Eastern offices have made efforts to adapt to a social media-integrated campus in order to reach students and connect them with the community.

Rita Pearson, the senior assistant director and transfer coordinator for admissions, said the Office of Transfer Relations has increased its efforts on Facebook.

“We’ve been giving students updates through our page by liking other pages and having students like our page so we can connect them,” she said.

She said the office does not use Twitter to reach out to students because she heard it was not as popular as it used to be so the Office of Transfer Relations has not pursued it.

Pearson said the office uses electronic media to coordinate with students and their families during the transfer process at Eastern.

“We use email as a primary way to converse with students, and we also do electronic evaluations,” Pearson said.

In this process, students will send the office their transcripts, and the staff of the office will evaluate them and send them back to the student.

One of the new efforts the Office of Transfer Relations has been doing is setting up appointments via Skype to communicate with students.

“Though Skype is a very useful tool, we can also do advising over the phone or by email,” she said. “We just started the Skype advising this year so we’re still experimenting with it.”

Pearson said technology and resources such as Skype have helped the office be more detailed in their evaluation process of future students.

“We can now help them in a more detailed way without the student being right in front of us,” she said.

New Student Programs also uses technology and media to reach out to new students at Eastern.

Tyler Micek, a graduate assistant and program coordinator for New Student Programs, said New Student Programs does not necessarily go after potential students on social media, but they focus more on current students.

“We are focused on the students that are already enrolled at the university, and we have Facebook groups that people can join either during or after their debut here at Eastern,” he said.

Micek said New Student Programs uploads pictures onto its Facebook page that allows students to tag themselves and connect with other students in the photos.

New Student Programs has also started using Twitter to connect with students.

“It’s been really useful for promoting some of our events,” he said.

The office also uses Twitter and Facebook in reaching out to students who are potential staff members.

Lori Henderson, the publicity and promotions specialist for the Graduate School, said she has not found Facebook to be successful in recruiting graduate students.

She said the success of Facebook has mainly been because of current graduate students and alumni.

“We try to keep our page populated of current student success and alumni success,” she said.

Henderson said the Graduate School itself is not using Twitter, but the Graduation Student Advisory Council does.

“What we’ve heard from our colleagues and other institutions is that they’re not finding (Facebook and Twitter) to be useful in the recruiting process,” she said. “It seems it’s more useful for current students and alumni.”

Robyn Dexter can be reached at 581-2812 or redexter@eiu.edu.