Social Media Adoption Soars as Higher Ed Experiments and Reevaluates Its Use of New Communications Tools

While it is no surprise that virtually every US college and university is using at least one form of social media to recruit prospective students, it is surprising to see these institutions move away from MySpace and message boards to focus on Facebook, Twitter, and blogging. This new report is the outcome of a statistically valid study of the nation’s four-year accredited colleges and universities. This is the fourth year that University of Massachusetts has tracked social media adoption by the higher-education sector. The findings are based on 456 interviews conducted during the 2010-2011 academic year.

This report was originally distributed by the Society for New Communications Research, which officially merged with The Conference Board in January 2016.