On this episode of Katie and Alli’s blogging adventures, we dove into our personal Instagrams to get a feel about the Seton Hall community. Along the way, we ran into some interesting personalities that shared their insight on what it means to belong to this tight-knit campus. We started by designing our Instagram stories to fit the Seton Hall theme, using blue, white, and pictures of our university. We introduced our project to our followers. This way, they knew our scavenger hunt was for a class project and were more willing to participate! We got well over 150 responses!
After learning about crowdsourcing, we found out that people love sharing their input. According to entrepreneur.com, “it’s all about participation and the ability to co-create via an increasingly connected world.” It helps them feel connected to something bigger than themselves, and the data is used to generate interesting responses to our questions. Social media has excellent platforms for crowdsourcing. Prescient Digital says, “Social media is becoming an essential component to crowdsourcing as it allows organizations to reach a wider audience faster, cheaper, and more efficiently than ever before.” This statement is very accurate- we had a huge audience of around 4,700 people and did not have to spend a penny to receive responses.
We had eight questions total. My two favorite questions were to see which places people like to eat at and fun facts about SHU- there was a lot I did not know about! A fan-favorite food place was the Trat, along with Pandang and Tito’s Burritos and Wings, some South Orange Village Classics. Many celebrities live around this area, including Lauryn Hill, Wyclef Jean, SZA, and Raymond Holt. Tony Soprano went here for a semester, and Jimmy Fallen would have, but he did not get accepted!
Another critical question that was asked was where people receive their news. Since we are journalists, it is intriguing to hear which sources students our age use. An overwhelming majority said Twitter- with Instagram and Snapchat coming in second place. Some said traditional news sites like MSNBC and the Washington Post. I get my news from Twitter the most and even occasionally turn on the TV to see the local news channel to stay updated.
A topic that piqued my curiosity was why people fell in love with SHU. Under the obvious answer of our successful basketball team, many stated they feel there are many opportunities to be the best version of themselves here, and they love the family-like feel of the campus.
The other four topics we used for this project were students’ favorite spots on and off-campus and found that many students have the same favorite locations all around South Orange. Many said the campus green and the balcony on the fourth floor of Jubilee Hall. Another topic that saw many responses was how students show their school spirit. Many students shared their favorite ways of displaying their school pride and favorite school events, like basketball games!
When students were asked about Seton Hall’s cutting-edge research and learning, many students responded with incredible opportunities and resources open to students to assist with their education. Many students also shared which organizations they are a part of and why they enjoy them; one common type of organization mentioned was greek life and academic clubs. Students were excited to answer all of these questions and show their Seton Hall pride!
Our top five favorite Tweets consisted of Madelyn’s response about boba (I actually ended up trying this place after I saw the tweet- it was pretty good!), Catherine’s Tweet about the tunnels between the dorms, and Heaven’s tweet about Pirate TV and WSOU! The last two were another one of Heaven’s tweets about the balcony on the fourth floor of Jubilee Hall and Julia’s tweet about the DU Blue club and the activities that they participate in.
Here is a response to one of our classmate’s posts asking about why we love Seton Hall!
The highlights for us were seeing so many people willing to help out for our project and wanting to get involved by sharing their answers. An issue we had was that some people liked certain questions over others, but regardless we still had a ton of answers by the end of the day. This was a fun assignment with interesting data!
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