<p>Interesting article in the Buffalo News takes a look at how colleges try to get a competitive edge by enlisting student bloggers to chronicle their lives online. The colleges featured include Dickinson College in PA, Colgate University, Ohio Dominican University, as well as MIT.</p>
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Surveys by Noel-Levitz have found that student blogs were among the top things prospective students wanted from college Web sites.</p>
<p>The MIT bloggers average 15,000 to 20,000 hits per day from more than 5,000 unique visitors. Admitted students rank the blogs among the top three factors influencing their decision to attend MIT.
<p>Michigan did this, too. I loved it, because I was never an undergrad here. It was really neat for me to read the perspectives of multiple undergraduates. I mean, they are out there for prospective students, but I got a lot out of them, too!</p>
<p>I became aware of the potential of student blogs in a big way two years ago when my daughter was deciding where to go. She followed various livejournal and MySpace communities for several months, and got an incredibly nuanced sense of the experiences similar students had at comparable schools, and the character of each school. She showed me some of what she was looking at; the differences were substantial. It was the #1 factor in her final decision where to go.</p>
<p>These weren't official blogs, like MIT and Hopkins have; these were just ongoing community bulletin boards. At some level, they were far more effective than the Potemkin blogs on the admissions websites (although they were a little harder to find, and not all schools had vibrant web communities). They had the unmistakable tang of the Real Thing -- including name-calling and petty disputes.</p>
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At some level, they were far more effective than the Potemkin blogs on the admissions websites (although they were a little harder to find, and not all schools had vibrant web communities). They had the unmistakable tang of the Real Thing -- including name-calling and petty disputes.
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<p>I completely agree about the effectiveness of "sponsored" blogs. These efforts are not very different from the emails and calls that originate from a campus: they might be more effective than the glossy and shallow brochures but are far from being substitutes for real information. It is obvious that the contents are sanitized and that the party line has to be pushed at all times ... something that is obvious on all of the admissions' boards.</p>
<p>As far as I am concerned, I think that the idea has lost its novelty and 100% of its luster. </p>
<p>Getting your news from the Pravda or the America@work does have its limitations, one being a different twist on objectivity.</p>
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and that the party line has to be pushed at all times
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<p>I agree that the fact that they are blogs written for admissions is a limitation. All of them are going to be writing for a certain audience who wants to know "what's it like there" and they're obviously not going to write about what sucks. </p>
<p>However, I thought the blogs I was reading revealed a certain level of honesty, especially the ones not written by freshmen. For example, one of the kids wrote a lot more about partying than I expected. He also talks about kicking down his door when he was locked out, the fact that his roommate was hit by a car on a city street, how a professor protests against academia by giving everyone "A's," how another professor made him redo 12 hours worth of labs when he lost his data. It may be a sanitized version of some of it, but it still wasn't the kind of "official version" of U-M life I think the admissions office might want to push. Another student wrote about how stupid he thinks his accounting quizzes are, how they're pointless busywork, and how it sucks to be a California resident who has to travel so far to get to school.</p>
<p>I'm sure their personal blogs not written for admissions consumption would read differently, but all in all I thought there was more reality in those entries than I was expecting. The "marketing" voice seemed to be shed after a few entries.</p>
<p>xiggi, I personally know several of the MIT bloggers, and I know for a fact that their content is NOT dictated and NOT sanitized and NOT censored. This is not to say the authors may not SELF-censor (and I had several conversations last year with one who was agonizing over whether to discuss something in a blog or not), but the content the MIT bloggers post is 100% up to them.</p>
<p>Mootmom, unfortunately, I am not in the inner circle who does share the secrets of the Gods at MIT. I can only comment on what I see. Inasmuch as I highly doubt that the contents on the MIT blogs are entirely uncensored, it does not really make any difference. Be it self-censored or via soft control, the fact remains that the posts are NOT independent. </p>
<p>Anyone remotely familiar with the open and uncensored "typical" platforms where students share opinions about their school should be able to see the difference.</p>
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Inasmuch as I highly doubt that the contents on the MIT blogs are entirely uncensored...
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They are entirely and completely uncensored. The bloggers are not told what to write or what not to write, and nobody has ever tried to dictate content either before or after it's on the site.</p>
<p>I mean, the bloggers as a group like MIT, and several of us are on CC representing MIT of our own free will (actually in most of our cases, including mine, CC came first and was the reason we were offered blogger jobs). I don't think I've seen a difference between what pebbles, LauraN, jessiehl, and I write on CC and what we write on the blogs.</p>
<p>I think blogs are a great idea, Colgate and Hamilton have them, and they really let me see what life there was like. I mentioned three of the Hamilton bloggers in my "why Hamilton?" essay, as well :)</p>
<p>I love the idea of blogging. The entries may portray the school in a very positive light, but what college website doesn't? It's a lot more refreshing to read the thoughts of an undergraduate than the same this-is-why-you-should-apply-here material sent out every year by colleges.</p>
<p>Is this going to be the "next big thing" in recruiting trends? </p>
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Logging in to our virtual reality campus is the next best thing to seeing Case in person. Get a feel for the 550 park-like acres that comprise the Case campus, and explore local landmarks, University Circle and the greater Cleveland area as well.
<p>Santa Clara enters virtual world in 'Second Life' - Simulation game replicates campus buildings online</p>
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Over 100 universities already have campuses in this virtual world of five million residents, according to Michael Ballen, an instructional technology resource specialist at Santa Clara, who is heading the project and sees the future of the communications technology in environments like "Second Life." "This is going to supersede the Internet," ...
<p>I agree about the self censorship part. I would say things on CC about Wellesley that I would not say if admissions asked me to write a blog. </p>
<p>Like how sketchtastic my neighbors were this year (illegal drugs), but it didn't bother me too much because I didn't return to my dorm until after 1am when the pair were just brushing their teeth. </p>
<p>But if someone asked about drugs at Wellesley, I would tell them about my neighbors, and how most people I talked to thought they were sketchy too.</p>
<p>If someone asked about campus security, I might mention I feel safe walking around campus after midnight.</p>
<p>I'm not I would ever write a blog titled "Drugs at Wellesley" or "Where Wendy Mouse is after midnight (hint: not Tower Court).</p>
<p>...and then again maybe not the "next big thing" at all or at least not yet: Chronicle of Higher Ed piece in "The Wired Campus" tell us that college admissions folks are finding out to their dismay that "build it and they will come" is just not working out as hoped in "Second Life". The question now is if these pricey virtual campuses are attracting enough visitors to make the investments worth it. For instance, Case Western Reserve University's virtual campus, designed to give tours to prospective students, has only attracted 40 people according to college officials. </p>