If you have read some of the work and research I have done, I am very passionate about teaching and mentoring students. This is one of the primary reasons I have become a professor and embraced social media pedagogy research as part of one of my main research lines.
Over the years, I have written about best practices in teaching social media and even shared some resources on how to design a class (like my resource book available here on Amazon). However, there is one topic in which I have been asked about recently, and it is:
How do you help students get their dream jobs in social media?
This has probably been one of the most frequently asked questions from fellow colleagues and professionals. How do you prepare students for a field that constantly changes and evolves? What are the things we can do as professors to really prepare our students? I admit, it is a challenge to see what the industry is looking for specifically.
There are some things we can do as professors to help out students do the best they can to be marketable and ready to tackle on the challenge of getting their dream job. Here are some of my tips:
In order to succeed, you have to lead by example. If you want to see the best performance out of your students, you have to show them what they need to do so they know your expectations. I always tell my students I never expect them to work harder than I do. However, I also let them know my daily schedule and what I have going on as well so they know what my expectations are for them.
What does this mean? This means your brand is equally important. Employers will be looking at your students and say – okay, you have taken a social media class, what did you do and perhaps who was your professor? You see this ALL the time in sports, especially with teams. We know of certain programs based on the athletes who came out of the program, but we also hear who was their coach as well. Your brand as a professor on social media has to be visible and known in the social media community.
How is this done? It doesn’t happen over night, but the first start is reaching out to professors who are on. We have a great community of professionals willing to help in #SMSports and #PRprofs, but we are not mind readers. Reach out to us and we can help. Then, I’d suggest looking at what others are doing and seeing what works and what has not worked. There are also great organizations (PRSA Educator’s Academy, AEJMC, NCA, etc) which share a host of great practices and ideas for how to get started. We are all in this together.
Be the student and learn from others. As professors, we sometimes forget what it means to be a student and what they are going through. We have to check in and see what they are experiencing and evaluate our own skills as well. I am a believer of being a life long learner and always look for opportunities where I can grow my skill set. That’s why I am traveling this weekend to Clemson, to learn from the best social media and sports team in athletics. I am super excited to not only see Jonathan and Jeff in person, but learn about what they are doing prepare their students for the field (and the list of where their former interns are now is impressive!)
Let them know sometimes their dream job changes. That happens all the time with students. However, you want to make sure to give them options and an overview of what the field offers to them. I was in a webinar last month, and I remember hearing from other professors on how they only focus on one industry or one area of the field for their classes. This also influenced which clients they worked with as well. This is one way to approach it, but it is also important to give students an idea – hey, this is just one area you can go into, but here’s another and what about this specialization over here! The more exposure you can give them, the more options they will have to choose from. If they are only exposed to one type of client or industry, that’s all they are going to know going forward.
Have assignments that will test them AND be applicable for the job. This is why I screen my assignments and syllabus among my professional contacts even before I assign them. I want to make sure if they saw a student with their portfolio with these items, they would take note of these. These will of course depend on the course and the overall learning objectives you have for the program, but you at least want to offer a range of assignments to prepare them for the job.
Start early with being a networker for students. That’s one of the reasons why I love using Twitter for my class. I tell my students FB is the place where you know someone (friends and family), but Twitter is where you can meet people you WANT to meet and get to know professionally. Most of my students are juniors and seniors, but I ask them where do they see themselves after graduation and in what industry. I try to see in my network who could be potentially a great person for them to chat with. I share relevant hashtags they need to follow to be engaged within that community both at a local and national level (sometimes even internationally). You need to walk them through the process and show them how it is done. It may be intimidating for them to reach out to a professional, so again, like the point above, you want to show them the way. Think of it as being a coach to them – help them with the early stages and once they feel confident, let them go on their way.
Prepare students to be “too good.” I actually had one of my former #Freberg16 students tell me this semester. He was applying for various internships in social media and he was able to show them what he had done in class and what certifications he has done. He has gotten some amazing internship opportunities, but he said one of the things he was told was the fact he was “too good.” This was a first I heard of this but then again, my advice was – that’s a good thing. You want to continue driving yourself to be the best you can be so the right position, brand, and professional opportunity comes your way, which in this student’s case, happened.
Realize you are not alone. One of my favorite movies growing up was “My Blue Heaven” with Steve Martin and Rick Moranis (if you haven’t seen it, it is great and was filmed in my hometown). But there is one line there where one of the characters tells Steve Martin he’s really not alone. And the same can be said in teaching social media.
As professors, we have to learn from each other and come together and talk about these challenges, opportunities, and ideas. We are ALL part of the same team and want the best for our students. So, that was one reason why I wanted to create this particular FB group for social media professors. I have invited both professors who teach social media AND professionals who practice social media. This way, we are all in this together with the goal in helping our students.
Hope you all are having a great day!
Best Wishes,
