How Facebook reflects your professionalism, or maybe the lack of it

Glori Hinck, a 2010 graduate of Boise State’s M.E.T. program and an associate professor of chiropractic education at Northwestern Health Sciences University in Bloomington, Minnesota, has been analyzing Facebook sites maintained by chiropractic students and has a curious tale to tell.

And it is a tale that EdTech students should think about, as well.

Her research shows that almost half (42%) of the 308 Facebook sites she visited featured unprofessional behavior. Using definitions of professionalism gleaned from peer-reviewed journals, Hinck says 34% of these Facebook sites allowed unrestricted public access to pictures featuring alcohol consumption and 26% provided access to photos exhibiting overt sexuality.
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She asked an important question in her recent presentation to the Association of Chiropractic Colleges, “Would you hang these photos on your office wall?” All pre-professional students, including EdTech students who are already practicing professionals, should think about it.

What are the ramifications? What do certain pictures mean to certain people and should you care? In a word, yes. Professionals, whether teachers or chiropractors, are very public people whose employment to some extent depends on community approval.

The problem with potentially offensive material is its subjectivity. For example, photos of a big game hunter with his or her trophy animal are well received by some people but may be offensive to others, as shown by the recent hullabaloo related to posting of big game trophy pictures by Donald Trump’s son.

The hunting picture might be fine in rural Minnesota where hunting is an accepted way of life, but the same photo may not be well received by clients in downtown Minneapolis.

The same is true of party pictures. A professional may drink with friends, but is it professional to make such images public?

That’s the question that professionals of all stripes need to ask themselves.

And here’s another.

What’s on your Facebook site?


NOTE: Next week, we’ll take a closer look at the role of Facebook in hiring practices.

Let's get together in Minneapolis or Boston

I hope to see those of you in the Minneapolis and Boston areas this spring.

I’m going to be in Minneapolis in mid-April for the National Charter School Association conference and in Boston in June for the National Catholic Educators Association conference.

We ALWAYS have a good visit when EdTech students show up at our booth at conferences. I think they do it, you know, to see if I’m real. Most prospective students meet me on the phone and expect me to act like a corporate stuffed shirt, but, as you know, that is the farthest thing from reality. It is always something of a treat to show up to get a good look at me.

When I introduce them to conference goers who may be only vaguely interested in the EdTech program, our students step in and tell about their online experience in the master’s program. They are the best salesmen we have.

Here’s a deal that’s hard to beat.

If you bring a friend interested in the EdTech master’s program to one of these conferences, I’ll buy dinner for the both of you.

April edition of EdTech Faces now available

I was talking with EdTech grad Lynn Longenecker on Skype one evening when a movement behind him caught my eye.

It was a gorgeous little girl in pajamas and she was peering at me through the bars of a stairway banister. I don’t know if she thought I was Uncle Fester from the Addams Family or what, but she kept slinking down the steps to get a better look.

I turned my attention back to Lynn and before you know it, she was right beside him. So I said, “Are you supposed to be in bed?” Maria flashed a mischievous smile and nodded. Then, like a hawk on a rabbit, something flashed across the screen and Maria was gone. An instant later, she was in the background again and still smiling at me as her mother carried her up the stairs to bed.

I had helped Lynn join the EdTech master’s program five or so years ago, but this was my first introduction to his family. I mention all of this because when Lynn Longenecker graduated, he quit his teaching job and moved his family to Bolivia for a three-year stint of peace-building.

You’ve got to read how he used instructional design principles to curb ethic violence in Bolivia. The story is now available in the April edition of EdTech Faces. Find it at http://issuu.com/edtech-boisestate/docs/edtech_faces--edition_2 >.