Social Media's Influence on Policy Issues
Early childhood professionals enacting positive social change benefit from the digital age, especially when leveraging social media. I would use two types of social media to communicate my policy issue. First I would include a micro-blog, such as Twitter. Twitter can be used to initiate campaigns and gain public support through brief messages. Second, I would choose to leverage Facebook by creating a page dedicated to early childhood mental health. Connecting with the general public, professionals in the medical field, and politicians would be beneficial for the policy issue. From here, private groups could be created to collaborate on specifics of the policy issue.
Benefits & Challenges of Social Media
One benefit of social media is the connection between users of social media. Social media has made it easier to introduce social issues, exchange opinions, and share news in real time to a wide audience (Hong, June, & Sung-Min, 2011). A challenge is ensuring my policy issue stands out and isn't lost in translation among the millions of content submissions in the social media scene. This is going to require networking and collaboration in order to be successful.
Johanna,
ReplyDeleteYou brought up an interesting topic in your challenge to the use of social media in communicating your policy issue. You stated that a challenge would be in assuring that the policy stands out, not getting lost in the content. With the use of these mediums, especially with Twitter, it would be possible for the information to get lost. That is something I had not considered before and makes me think that if I used Twitter I would need assistance or networking with others to stay on top of the media flow. Lost information could be detrimental to the policy issue. Thanks for bringing up this challenge.
Darla
Johanna,
ReplyDeleteI agree with your point that one must be careful that our challenge does not get lost in content. I belong to several professional and personal groups on Facebook. When I first join a group, I actively pay particular attention to the group. After a while, my participation lessens. How will you keep followers' participation as you champion your cause?
Melissa,
DeletePosts need to be thoughtful, provoking, and not posted too often in order to catch the reader's attention. Additionally, holding trivia and contests entices readers to participate in the group life of the page.
Johanna
Johanna,
ReplyDeleteYou made a point that you can dedicate a page to a policy or topic using Facebook. This is new to me. I do not have a Facebook account or even used it. My children have accounts and keep up with them but it is all personal. Is there a more professional side of Facebook or would LinkedIn be a better choice for professional policy issues?
Sharon Lloyd
Sharon,
DeleteI do believe there is a professional side to Facebook. However, when creating a page, you need to share it and ask others to join the group. This requires networking and collaboration. I am on LinkedIn, but I am not as experienced with it as Facebook. It is my personal opinion that you wouldn't reach as many people through it.
Johanna
Hi Johanna,
ReplyDeleteYou provide a good example of how usage brings familiarity which makes ease of usage more inviting. I do agree, however, that when sites are overloaded with too much "stuff" there tends to be less attention and the impact gets watered down.
Johanna, you make a good point about making sure your policy issue stands out. Because these are such vast media outlets that is certainly a possibility. With Twitter's 140 character limit, you would want to make good use of your powerful statement, possibly use a hyperlink to more information. Also, if you tag it as an #ece it would be included in similar other posts by these types of organizations.
ReplyDelete