sentiment analysis’ or ‘opinion mining’, make this easier than ever.
Student engagement Email might not actually be dead as a method of communicating with students but it is certainly showing signs of its age and other more sophisticated and versatile options available mean it is no longer the default choice. The need to engage with students
has become as important as sharing information and can now be achieved in a greater variety of ways than ever. Use of a range of complementary social media platforms enables institutions to circulate promotional information and create a forum within which to generate positive messages about themselves and their communities. Major news can be disseminated quickly to the world and individuals can be engaged in one- to-one conversations. Recognition of these benefits has both facilitated and necessitated universities becoming hubs for multi-media interaction. Of course, the effectiveness of these new
communications channels is determined by the extent to which they are used by their intended audience. A university email account may be less versatile than its more sophisticated social media counterparts but at least institutions know that every student enrolled on one of its courses will have one. There is also the issue of credibility to consider, with many students reporting that information circulated by social media is considered less trustworthy than that received through more conventional modes of communication. The extent to which social media
activity is now shaping the way universities interact with the world has reached the point where institutions are being appraised and ranked as social media users by a range of commercial organisations. In May 2014, rankings were published for the top 100 UK universities on Twiter. Using the extent of recent Twiter activity, the number of followers (and of those followed) and the volume of
“Students at university now have been exposed to mobile technology and social media for a large proportion of their lives”
“Email might not actually be dead as a method of communicating with students but it is certainly showing signs of its age”
re-tweets generated, a measure of ‘social authority’ and ‘influence’ was created. The importance of following others and frequency of communication explains why Oxford and Cambridge – which have by far the highest number of followers of those listed but do not reciprocate to the same extent and tweet relatively infrequently – did not top the table.
Veting The use of social media by employers to vet prospective employees has been established for some time and could be applied by universities to prospective students. Whilst not an illegal activity in itself, this approach has led to some consternation and does create the risk that information about a candidate relating to a protected characteristic is used – or appears to have been used – to make discriminatory decisions in breach of the Equality Act 2010. Guidance on good practice in this
context has been produced by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO).
A sensible approach would: not use the veting process as a means of general intelligence gathering; make it clear to candidates that social media veting may take place; provide candidates with the opportunity to respond to any adverse findings before a decision is made; ensure the extent of searches is proportionate and its timing appropriate.
Dispute resolution Perhaps one area in which universities could beter utilise the possibilities of the social media presence they already have in place is in relation to the resolution of complaints and dispute resolution. One of the main advantages offered by social media – responsiveness – lends itself well to informal resolution, providing swift and effective action in order to address, or even pre-empt, potential complaints or disputes
RIGHT: Kris Robbetts
before they have a chance to escalate to a more formal footing. This is of course a priority consistent with the objectives of the Office of the Independent Adjudicator's proposed framework on handling complaints and appeals, which is due for publication in September.
Abuse No article on social media would be complete without some atention being paid to the way in which things can go wrong. There is no shortage of stories demonstrating how social media can be abused, deliberately or otherwise, with consequences ranging from mild embarrassment to death threats with legal repercussions ranging from criminal conviction to civil liability (notably by breaching Data Protection law or posting defamatory content). All users of social media, whether
corporate or private, should know that accounts are potentially vulnerable both from misuse and atack. The actions of aggrieved employees at HMV in January 2013, who used the company’s Twiter account to express their anger at being sacked, illustrates how social media can be subverted to harm an organisation’s reputation. The possibility of accounts being hacked and used to disseminate inappropriate or misleading information is also a significant risk, as the Russian President, Dmitry Medvedev, discovered very recently.
In the absence of specific legal regulation in the field of social media, it is critical that universities ensure that their internal policies and procedures adequately cover not only how social media must be used, but also what will be done in the event that problems arise. Staff and student disciplinary regulations should address social media specifically and disciplinary sanctions will be open to challenge unless they are both justified and proportionate. Email might not quite be dead within higher education, but social media has certainly changed the way that universities communicate and interact with their own teaching, learning and research communities as well as the world at large. As with any technologically-driven change, the value of the opportunities has to be gauged against the risks. A combination of good practice and well drafted policies and procedures will mean that the focus can remain on enhancing the student experience, be that through beter engagement, or simply by being more transparent and responsive. UB
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