How am I Perceived Online?
Previous to this assignment I have googled myself because I was curious to discover how current or future employers would see me through a digital lens. Although I'm not a consistent social media poster, I have had a facebook since I was in high school in addition to instagram, snapchat, and twitter. I didn't completely understand the idea of a digital tattoo until I was in college and social media was becoming much more popular. In a college education class we spent time discussing the importance of being private on social media in order to not be seen by our students and separate our personal and professional life. However, I have now realized through this graduate class that having an online presence is not a negative thing, but instead provides many opportunities, especially as an educator. Although I'm still cautious and very aware when I post on social media, I would like to increase my online presence positively in order to make a difference in education.
What Strangers can find out about Me:
- My nickname
- Where I went to high school and college
- High school sports pictures
- Sports I have played
- Youtube posts (specifically from this graduate class)
- The semesters I made the Honor Roll/Dean's List
- Flashcards I have made on Quizlet
- My address from college and growing up (not my current address)
- View my Twitter account
- A list of my relatives
- My career
Concerned, Content, Confused???
I felt each of these emotions when I was searching for myself through a variety of websites. I found the most information about myself through a google search and typing in the different names and usernames I most commonly use: Katie Marie, Katie Pollastrini, Katherine Pollastrini and Kpollastrini. Through these searches I found mostly information regarding my performance in high school and college in sports and academic articles and postings. When using other websites such as Nuwber, Pipl, Radarius, Truthfinder, and InstantCheckMate I found information regarding previous living locations and family members. I was concerned because I do not believe I found enough educational information about myself that future employers might be interested in. I'm very grateful for this graduate class because not only have a gained many technological tools I'm excited to implement into my classroom, but I have begun to create more of a digital presence related to my career. I plan to continue to blog and add to my website in order to display my knowledge and learning experiences. On the other hand, I was content about the fact that not as much personal information was accessible through these online searches. I was surprised and confused about this fact, but there are some factors that may have contributed to this privacy. First, I have rented an apartment for the past two years so that information is not public knowledge. Also, I thought there would be more pictures of myself online, but the lack of pictures might be because my social media accounts are private. Conducting a self-search was very eye-opening and I'm exciting to use the results in a positive manner.
Who else should be taught about Digit Tattoos?
I believe that all individuals should complete a search of themselves in order to be aware of how their image is impacted in the virtual world. This process should start at a young age since as mentioned in the screencast, 81% of two-year-olds have a digital footprint. I think it should be introduced by a computer teacher by either 2nd or 3rd grade. Already at this age students are joining a variety of websites and social media accounts and they should be aware of how their footprint is forming. However, I believe that this skill should be taught throughout a student's educational journey because the purpose of an online presence will change throughout their life. For instance, when I was in high school I was concerned about displaying myself as a responsible and intellectual individual for the college admissions process. Now I'm focusing on creating a more professional presence and documenting my educational experiences.
It sounds as if you did a thorough search which as you stated is something all of us should do a few times each year. I like that you are still willing to use social media and a digital presence as an advantage. We can have strong professional AND personal digital lives!
ReplyDeleteI also had that same concern: not enough educational information future employers would be able to look at! I am grateful that this class has opened up different outlets for us to use to expand our digital presence and gear it to a more profession view or ourselves including out blogs and websites. We need to conduct another data mine in the future to see what has changed through all the different things we have learned.
ReplyDeleteKatie, you made a good point. Prior to this class, I really only thought of having an online presence as being a possible negative thing to current and future employers. But this class has allowed us to have the potential to create an online presence that could benefit our careers and be extremely useful in our classrooms.
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