first blog post

As a self-proclaimed link to the old media,  I’ve realized that I’m going to have a ridiculously steep learning curve in our seminar. So be it. 

What has struck me, as I’ve been procrastinating actually getting this up and running, is how many different moments over the last several days have been about incorporating new media elements into my professional life:

- Some of my Encounters students asked me if we’re going to have another Facebook-based final project this term

- I’m nudging several students to develop blog posts about their experiences in our new civil rights teaching initiative (I neglected to ask if any of them had actually done this before…)

- The SEC team has adopted a set of goals about significantly increasing our use of social media to engage students with our programming

- I’m developing a new position in our office that will allow us to dedicate staff time to focus on new media enhancements to our communications strategies

And, the big one…

I just told the board of trustees that our office knows that we’re behind the curve when it comes to all of this and that we’re going to be at a very different place in a year or so, technology-wise.

So, the take away lesson for me is that I need to exploit our time together this semester to learn and practice and understand as much as I can because if I don’t ... I’m doomed.

And, from a teaching standpoint, if I can’t learn this new material/philosophy/skill set/mind set/approach to reality, how can I ask (or tell) anyone else to?

Finally, since I’m likely to be worrying about these questions all day while everyone else is watching football, here’s my attempt to pull together the old media, the new media, the Super Bowl, and my gratuitous effort to learn how to add a web link into this pioneer post–

http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2012/01/old-media/