100+ students each semester and several hundred Facebook followers = great promotion potential.

Image source: Pixabay

I recently found this contest by @kpine: Ok, contest number 2, better late than never, and it made me take pause to consider what I do to help promote Steemit to the rest of the planet.

On one hand, I don’t do as much as I should considering I’ve invested a significant amount of time on Steemit, and money on Steem. I believe there is tremendous potential here, not only as a way to make a buck writing and commenting, but also as an entry to blockchain, and a healthy way to engage with all the possibilities that blockchain presents.

My own promotion of Steemit comes down to two specific things. First, I post links to my posts on Facebook. Second, I encourage all of my college students to join.

Facebook. Yes, like many of you, I struggle with Facebook. It’s already an outdated app in many ways, but it is also where I have access to several hundred people, and I have definitely created a small, local following of my blog within that community. For example, a few days ago I bumped into a friend as we were both waiting for the train. He has kids at my kids’ school, and we both volunteer with the PTA. He said, “Hey Craig, how’s it going? I haven’t finished your latest installment on the ‘Why College’ series but I really like it so far.” Not only did this make me happy from a promoting Steemit perspective, but it also led to a great conversation that lasted the entire train ride. I’ve also been emailing with a parent of one of the girls I coach on the high school track team. Her daughter is stressing out over where to go to college next year, and she and her husband are appreciating my posts as good perspective on their decision-making process. This is why I started the series, so it warms my heart to help anyone with my 30 years of higher ed experience, and with each conversation I know I’ve introduced Steemit to one more family.

And speaking of higher ed, the more significant form of promotion I do, at least in terms of numbers, is in my college teaching. I am a communication professor at a large community college. One of the single most important things I believe I can help my students to understand and take more seriously is their own ability to promote themselves professionally. Skills such as writing, and making logical, persuasive arguments, are hugely important. I see Steemit as an awesome way to kill multiple birds with one post :).

I haven’t yet figured out how to get the students up and running en masse, but I know there are other teachers out there working on this, and I hope to build more of a community here around that. For example, I just commented on a post by @alvinauh titled, The Struggles My Students Face Starting Off On Steemit. He brings up some great ideas for helping students get started, like providing them with a formatted template that allows them to learn markdown while getting early posts up quickly. He also discusses the idea that making money on the side is a good idea for any struggling student, but that students also tend to already be overworked, so striking the right balance with encouraging Steemit is important.

I am hoping to eventually have a clearly defined context for my students to practice their self-promotion on Steemit. I envision alumni continuing to interact with each wave of new students. I also imagine students “submitting” some assignments via Steemit: post the assignment to Steemit, then drop the url in the assignment page in our online course portal. Then perhaps I can encourage/incentivize more engaged peer reviews of work on Steemit.

Damn, just writing that gets me really psyched to make this happen. There is simply no doubt in my mind that blockchain will completely turn education on its head.

In a few weeks I will be launching a new version of an online course I’ve taught in the past. It is our basic intro to communication course, and I’ve edited it to be an online communication course about online communication! I will have my students use Discord for discussions and collaboration in place of our course software discussion board, and I will require the students to complete various projects on different apps and online communties. If I can figure out how to get 25 people set up on Steemit quickly I will definitely use it in the course. Any help or suggestions on that end are appreciated.

So, that’s my post on how I promote Steemit, but obviously it’s about much more than that. If anyone out theres is a student, teacher, or other role and be wants to connect, please comment.

Check out my series by reading my most recent installment: What is College Actually For? 2nd Post in the Series: Why College; An Honest Insider's Guide for Students and Parents.

About Me

My name is Craig and I have been teaching college courses for almost 30 years. My "career" began when I was still an undergrad and my professor would call me (on my land line) to tell me she was too sick to attend class and then ask me to teach that day's session. She knew I was planning to attend graduate school on an assistantship that would involve teaching my own classes, but it occurred to me much later that I was probably saving her from getting fired. (She had a chronic health issue that the college was not willing to accommodate, but it did end up taking her life at a relatively young age.) I did go to graduate school, and I have been teaching more formally ever since. For 17 years I taught part-time at various colleges around the US, while also working my way up from entry level positions to senior management in both retail and hospitality. I have taught at schools from La Salle University in Philadelphia, to Seattle Central Community College, to Chaminade University in Honolulu, and I have held jobs from Christmas tree salesman to general manager of a large retail mercantile, and busboy at a second rate diner to beverage manager at one of the largest hotels in the world. My relatively unique work experiences has provided some really good insight into what employers look for in new college graduates, and has helped me craft classes that are as relevant as I can imagine. I also believe I am an expert on the specific qualities students should hone while going to college to be as successful as possible beyond. Let's just say that while I was teaching part time all those years, I also hired, and fired, a lot of employees. More recently, I made the transition to full-time teaching ten years ago, and am currently a tenured Assistant Professor at Community College of Philadelphia, the second largest higher education institution in Pennsylvania, where I am a member of what I've been told is the largest English department in the United States. I was the lead writer of our current Communication Studies curriculum, have served as its Chair, and enjoy teaching communication courses to our 350 or so majors.