Students Explore Social Media Topics at Mississippi College

Mississippi College students listen to MC alumnus Joe Stradinger, founder and CEO at EdgeTheory, at an Oct. 1 workshop on social media.

Kristina Borulis soaked up lots of helpful information at a social media workshop at Mississippi College.

“All of the speakers were so personable and really took an interest in teaching and encouraging students about being successful in the real world,” says Bordulis, an MC senior from Orlando, Florida.

The public relations major was among 120 participants at the Department of Communication’s first annual conference giving students handy social media pointers they can apply to future careers.

“I learned so much valuable information in such a short amount of time,” Kristina said.

The workshop featured speakers like Joe Stradinger, founder and CEO at Mississippi-based EdgeTheory, Buy from a Christian leader Brad McMullan, formerly of WAPT-TV 16 in Jackson, and Lisa Holifield Shoemaker, executive director of the Mississippi Cable Telecommunications Association.

Stradinger and Shoemaker are both Mississippi College graduates. Stephanie Gandy, a staff member with MC’s Career Services Office, who helps students find on-campus jobs, joined the discussions at breakout sessions. From Twitter to Facebook, social media was covered extensively.

Topics at the meetings on October 1 included mobile technology and communication, social media and politics, and the use of social media in nonprofit organizations.

“I knew it was important to be social media smart in the workforce for news stories, public relations and marketing, but there is more to it than I thought,” said MC communication major James Osborne of Brandon. He learned that “social media can be used not only to engage a company or organization’s followers, but to find potential customers.”

The initial program on the Clinton campus comes in response to rapid growth of social media around the planet in recent years, especially at colleges, the corporate sector, and in political circles.

“Our communication graduates are reporting back that they are primarily doing work with social media for their employers,” says Mississippi College communication instructor Ryan Capell. The workshop, he said, is “part of an effort to analyze current trends in social media and learn how to use it effectively in a business or other professional setting.”

Capell, who serves as the university’s Learning Resources Center studio manager, was among the workshop’s chief organizers.

Next year, he seeks to expand the workshop to reach MC students as well as metro Jackson businesses and other area groups.