Students enrolled in Social Media at Olney do a side-by-side comparison of the 2015 school yearbook with one from the 1930s.
“Snapchat”
“Tweet”
“Hashtag”
“Insta”
The curious and pervasive terminology of social media has become entrenched in the modern conversational vernacular, but what do these terms really mean? In a world of “likes,” “comments” and “shares,” what are the overarching implications of each mouse click or screen tap? Why are certain stories, posts and pictures uploaded to certain platforms at certain times? Students in the Social Media at Olney Endeavor have spent the first few weeks of the school year exploring these questions.
“These are tech-savvy kids who use social media, for the most part, numerous times each day,” said Aaron Schultz, who facilitates the 8-week Endeavor. “What we are aiming to do is break this whole thing open and look at social media’s versatility beyond the typical daily interactions most people experience. We want to go ‘behind the scenes’ and deconstruct the process that precedes a social media post ‘going live.'”
For students, that exploration begins with the school’s own social media platforms. “We can spend an entire term focusing on how corporations and NPOs and celebrities are leveraging Twitter and Facebook, but the real connection occurs when we can identify terminology and techniques and apply them to our own school accounts,” said Schultz. While the Endeavor is structured to cover topics, themes and concepts such as emotional and social health, self-awareness, consumerism and the information age, every discussion thus far has referred back to one central term: audience.
“We have a lot of audience from alumni,” said Abraham Song, a junior from China.
Juniors Abraham Song and E.J. Reed showcase an early photo of the Main while sophomore Lichen Yang explores miscellaneous items in the Olney Friends School archives room.
While the school has accounts on Twitter and Instagram and has its own YouTube channel, the most popular platform, by far, is Facebook. On Facebook, alumni make up the largest segment of the school’s audience (which students in the Endeavor have been defining as “the number of people who see any given social media post”). Posts are also regularly seen by current students, faculty members, friends of the school and area residents, among others. For most, though, there exists at least some connection with Olney.
Because of those connections, students took the opportunity to explore the school’s archive room on Monday, September 14th to look for items that might be of interest to Olney’s social media audience. What they found during the 45-minute exploration, however, brought their classroom discussions full circle. A cache of photos, essays, letters, recipes, memorabilia and keepsakes highlighted how much has changed throughout the school’s history, but also how many traditions have persevered.
Abraham Song felt that a series of handwritten letters from the early 1900s would be especially popular among the school’s audience. “I liked the old letters, because their handwriting is so beautiful. You know, people don’t have handwriting like that today.” When asked why, Song felt that technology has played a major role in not only affecting the aesthetics of the written word, but also its prevalence. “We don’t need the letters anymore. We’ve got e-mail, we’ve got texting, we’ve got phone calls. We don’t need to write a letter.”
Lichen Yang, a sophomore, had a different idea.”Well, basically, the files, the pictures, everything about the school’s history, it’s very interesting. It’s kind of a different feeling. This school was created so long ago,” said Yang, when asked what he thought people would enjoy seeing. He had an affinity for one item in particular, however — a wooden bat named the “F.B.S. Boomer.” Yang, who was somewhat unfamiliar with American baseball, wondered how students at Friends Boarding School (the former name of Olney Friends School) used the item, and thought posting a picture on Facebook may start a discussion among alumni about its use and history.
Sophomore Lichen Yang displays his favorite item from the Olney archives, the F.B.S. Boomer.
Sophomore Joe Velick, who helped reorganize the room earlier this year, equipped students with gloves and encouraged them to handle all items — some of which are over 150 years old — with the utmost care. He was excited to have pictures shared of documents, diplomas and educational materials from the 1800s. Velick also enjoyed finding the “Graddy Essays” of Head of School Ken Hinshaw and Farm Manager Don Guindon, both members of the Class of 1974. One item he felt would connect with almost anyone affiliated with the school, though, was a receipt from the fire of 1910. The bill, which tallies the cost of an axe, a hose, two lanterns and five hours of work from nineteen local firemen is now displayed in a case in the school’s conference room.
When asked why he felt people would want to see antique pictures of the school or photos of an old baseball bat on social media, Song felt that the archives were the best way for alumni, current and even future students to embrace the school’s rich history. “This is attractive. This school goes back to 1837. I wonder how the people, how they lived their lives like a hundred years ago. Well, we don’t have that choice. I mean, this is not a problem we can talk about because we cannot go back to the 1870s. But we have pictures and letters.”
To see over a dozen more photos from Social Media at Olney’s exploration of the archives, view our gallery by clicking here.
