Professors Increase Engagement With Facebook

Tony Zanders

In June 2007, Inigral’s engineers and Facebook alum Jeff Hammerbacher came together to create a Facebook application called Courses. The app allowed college students to add and share course schedules, connect with classmates and instructors, and create class discussions, all without exposing their personal profiles.

After getting feedback from the higher ed community, our team went back to the drawing board to build a more complete Facebook offering that answered institutional needs outside of the classroom. In January 2008, we began beta testing this new application with Abilene Christian University. It was called Schools: a white-label Facebook application designed to engage interactivity on college campuses. Success at Abilene Christian brought us into several partnerships during 2009, including one with Arizona State University.

Arizona State Professor Lisa Rodrigue McIntyre seized this opportunity to try something new with her students last semester. She joined about 50 other Arizona State instructors to use Schools in an attempt to reach their students within Facebook. Lisa had one goal in mind when using the application, and it was to increase engagement with students through a means of communication that they were comfortable with.

Before Schools, we had to achieve peer-to-peer engagement in the classroom through group work. And even with the heavy amount of group work last semester, this was different, because you don’t always get to see their concerns. Students don’t want to show weakness and doubts to an instructor, and Inigral’s application lends itself to total transparency of seeing what their anxieties were, because you’re taking the back seat in the conversations.

- Lisa Rodrigue McIntyre, ASU Instructor

To start the semester, Lisa’s students had an assignment to test the application. Out of the 35 students in the course, only 2 opted out of the test assignment. Success for her was determined after the assignment was over, when the students continued to use the application.

Student testimonials from Lisa’s course

“I like the fact that I can see what other people are taking the same courses as me; although our classes are not too big, this allows me to go back and put a name with a face.”

“In the name game tab, I liked that it challenged you to recall people’s names based on their pictures. I can see how this helps recognition and networking.”

“I found it very easy to navigate through this application. All of the tools needed to explore are provided on the homepage. I liked the fact that the layout was pretty basic to provide less confusion. I liked how my classmates were all listed on the page. Since some provided their current status, I could see how they were progressing in their courses.”

“I like the hometown map concept. It made me feel good that I was able to see I am not the only one who came a long distance to ASU.”

“As a place to find other ASU students with similar interests and in our courses I like it a lot. The ability to find study groups is nice—particularly in the undergraduate courses that have hundreds of students.”

Learn how Schools can bring Facebook back to your campus by joining us for a free webinar on October 30. Sign up here.